Page:History of India Vol 6.djvu/269

 THE FIRST DUTCH EXPEDITION TO INDIA 211 " to the countries lying on the other side of the Cape of Good Hope," and the journals of the voyage show that Linschoten's sailing directory was used on board. Houtman returned in 1597, having lost two-thirds of his crews and done little in actual trade, but bringing back a treaty with the King of Bantam which opened up the Indian Archipelago to Holland. Linschoten's work was in some sort a revelation. All northern Europe learned that the path lay open to India, and that the Indian system of Portugal was rotten to the core. English and German translations appeared in 1598, two Latin translations in 1599, and a French translation in 1610. The preface to the Eng- lish edition in 1598, by W. P. (generally supposed to be William Phillip), sounded like a trumpet-call to the nation, and gave a direct impulse to the founding of the East India Company. It speaks of the " great prov- inces, puissant cities, and unmeasurable islands ' of the Indies. " I doo not doubt, but yet I doo most heart- ily pray," it adds, " and wish that this poore Trans- lation may worke in our English nation a further desire and increase of honour over all Countreys of the Worlde " by means of " our Wodden Walles." England had, meanwhile, received a similar impulse of her own, and from a native source. In 1591 Ralph Fitch returned to London with a marvellous tale of travel. The first Englishman who dwelt in India was Thomas Stephens, of New College, Oxford, 1579, unless we accept the legend of Sighelmus of Sherbourne's pil- grimage to the tomb of St. Thomas near Madras, in the