Sketches from Formosa.

PIONEERING ON THE PESCADORES 17!
The Pescadores came first prominently under the notice
of western nations in the early part of the seventeenth
century. It was in 1622 that the commanders of an
expedition from Holland were repulsed in an attempt to
establish a settlement at Macao, and it was during the
course of the following year that their small fleet sailed
up the coast of China, and took possession of these
islands. The resistance offered to them must have been
very slight. Trade with Formosa was still a question
of the future, communication with the mainland much
less frequent than it is at present, and the inhabitants
of the Pescadores, then few in number, were dependent
almost exclusively upon their own slender resources for
sustenance and protection. The conclusion, therefore,
arrived at by the officers in charge was that it would
be madness to engage in conflict with those powerful
strangers, and that no alternative was left but to see the
Dutch flag unfurled over what was afterwards to become
the Dashing Lake County of Taiwan.
Of course, intelligence of what had taken place was
soon conveyed to the Provincial Governor. Captain
"
Collinson thus continues the narrative : The Authorities
at Amoy and Fuh-chau unsuccessfully endeavoured to
drive out the new-comers ; but failing to do so, they
urged them to leave for the much richer island of Formosa.
This was at first declined , but after a series of negotiations,
ruptures, hostile attacks, and specious treaties between
the parties, and the landing of four thousand Chinese
soldiers to garrison a fort on the largest island of the
group, the Dutch agreed to move over to Formosa, where
they built Fort Zealandia. Their conduct had been so
harsh towards the natives of the Pescadores, and such
prisoners as they had captured, that the people on the
mainland refused to trade with them."
One thing made clear during the course of this struggle