EMPIRE IN THE EAST-^131lim world; ships from everywhere moving teak, sandalwood, and other
fine woods; ivory and rhinoceros horn, valued as an aphrodisiac; also
rare and not-so-rare animals, including monkeys, tigers, and above all
horses and elephants, for use in war and ceremony; and everyone
bringing precious metals to balance accounts (silver from the New
World to India and China, gold from East Africa and Japan). Much of
this Asian trade was spontaneous and improvisational—a kind of
Brownian movement. One went where the cargoes were, bouncing
from port to port. This is the way of what later came to be known as
tramp steamers; these were tramp sailing ships.^6
Along with this went a shift out of trade into what the economist
would call rent-seeking activities. In particular, the Portuguese sought
to use their power to batten on the trade of others. They became the
robber barons of the Indian Ocean. All merchant vessels were required
to purchase a Portuguese trading license. Those that did not were li
able to seizure. The shift to racketeering and local trade made possible
important economies: many fewer ships went out from Europe to Asia.
In their stead, the Portuguese used Indian-built vessels. Hardwood
was readily available, and Indian carpenters quickly learned to work to
European specifications—and for much lower wages. Crews also went
native. Sometimes, except for fifteen or twenty European (or Eurasian)
soldiers, gunners, and officers, the entire ship's complement would be
Asians or African slaves. Given the size of the Indian Ocean, one might
have thought the need for patrol ships endless, to ensure obedience to
Portuguese controls. Here the topography helped: the narrow trade
routes and passages made for easy surveillance. Besides, one did not
have to be everywhere; a few exemplary boardings and seizures made
the point.
The trouble is, two and more can play the game. The European
newcomers fought harder and sailed better. Accounts of early Dutch
and English voyages to the area (early seventeenth century) are full of
waiting and skulking, of traps and perfidy, of attacks and captures. One
side's knave was another's hero. James Lancaster, a bold and skillful
English captain, could not get enough by trade on his second voyage
to the Indies (1601)? No problem. When Lancaster returned to Eng
land two years later, his ships laden with booty, King James knighted
him for his efforts. The surface of the Indian Ocean mimicked the wa
ters below, full of predators feeding on one another. All of this
amounted to legalized piracy, legitimized for the Dutch and English by
a state of war with Spain, which war extended to Portugal once the two
Iberian kingdoms were joined in 1580 by common rule. So profitable