I answer two of your Grace's letters in this: one dated July, six hundred and one, and the other July, six hundred and two. In both of them your Grace relates to me the shipwreck that befell you and how you saved yourself by swimming. Long before I saw your Grace's letters, I had learned of your mishap, whereat I was very anxious and even quite grieved; because of what was reported here, I imagined that your Grace had a part in it. Consequently, I was singularly overjoyed at the assurance that your Grace still possessed life and health. Having them, one can conquer other things; and without them human treasure has no value. By way of Flandes (whence ships come daily to this island), I learned much, nay, all the event, although not so minutely. For Oliver de Nort, who was the Dutch general, with whom the engagement occurred, arrived safely in Holanda, with eight men--and he made nine--and without money. His purpose when he left the rebellious states of Holanda and Zelanda, with five armed vessels laden with merchandise--which were worth, principal and merchandise, one hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand ducados--was to trade and carry on commerce through the strait (and such were his orders), in whatever parts he should be, with friends or enemies. He was not to attack anyone, but only to defend himself and to incline the Indians to trade and exchange with him. All the vessels having reached the strait together, three of them became separated there because of storms, and must have been wrecked; for up to the present nothing has been heard of them. Having seen himself so abandoned, and that he could not restore his loss by trade, or else because he did not receive a hospitable reception from the inhabitants of Piru, he determined to exceed his orders, and make that voyage one of plundering. Accordingly he stationed himself at the mouth of the river to await ships. The rest that befell, your Grace knows. Oliver de Nort is a native of the city of Roterdam, and he reached it with an anchor of wood. [209] He had no other with which to anchor, nor indeed had he any other left. It is said that this is a very heavy wood of the Indias, and he has placed it at the door of his house, as a mark of distinction. He arrived, as I say, with nine men, all told, very much worn out, and as by a miracle. He has printed a book of his voyage, with engravings of his vessels, and many other details of what happened to him, and the hardships that they endured in the fight and throughout the voyage, both to show his own glory and to incite others to similar deeds.