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In those early decades of the 17^th century the spice race was hotting up, especially after the enormous profits the first voyages raked in. just as the financial heavyweights were tempted so were lower echelons of the great and the good. Black sheep and ugly ducklings headed east, either encouraged or by their own free will, to try and salvage some family honour and make a few bob, pioneer FILTH,(Failed In London, Try Hong Kong) or ESL Teachers, these hardy souls didn’t have the luxury of credit cards, mobile phones or the internet to make home seem much closer. Often they were washed up, literally in some cases, on some unknown tropical coast and had nothing but their wits to help them survive. Many lacked even that. 

At that time the ports of Pattani, Ligor, Singgora (Songkhla) on the south east coast of the narrow peninsula and Ayuthya were doubly important. Not only for the domestic markets, China had turned inward and the only trade foreigners could affect was through Macau, which was highly restricted or through some neutral ports like those of the Gulf of Siam, Formosa or The Philippines.  

Floris first touched base in Pattani in June 1612, 18 months after leaving England. En route he had stopped off on the eastern ports of India and Bantam (now Banten) in Java, trading and generally burying colleagues. His notes of his 4 year journey will never win any literary awards but they do offer us a chance to pull back the years and at least a glimpse of a forgotten time. Being Dutch he wrote his diary in his own lingo and the translation passed down to us gives us a second hand view of his own impressions. The spelling is much different to modern day usage and his convoluted sentences can be hard on the reader especially as one soon forgets who the subject of any one sentence was. 

Functional would be a polite way of calling his recollections. He was after all a merchant and deaths are recorded in the same matter of fact manner as arson and disappearing vessel as if he was entering it all in a giant ledger. They arrived on 22^nd June and found a Dutch vessel already berthed, The Bantam, named after the major trading port in Java and while it would be interesting to know what the good captain of this rival ship thought of a fellow cloggy in the pay of the competition, instead we learn only that they advised about Pattani’s manners and ‘custome.’ It is also interesting to note that Floris refers to Pattani as a country separate from Ligor, Siam, Pahang and any others of the peninsula. 

The following day another Dutch vessel arrived from Banjarmasin, a major trading port on the south east coast of Borneo, where they had just 'burned and pillaged the towne,' in revenge for some unspecified wrong. After revictualling they were off to Japan. Floris in the meantime was advised to stick around a bit longer while the officials made ready 'too receyve' the royal letter honourably.  

In due course a couple of Chattis, traders from Southern India, came aboard to translate the letter into Malay, for which they were well rewarded. When finally they were allowed ashore they were no doubt all excited but Floris deadpans their arrival as greeted by the locals 'according to the manner of the countrye,' whatever that means. The good Floris regales us with how the bloody letter, laid in gold, was carried on a bloody elephant with bloody minstrels but neglects to tell us 'the manner of the countrye!' 

Anyway, the court accepted they were interested in free trade and promised to advise their customs and duties. Which of course Floris didn't see fit to commit to paper. We learn about a 'banckett' of fruits with the harbour master, Shah Bandar, and Laksamana, we learn they return home on elephants  and we even learn they spent the night at the house of the longer established Dutch. 

The following morning the Laksamana returned with a Dato Besar, like a chief minister, and they all repaired to the Balai, or audience hall. Interestingly the ranks and venue are words of Malay origin and are significant in that while Pattani may have recognized the King of faraway Siam by paying tribute, it was on much closer cultural and linguistic terms with its closer, Malay, neighbours.                                     

Anyway, Floris and the English pressed for a brick house so they could store merchandise on land while the ship sailed for Siam. Obviously some sturdy premises would likewise reduce the risk of fire damage or break in. The officials were singularly unimpressed; pointing out the Dutch had been here ten years before getting such a building so really the English couldn't really complain that much could they? They could and did. Floris was possibly getting a tad excited at this point, making the excellent point that building a brick house after a fire would be pointless if everything had been destroyed. After talking in circles with 'these blockheads' the officials finally agreed to check with the Green Queen. The next few days, gamely they followed up on their house while the officials hummed and hahhed in that oh so leisurely manner of the east. After all, reasoned the officials, there was no mention of it in the letter from their king. Floris, really getting pissed now, describes them, in translation at least, as 'suche people would have stinted a madde brayne.' It is not recorded what the Pattani folk felt about these whinging, uninvited, guests from afar. 

