11. It is very interesting to read how this East India Company first were only permitted just to land in India, and buy and sell a few goods; then, how they obtained permission of the emperor, for there was an emperor of India then, to build some warehouses on the sea coast, and form a little settlement, called a factory; then how they gradually established more factories, and took soldiers to protect them, and gained possession of lands, where they built towns, so that many English families went to live there.
12. Such was the beginning of the British empire in India; and, I dare say, that if the emperor could have foreseen the consequences, he would not have consented to have an English factory built on his coast.
13. In the reign of Elizabeth, Captain Francis Drake made a voyage all round the world, though he was not the first navigator who did so, but he was the first English one.
14. This was a grand exploit, as few people had believed, then, that it was possible, or that the world was really a round body; so you see how these voyages tended to increase knowledge, as well as to improve commerce.
15. When Drake returned, the queen went to dine with him on board his ship, and made him a knight, after which he was called Sir Francis Drake, and he soon became an admiral.
16. In the mean time, several voyages had been made to America, and Sir Walter Raleigh, who was one of the great men of the time, had taken possession of a tract of land for the queen of England, which he called Virginia, and it still bears that name.
17. The Europeans behaved very unjustly about America, for although the natives were savages, they had no right to take away their lands.
18. But they did so in every place they went to; and if they were Spaniards, they set up the Spanish flag, and the commander of the ship said, “I take this country for the king of Spain;” and then would fight with the poor natives, and kill them or drive them away; and, I am sorry to say, the English used to act much in the same manner.
19. The Spaniards who had taken some of the West India Islands, and settled colonies in South America, wanted slaves to work in the gold mines, and their sugar plantations; so an English captain took out some ships to Africa, and carried off a great many negroes, whom he sold in the West Indies, for a large price; and from that time this trade was carried on to a great extent, and was permitted, by government, until the beginning of the present century.