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Rh who had suffered. But from that time the Dutch remained masters of Banda and the Spice Islands. They monopolized the whole trade of the Indian Archipelago, until die great naval wars which commenced in 1793.

Early English Settlements in Madras.—The result of the massacre of Amboyna was to drive the English from the Spice Islands to the mainland of India. Their first settlements were on the Coromandel coast. An English agency had been established at Masulipatam as early as 1611; and this was now (1632) raised to the rank of a factory under the authority of a farmán, known as 'the golden farmán,' from the Sultan of Golconda. A few years earlier (1626) an English factory had also been founded at Armagáon (now a ruined place in Nellore District), which mounted 12 guns, and employed 23 European agents. At last, in 1639, Mr. Francis Day, the Chief of Armagáon, bought from the Rájá of Chandragiri a more favourable site lower down the coast, called Madaraspatam or Chennapatam. Here he built Fort St. George, and became the founder of Madras. Madras was the first territorial possession of the Company in India. For some years it remained subordinate to the English factory at Bantam in Java, but in 1653 it was created an independent Presidency.

Early English Settlements in Bombay.—On the west coast of India, Surat was long the headquarters of English trade. The factory was established here in 1612-15, with agencies at Gogra, Ahmadábád, and Cambay, as the first-fruits of the naval victory over the Portuguese off Swally. At this time Surat was the principal port in the Mughal Empire, through which flowed all trade between Northern India and Europe. In 1661, the island of Bombay was ceded by Portugal to the British Crown, as part of the dowry of Catharine of Braganza, queen of Charles II.; but it was not delivered up by the Portuguese until 1665. In 1668, King Charles II. sold his rights over Bombay to the East India Company for an annual payment of £10. The city of Bombay was then a mere fishing village, dominated by an old Portuguese fort, and notorious even in the East for its unhealthiness. But it had the supreme advantage of being placed on an island, secure from the raids of