It would be of interest if we were left some knowledge of their daily schedule, of their life, as they settled into a routine in that strange and wonderful place but Peter Floris was writing to a specific audience. The Directors of the East India Company and like investors everywhere their interest was purely the bottom line. Those Elizabethan Warren Buffets with their ruffs and goatees had no altruistic interest in exploration, science or culture; rather the ledger and the only thing that could get them het up were extraneous expenses which usually involved bloody great piss ups on their account. 

Those bean counters in Leadenhall Street begrudged the slightest farthing being expended with no hope of financial gain and would no doubt have collectively tut-tutted Floris' ambition for a stone built house, however well intentioned the proposal. Indeed, rather than today where good managers are seen as valuable assets, at least on MBA programmes, the captains and merchants on those long voyages were viewed as a necessary, expensive, evil. London was convinced they were all engaged in private trade, a no no, often using company stock or funds. Often they were of course and being aware of this, Floris and his ilk went to great lengths in their correspondence to show how everything they did was above board and scrupulously fair.  

History, and literature, may have ignored the plucky, unimaginative Floris but a contemporary of his is much better remembered thanks to an epic work by James Clavell. While Floris dutifully kept his diary up to date and rode elephants William Adams was inveigling himself into the Shogun's good books in far off Japan, mastering the language, nurturing powerful friends at court. Anyway, Adams had written to Bantam urging trade and a reply was being sent via Pattani. 

In Floris' time the Japanese weren't the welcome guests they are in modern Thailand. Today, Japan Airlines bring thousands of Japanese tourists with bulging wallets and a yen to spend. Japanese car plants provide jobs to an ever increasingly skilled workforce, add zeros to the export numbers and keep the traffic on Bangkok's roads stalled. But tell Peter Floris or the Green Queen how welcome the Japanese would become almost 500 years down the line and no doubt they would curse you in no uncertain terms. 'Suche people would have stinted a madde brayne.' 

At that time Japanese pirates were the scourge of the seas 'feared in all places where they come,' while highly prized as mercenaries. The first Dutch factory in Pattani was destroyed in 1605 by pirates, no doubt why Floris was so keen on acquiring a sturdy, permanent house. On at least one other occasion had they attacked and burned the town in recent years and with other more local dangers one can imagine hid desire for solid brick. 

Floris did manage to rent a couple of houses, one for 'us' and one for the sick of which there were plenty. In a moment of dry humour he records, replete with the spelling of the day, 'as yf the plague had bene in the ship.' The ship's captain, Hippon, died on 9th July, at 11 pm, leaving the merry band in a spot of bother. A ship's captain was the executive and the judicial branches in one mighty figure and to replace him was a serious business thought out even before the ship had left her home port.  

All gathered together on board and, no doubt with great solemnity, rocking gently on the tide, turned to Replacing Captains for Dummies. The procedure was fairly straightforward and a damned sight easier than electing a new pope or leader of the Conservative Party. Future appointments, in case of death, sickness or jumping ship, had been decided and put in numbered boxes so Floris and the gang just turned to the relevant box. Robert Browne was the preferred choice in box # 1 but they'd already buried him in a different type of box, in Madras, so Robert Essington was second choice. The problem was while Robert was a good merchant he actually knew squiddly about sailing so they nominated someone to act as his subordinate. Job done they praised God and waited for the next one to die. They didn't have a long wait. 

