The Embassy of Sir Thomas Roe to the Court of the Great Mogul 1.1.7

1.1.7

Under the patronage of the Prince, Roe sought experience of the adventurous sort which was then in fashion. Equipping a couple of pinnaces, he set sail in February, 1610, on a voyage of discovery to Guiana, in the course of which he is said to have penetrated three hundred miles up the little-known river of the Amazons, and to have examined the coast from the mouth of that river to the Orinoco, reaching England again in July, 1611. Soon, however, a cloud came over his fortunes. The Prince, from whose favour he might have hoped for much, died in November, 1612; and a few months later, the Princess's marriage took away his other patron. After spending some months on the Continent, Roe resolved to enter public life; and in the "Addled Parliament" of 1614 he sat as member for Tamworth. But though "he was one of those men who, if James had been well advised, would have been the very first to be selected for high office," his enlightened views were little likely to commend themselves to that monarch; and thus left with no prospect at home of reconciling his loyalty and affection for the royal family with his duty to the nation, it was to foreign service alone that Roe could look for a career of usefulness.