Epstein, Mordecai: The English Levant Company: its foundation and its history to 1640 (London: George Routledge & Sons Ltd, 1908)

248 THE EARLY HISTORY OF
to procure an ample safe-conduct, who is
always to remain there at the charge of the
merchants, as agent to impeach the indirect
practices of the said ambassadors, whose
repair 6 thither is to be handled with great
secrecy, and his voyage to be performed rather
by land than by sea, for that otherwise the
Italians that are here will seek underhand that
he may be disgraced at his repair thither, and
therefore it shall be very well done to give
out that in respect of the danger of the traffic
her majesty cannot be induced that her sub-
jects shall trade thither.
To withstand the force, great care is to be
had in good choice of ships, to see that the
same be well furnished both of men and muni-
tions, and also it is to be thought that unless
twenty sail may be set on work they shall not
be of sufficient strength to withstand those
that will seek to impeach them, wherein care
would be had that they pass not the strait
nor coast of France, Spain and Italy in time
of calms, and therefore it would be ordered
that the voyages might be so performed as
that both in their going and return they might
pass in the winter seas.
6 Cf. p. 9 above, note (26).