After a busy week burying people and finding a new captain you can be sure that all Floris was looking forward to was a bit of peace and quiet. He got burgled! Well, that's what he claimed. The Dutchman was in a house with some 14 others, a flimsy affair made of reeds. He goes on in great detail about the sleeping arrangements, how he and Mr Lucas were in a bed 'apart lyinge close together, having a great black dogge lying under.' A trunk was by his feet. There was very little space to move around, Floris trying hard to convince the Directors that the theft was some superhuman feat and not the result of too many pissed up sailors and traders. Or an inside job. Anyway these miscreants, whoever they may have been, allegedly climbed up the flimsy wall, unseen by the guard, climbed through a presumably open window and silently slid into the dark room. Where 2 burly sailors were sleeping. The intruders then crept under the bed, past the great black dogge who, no doubt, was sleeping peacefully or rolled over to have his belly scratched, and opened the padlock of the trunk. They took money, 'dyverse prety things,' his sword and much else, leaving behind Lucas' sword for some reason. And no one stirred. No one heard a sound. The guard reported seeing and hearing nothing. Sherlock Holmes would love a case like this, though by applying his own methods it is an open and shut case. If no one was seen or heard entering or leaving the house, if the dogge didn't react then Holmes would point the finger at an inside job and be back at Baker Street for tea with Mrs Hudson.  

And so life went on for the redoubtable Floris and his dwindling band. In November of the same year John Downes died. Mention is made of him sitting at dinner 'att noone' and being dead 'att night.' Floris doesn't seem overly upset, complaining Downes, despite being just a servant of the previous captain, had his fingers in the company cookie jar and was indebted to many Chinese merchant ashore.  

On New Years Eve the Queen, 'a comely old woman,' 'wente to sport hirselfe', whatever that may mean, accompanied by 600 local boats. She was tall, in this particular diary entry her age was left blank, full of majesty and without equal throughout the Indies. Well, so the good Peter says. The Green Queen was accompanied by her younger sister and heir whose age was guessed at a rather precise 46. The brief meeting with the future Blue Queen was ended when she 'lette fall the curtaine' but that they should come again the next day. 

The following day, New Years Day, was party time. The Pattani folk put on a dancing show, again the flowery Floris had never seen anything like it in the East. Then the English and Dutch put on a show and the Green Queen 'was muche rejoyced.' Apparently she had not been out of her palace in seven years so their was much rejoicing when she set off hunting wild buffalo. The Europeans caught up in the excitement fired their muskets in the air. You had to be there I guess.  

The Queen had other things on her mind at this time. Her younger sister had married the King of Pahang way back when and the sisters had not seen each other for nearly three decades. Any requests from Pattani had been brushed aside by Pahang with various lame excuses so the Queen, aware of her own mortality, decided to act. Any vessels heading for Pahang were held in Pattani while she sent what was in effect her navy. An early naval blockade if you will. 70 ships took some 4000 men south with instructions to bring back the sibling by peace or force. It was also rumoured that Johore was itching to invade Pahang while a ruler in Borneo was prepared to intervene should Pahang need it.  

In July the Pahang King arrived in Pattani with his wife and children. He was not a happy chappy, what with having lost his house and fort. Still the sisters were reunited. Floris, in a neighbourly gesture visited the King who responded well but he wasn't well respected generally. Another time the Europeans invited him to their house and he arrived in great state but the picture painted in the journal is of a slightly pathetic monarch living on past dreams. He returned to Pahang in August with his wife and children. The Blue Queen shall return shortly to these pages. 

October saw the start of Ramadan, or the Moorish Lent Floris calls it. It started with a good old fashioned riot! The Dato Besar was disliked by some of his Javanese slaves. He arrested and bound two of them and the slave leader or penghulu took offence at this. The Dato Besar took offence at the penghulu taking offence and killed him. The rest of the slaves rioted, burning down the town, attacking anyone in their path. They were joined by the Laksamana's Javanese slaves and pretty soon there were dozens of angry Javanese pillaging the town. They also took the 'beste bondswomen' and for once Floris gets exact, who they were 'domineering very lustly' until after dinner. 

There were rumours the Europeans too would be attacked so the English and Dutch armed themselves, putting on a big show. In the meantime the Javanese fled up country leaving Pattani burning for a third time in recent years. 

Floris seems to get a little emotional as he prepares to leave describing this troublesome time. He must have grown attached to the place or some people but he leaves no clues in his writing, instead leaving behind a functional, read boring, account of his time there. He fails to name local functionaries, referring to them purely by their title yet at other times does name foreigners when they form part of the crew. Perhaps the detail lies in what he omitted or, in the case of the burglary, the unusual accuracy. Still, he has left something and I would buy him a pint for his trouble.