“I comitt yoʳ honnoʳ to Gode’s most mercifull protection this 21ᵗʰ of October 1599.
“Yoʳ honnoʳˢ most dewtifull
“Ever to comand,
“Henry Lello.”
Addressed—
“To the right Honᵇˡᵉ Sir Robert Cecill, knight, principal secrʳⁱᵉ to the Queen’s most Exᵗ Magᵗⁱᵉ and Her Highnes’ honorable privie Counseill.”
§ 2.—Of the Dallam Family.
Such was the state of affairs in Constantinople when Master Thomas Dallam, whose diary we here produce, went to present a complicated organ, which he had made, as a gift from Queen Elizabeth to Sultan Mahomed III. His MS. diary was written just after the publication of Richard Hakluyt’s volumes of travels, or else it would in all probability have been included in them. From the foregoing remarks it will easily be seen why so handsome a gift was sent out with so much trouble; the Queen was anxious for the Sultan’s friendship and allegiance against her Catholic enemies. To further the interests of the infantile Levant Company such a present would be exceedingly useful, and, in choosing Dallam as the bearer of this present, Queen Elizabeth evidently selected, as subsequent events showed, the most skilled man in his craft that she could.
Some interesting notes with regard to this present may be gathered from the State Papers, Jan. 1596. For some time there had been a discussion about sending a present to the new Sultan of Turkey. The Levant merchants apparently thought it would imperil their own safety and their factories in Constantinople if Sir E. Barton’s papers were not made out by the Queen, and if the present did not come from her Majesty herself. Hence, out of compliance with their wishes, Sir E. Barton, though the Company’s nominee, was accredited as ambassador from Queen Elizabeth, and the present, which the Levant merchants no doubt paid for, purported to be from the Queen of England to the Sultan.