34 The Beginning of British Honduras
governing, strengthening, and preservation of the said planta-
tions, but chiefly for the advancement of the true Protestant
religion, and farther spreading of the gospell of Christ among
those that yet remain there in great and miserable blind-
nesse and ignorance."
 Amongst the partners in this company were Philip Earl of
Pembroke, Edward Earl of Manchester, William Viscount
Say and Seale, Philip Lord Wharton, Henry Earl of Holland,
Robert Lord Brook, and John Pym. William Laud, Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, also gave them his assistance, as the
Bishops of London and Lichfield had assisted in the Amazon
ventures of Captain Roger North. The Earl of Warwick was
a speculator in privateering, and a group of the wealthy Com-
pany of Merchant Adventurers of London were also backing
him. Privateering was a part of their commercial interests,
and in this they used the Puritans, who were in religious op-
position to Charles I and his friendship for Spain, to assist
them to colonize fortified sites from where they could raid
the Spanish shipping and the Spanish Main.
 In the "Travels of Captain John Smith" we read that in
 1612 Richard Moore arrived as governor in the Somer's
 Isles, and that in 1614 he had a great famine on his hands due
 to the arrival of too many colonists, too much fort-building,
 too little planting of foodstuffs, and his relatively too great
 interest in looking for ambergris. Already in 1613 Captain
 Daniel Elfrith had brought the colonists a caravel of meal
 taken from his friend Fisher in the "West Indies," and in the
 same yeai the company sent Bartlett to overhaul Moore in
 mistrust of their allotted share of ambergris. Governor Moore,
 who had exploited the Ambergris Caye in British Honduras,
 died later in Sir Walter Raleigh's last voyage to Guiana.
 In 1613 Captain Powell of the "Hopewell' who was well
 acquainted with tfie West Indies went with others from the
 Somers Isles to look for fruits, seeds, plants, goats, cattle. The
 famine forced them to go out to the Spanish areas where trad-
 ing with foreigners was strictly prohibited. In 1618-19 Cap-