Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 2).djvu/176

 in this expedition were four hundred and eighty, all told; the cost of the vessels and their equipment, 45,000l., while their cargoes absorbed 27,000l., the whole of the remaining capital of the Company. They had on board twenty merchants as supercargoes, and were fully provided with arms and ammunition—an exceedingly necessary precaution in those days. The voyage proved successful; relations were formed with the king of Achin, in Sumatra, and a pinnace having been despatched to the Moluccas and a factory established at Bantam, the ships returned to England richly laden.

But the English East India Company soon found in their trade with India a much more formidable rival than either the Spaniards or Portuguese. The people of the Netherlands had long been successful navigators. They had for more than a century carried on a large and profitable commercial intercourse with England, and, at the commencement of the reign of Elizabeth, the value of the trade between the two countries was estimated at 2,400,000l. per annum, then considered so large that the merchants engaged in it were said to "have fallen into the way of insuring their merchandise against losses by sea by a joint contribution." This is the first notice of any mutual assurance association in England, though the principles and practice of insurance were probably known to the ancients, and would seem to be referred to in the compilation popularly known by the name of 'The Rhodian Law.'