chap.

xxiv.

1609 .

270 HISTORY OP ENGLAND.

vered to the authorities a letter threatening them with thevengeance of the King of Great Britain, and a copy ofthe Act of Parliament by which the Company had beencreated. The Castilian governor, who probably knewthat William, as Sovereign of England, would not,and, as Sovereign of Scotland, could not, protect thesquatters who had occupied Darien, flung away bothletter and Act of Parliament with a gesture of contempt,called for a guard, and was with difficulty dissuadedfrom throwing the messenger into a dungeon. The Councilof Caledonia, in great indignation, issued letters of markand reprisal against Spanish vessels. What every manof common sense must have foreseen had taken place.The Scottish flag had been but a few months planted on thewalls of New Edinburgh; and already a war, which Scot-land, without the help of England, was utterly unable tosustain, had begun.

By this time it was known in Europe that the mysteriousvoyage of the adventurers from the Forth had ended atDarien. The ambassador of the Catholic King repairedto Kensington, and complained bitterly to William of thisoutrageous violation of the law of nations. Preparationswere made in the Spanish ports for an expedition againstthe intruders; and in no Spanish port -were there morefervent wishes for the success of that expedition than in thecities of London and Bristol. In Scotland, on the otherhand, the exultation was boundless. In the parish churchesall over the kingdom the ministers gave public thanks to