This company was greatly encouraged
during the reigns of James I. and Charles I.
but the Dutch taking several forts on
the coast of Africa from the Portuguese,
committed great depredations on the Eng-
lish, upon which Charles II. the better
to enable his subjects to carry on that
trade, incorporated a body of merchants,
in the year 1662, by the title of The
Company of Royal Adventurers of England
to Africa: but the subscriptions for carry-
ing on this precarious commerce not an-
swering the expectation of the incorporated
merchants, they were soon involved in
debt, and reduced to such difficuties as
rendered them unable to continue their
trade to advantage; wherefore they agreed
for a certain sum, to surrender their
charter to the crown, and to assign all
their estates and effects both at home and
abroad to certain merchants, who intended
to erect a new company, for the more ef-
fectual carrying on a trade to Africa:
these merchants the King incorporated in
the year 1672, and these were the Royal

By virtue of this royal grant, the
company made a considerable progress in
erecting forts, and settling factors: but
their trade being laid open by parliament
in the year 1697, they were rendered un-
able to support their forts, it was there-
fore enacted, that all private traders to
Africa should pay ten per cent. to the
company for that purpose.

This duty did not however answer the
end for which it was granted, and the
company was obliged to apply to parlia-
ment in the year 1730 for relief, when
they obtained a certain sum for that pur-
pose, and it was enacted that all his Ma-
jesty's subjects treading to and from Af-
rica, between Cape Blanco and the Cape
of Good Hope, should hereafter be deemed
a body corporate, and that all the coun-
tries, islands, rivers and places, together
with the forts, should be in the pos-
session of this new company; the mem-
bers of which should not trade to or from
Africa in their joint capacity, have any