he island of Sumatra,
first; and from thence to Siam, where we exchanged some of our wares for
opium, and for some arrack; the first a commodity which bears a great
price among the Chinese, and which, at that time, was very much wanted
there: in a word, we went up to Susham; made a very great voyage; were
eight months out; and returned to Bengal: and I was very well satisfied
with my adventure.

I observe, that our people in England often admire how the officers,
which the Company send into India, and the merchants which generally
stay there, get such very good estates as they do, and sometimes come
home worth sixty, seventy, and a hundred thousand pounds at a time. But
it is no wonder, or, at least, we shall see so much farther into it,
when we consider the innumerable ports and places where they have a free
commerce, that it will then be no wonder; and much less will it be so,
when we consider, that at all those places and ports where the English
ships come, there is so much, and such constant demand for the growth of
all other countries, that there is a certain vent for the return, as
well as a market abroad for the goods carried out.

In short, we made a very good voyage, and I got so much money by the
first adventure, and such an insight into the method of getting more,
that, had I been twenty years younger, I should have been tempted to
have stayed here, and sought no farther for making my fortune: but what
was all this to a man on the wrong side of threescore, that was rich
enough, and came abroad more in obedience to a restless desire of seeing
the world, than a covetous desire of getting in it? And indeed I think
it is with great justice that I now call it a restless desire, for it
was so: when I was at home, I was restless to go abroad; and now I was
abroad, I was restless to be at home. I say, what was this gain to me? I
was rich enough already; nor had I any uneasy desires about getting more
money; and therefore, the profits of the voyage to me were things of no
great force to me, for the prompting me forward to farther undertakings:
hence I thought, that by this voyage I had made no progress at all;
because I was come back, as I might call it, to the place from whence I
came, as to a home; whereas my eye, which, like that which Solomon
speaks of, was never satisfied with seeing, was still more desirous of
wandering and seeing. I was come into a part of the world which I never
was in before; and that part i