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DIFFICULTIES OF THE EAST INDIA COMPANY 225 dence tends to show that " the East India Company was partially an outgrowth of the Levant Company." It was an outgrowth that at first seemed destined to be nipped in the bud. The more ambitious of the 101 merchants and citizens who put down their names for 30,133 on September 22, 1599, contemplated a sin- gle voyage to begin with, but not a single voyage alone. Three days later they resolved to ask the queen to grant them " a privilege in succession and to incorporate them in a company, for that the trade of the Indias being so far remote from hence, cannot be traded but in a joint and a united stock." They also prayed for her assurance that their ships, when ready, should not be detained on plea of the public service ; for a privilege to export foreign coin or its equivalent from the realm; and for freedom from export-customs on the goods sent forth by their first six voyages. Queen Elizabeth, ever the lady patroness of private adventure, signified her gracious assent to certain of the promoters " who have bene at ye Court." But her Privy Council held back. In the previous year, 1598, France had made a separate peace with Spain by the Treaty of Vervins, and Elizabeth was by no means anxious to be left sole champion of the Nether- lands' cause. It seemed indeed as if the Anglo-Span- ish war, which had dragged through the fourteen years since 1585, was at last about to close. Accordingly, the Privy Council threw over the East India adven- turers, rather than risk a new grievance to Spain. On October 16, 1599, it refused the privileges they sought,