It were much to be desired that this first account of the political intercourse between Britain and Hindoostan could have been given at full length, more especially as that extensive, rich, populous, and fertile country is now almost entirely reduced under the dominion of the British crown; and as Sir Thomas Roe, even in the garbled state in which we are forced to present his observations, clearly shews the inherent vices of the Mogul government, through which it so rapidly fell into anarchy, and was torn in pieces by its own cumbrous and ill-managed strength.  Perhaps the archives of the East India Company are still able to supply this deficiency in the history of its original establishment; and it were surely worthy of the more than princely grandeur of that great commercial company, to patronise the publication of a collection of the voyages, travels, negotiations, and events which have conduced to raise it to a degree of splendour unexampled in the history of the world.  The importance of this first embassy from Great Britain to the Great Mogul, and the vast consequences, both commercial and political, which have since arisen from that early intercourse, have induced us to give the following additional information respecting the mission of Sir Thomas Roe, from the Annals of the East India Company, vol.  I. p. 174, et sequ., which will in some measure supply the defects in this journal, as published by Purchas and Churchill.—­E.

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“The information which the Court [of Committees or Directors of the East India Company] had received, in the preceding season, [1613-14] induced them to apply to the king to grant his royal authority that an ambassador should proceed in his name to the Great Mogul.  King James, in compliance with the wishes of the Company, on the 14th January, 1614-15, granted his commission to the celebrated Sir Thomas Roe, “to be ambassador to the Great Mogul, or king of India,” the company agreeing to defray the expence, in consideration, that, under their exclusive privileges, they were to acquire such benefits as might result from this mission.

“Sir Thomas Roe sailed from England in March 1615, on board the Lion, Captain Newport, and arrived at Surat, whence he proceeded to the Mogul’s court at Agimere, which he reached in December, 1615; and on the 10th January, 1616, was presented to the Mogul as ambassador from the king of England, when he delivered the king’s letter and presents.  Of these, an English coach was the chief article, and with it the Mogul was pleased to express his satisfaction, and to give the ambassador a gracious reception.  From the company’s agents having already been too profuse in their presents to the ministers and favourites, Sir Thomas found that the articles which he carried out as presents were not so highly estimated as he expected; he therefore informed the court that nothing less than valuable jewels would be deemed worthy of acceptance; and at the same time he advised that ‘four or five cases of red wine’ should be sent as presents to the king and prince, as, in his own words, ’never were men more enamoured of that drinke as these two, and which they would more highly esteem than all the jewels in Chepeside.’