The populace of Edinburgh burned Rochester in effigy.

Money was poured faster than ever into the treasury of the Company.

A stately house, in Milne Square, then the most modern and fashionable part of Edinburgh, was purchased and fitted up at once as an office and a warehouse.

Ships adapted both for war and for trade were required; but the means of building such ships did not exist in Scotland; and no firm in the south of the island was disposed to enter into a contract which might not improbably be considered by the House of Commons as an impeachable offence.

It was necessary to have recourse to the dockyards of Amsterdam and Hamburg.