hers, this fellow began highly to extol
their king of Holland, pretending that he was the greatest king in
Christendom, and held all the others under his command. He little
thought that we understood what he said; but I was not slack in telling
him, that he need not be so loud, for they had no king in Holland, being
only governed by a count, or rather that they governed him. Nay, if they
had any king at all in whom they could boast, it certainly was the king
of England, who had hitherto been their protector, and without whose aid
they had never been able to brag of their States. This retort made the
Spaniards and Portuguese laugh heartily at the poor Hollander, and made
him shut his mouth.

And now for the news of this country. The emperor is great enemy to the
name of Christians, especially to the Japanese who have embraced the
faith; so that all such as are found are put to death. While at Meaco, I
saw fifty-five martyred at one time, because they would not forsake the
faith, and among them were some children of five or six years old, who
were burnt in the arms of their mothers, calling on Jesus to receive
their souls. Also, in the town of Nangasaki, sixteen others were
martyred for the same cause, of whom five were burnt, and the rest
beheaded and cut in pieces, and their remains put into sacks and cast
into the sea in thirty fathoms deep: Yet the priests got them up again,
and kept their remains secretly as relics. There are many others in
prison, both here and in other places, who look hourly to be ordered for
execution, as very few of them revert to paganism. Last year, about
Christmas, the emperor deposed one of the greatest princes in all Japan,
called _Frushma-tay_, lord of sixty or seventy _mangocas_, and banished
him to a corner in the north of Japan, where he has a very small portion
in comparison with what was taken from him, and he had the choice of
this or of cutting open his own belly. It was thought that this would
have occasioned great troubles in Japan, for all the subjects of
_Frushma-tay_ were up in arms, and meant to hold out to the utmost
extremity, having fortified the city of _Frushma_, and laid in
provisions for a long time. But the _tay_ and his son, being then at the
emperor's court, were commanded to write to their vassals, ordering them
to lay down their arms and submit to the emperor, or otherwise to cut
open their own bellies. Life being sweet, they all submitted, and those
were pardoned