Page:History of India Vol 7.djvu/119

 STRAINED RELATIONS BETWEEN DUTCH AND ENGLISH 85 will lose both their own." In 1617 came the news that the Dutch had forty or fifty English prisoners in irons at Amboyna, starving on a single cake of bread a day, so that they were reduced to skin and bone. The personal hatred between the agents of the two Companies had now risen to fever-heat. The English despised the phlegmatic " mechanic " ways of the Hol- landers, called them " shoemakers " and. " beer-brew- ers," and flew into a passion at the mere sight of a Dutch document. In 1618 our admiral at Batavia, Sir Thomas Dale, on receiving a communication in Flemish, " scolded, stamped on the ground, swore, cursed," ask- ing " why the letters were not in French, Spanish, Latin, or any other language if we did not like to write English." The Dutch paid back abuse with scorn, pulled down the English flag, befouled it, and tore it to pieces, and hit upon a device for rendering it hateful to the natives. In 1617 they " covered all the seas from the Red Sea to the coast of China, spoiling and robbing all nations in the name and under the colour of the English." In 1618 they publicly insulted our flag by running up the French and English colours, with Prince Maurice's banner displayed above, " triumphing in the doing thereof, because they have overcome both." If we look only to their position in the East, they had cause for exultation. Their second governor-gen- eral, Gerard Reynst (1614-1615), proved a worthy suc- cessor to Pieter Both. A director of the United Com- pany at Amsterdam, Reynst was induced to accept the governor-generalship by liberal allowances, a gold