88 THE STRUGGLE FOR THE EASTERN ARCHIPELAGO years (1613-1621) only amounted to 87% per cent. Its permanent achievement, as we shall see, was the strengthening of our position not in the Eastern Archi- pelago, but on the west coast of India under the sanc- tion of the Moghul emperor obtained by Sir Thomas Roe. In 1616, however, its credit stood high, and the expectations from the division of its profits still higher. When, therefore, on the expiration of the four years of the First Joint Stock (1613 - 1616), the London Com- pany resolved to open a new contribution for another four years, it was eagerly subscribed. The spirit of adventure among the English nobility and country gen- try, which had found scope on the Spanish main under Elizabeth, but which the Spanish entanglements of James pent up, sought an outlet in the Second Joint Stock of the East India Company. Fifteen dukes and earls, thirteen countesses and ladies of title, eighty-two knights, judges and privy councillors, headed the list of 954 subscribers. The contributions amounted to £1,629,040, the largest capital that had ever been sub- scribed to any joint stock undertaking in the world. With this sum, to be divided into three voyages, it seemed as if the English Company might at length hold their own against Holland in the Eastern seas. They soon discovered, however, that the capture of the spice trade was not to be achieved by money alone. Both at home and in the East the English organization was inferior to the Dutch. The original weakness in the constitution of the London Company still rendered it unfit for great or permanent efforts. The " sepa-
