this persuasion of the good fortune of both my friends I did content myself during several years that I heard naught from them, believing them to be so greatly busied with their gracious designs for their tenants that they lacked the time to write to me, and never suspecting that first of all their letters had miscarried, nor later that evil was befallen them, until I heard it from their own lips. Now about a year after my return to Surat our ambassadors came back from Agra, their business well ended, and I, who conceived myself to have, as you may remember, a crow to pick, as we say, with Mr Spender, did demand of him his reason for denouncing me to the Mogul, and thereby imperilling both my life and my friend’s. But instead of betraying shame or confusion, such as you might expect, at my knowledge of his treason, he turned aside my question with the greatest coolness in the world, saying only that ’twas a person’s bounden duty to use any means in his power to succeed in his designs. And I then leaving him, fearing lest in my rage at his effrontery I should lay violent hands upon him, learned from others of the ambassage that the viscount’s escape was at first kept as a secret by the Moguls, but that when it came to the ears of the ambassadors, Mr Spender gained an audience of the emperor, and all for to tell him that our _cooleys_ returned from Gualleyor had spoke of a second Europe man in my train, whose face they had never seen, and this (said Mr Spender), might well be the escaped prisoner. And the Mogul, hearing this, did take those measures to stop us whereof you know already, and showed himself very favourable towards Mr Spender and the rest of the ambassage. CHAPTER XVI. OF MY DEPARTING FROM EAST INDIA, AND RETURNING TO MY HOME AND DOROTHY. Now after my friend was departed I did spend seven years, more or less, in the service of the Company at Surat, serving them to the best of my ability, and enjoying at the last the dignity of warehouse-keeper, which is a place of some honour and profit. Yet I wan’t, during all this time, tied, so to speak, to my desk in the Factory, for I made three short voyages to the Further East on the Company’s occasions, sailing once to Bengall, and again to Bantam in the island of Java, and once again to the great kingdom of Syam, from all of which journeys I did bring back experience and profit for myself, as well as advantage to my employers.