That ended one of the most famous of the expeditions which tried to establish for the Hollanders a new route to the Indies through the Strait of Magellan. But while Van Noort was in the Pacific the route of the cape had proved to be such a great and easy success that further attempts to reach Java and the Moluccas by way of the Strait of Magellan were hereafter given up. The Pacific trading companies were changed into ordinary Indian companies which sent all their ships around the cape. As for Van Noort, who was the first Hollander to sail around the world, he entered the naval service of the republic, and had a chance to practise his very marked ability as a leader of men in more dangerous circumstances. As an Indian trader he would not have been a great success. The old irresponsible buccaneering days of that trade were gone forever. The difficult art of founding a commercial empire by persuasion rather than by force was put into the hands of men who were not only brave, but also tactful. CHAPTER VII THE ATTACK UPON THE WEST COAST OF AMERICA This is the story of another expedition which tried to get possession of the Indian route by way of the Strait of Magellan. It was a sad business. [Illustration] Oliver Van Noort, although he met with many difficulties, managed to bring one ship home and added greatly to the fame of the Dutch navigators. But the second expedition, equipped by two of the richest men of Rotterdam and sent out under the best of auspices, proved to be a total failure. The capital of half a million guilders which had been invested was an absolute loss. Most of the participants in the voyage died. The ships were lost. Perhaps everything had been prepared just a trifle too carefully. Van Noort, with his little ships, knew that he had to depend upon his own energy and resourcefulness; but the captains of the five ships which left Rotterdam on the twenty-seventh of July, 1598, with almost five hundred men were under the impression that half of the work had been done at home by the owners. Perhaps, too, there is such a thing as luck in navigating the high seas. One fleet sails for the Indies and has good weather all the way across the ocean. When the wind blows hard it blows from the right direction. The next squadron which leaves two weeks later meets with storms and suffers from one unfortunate accident after the other; everybody gets sick, and when the sailors look for relief on land they find nothing but a barren desert. And so it goes. It is not for us to complain, but to recite faithfully the sad adventures of the good ships the _Hoop_, the _Liefde_, the _Geloof_, the _Trouwe_, and the _Blyde Boodschap_, all of which tried very hard to accomplish what Van Noort had been allowed to do with much less trouble.