ers of advice for the Portuguese
ships coming from the East Indies; and that, including those they had
taken, the English had at least 40 ships together, so that nothing could
escape them; therefore, that the Portuguese ships coming from India
durst not put into the islands, but took their course between 40 deg. and
42 deg. of N. latitude, whence they shaped their course for Lisbon, shunning
likewise Cape St Vincent, as otherwise they could not look for safety,
the sea being quite full of English ships. Wherefore, the king advised
that the fleet now at Havannah in the Spanish West Indies, and ready to
sail for Spain, should remain till the next year, because of the great
danger of falling into the hands of the English. This was no small
charge and hindrance to the fleet, as the ships that remain long at the
Havannah consume themselves and in a manner eat up one another, from the
great number of their people, and the great scarcity and dearness of
every thing at that place; wherefore many of the ships adventured rather
to hazard themselves singly for the voyage than to stay there; all of
which fell into the hands of the English, and many of their men were
brought to Tercera: So that we could see nothing else for a whole day
but spoiled men set on shore, some from one ship and some from another,
it being pitiful to see and hear them all, cursing the English and their
own bad fortunes, with those who had been the cause of provoking the
English to war, and complaining of the small remedy and order taken
therein by the officers of the king of Spain.

The 19th of the same month of September, a caravel arrived at Tercera
from Lisbon, bringing one of the kings officers to cause lade the goods
that were saved from the Malacca ship, and for which we had so long
tarried there, and to send them to Lisbon. At the same time Don Alonso
de Bacan sailed from Corunna for the Azores with 40 great ships of war,
to wait for the fleets from the Spanish and Portuguese Indies, which,
along with our Malacca goods when laden, he was to convoy to the Tagus.
But, when he had been some days at sea, always with a contrary wind,
only two of his ships could get to the islands, all the rest being
scattered. When these two ships arrived at Tercera and did not find the
fleet, they immediately returned in search of it. In the mean time the
king changing his mind, sent orders for the commercial ships to remain
in the Indies, and for Don Alonso Bacan to retu