Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 12.djvu/823

799 HISTOliY.] INDIA 7 C J9 ) h disputes between the English and Dutch companies, was ratified. When it was proclaimed in the East, hostilities solemnly ceased for, i- the space of an hour, while the Dutch and English fleets, dressed i out in all their Hags and with yards manned, saluted each other ; ries. but the treaty ended in the smoke of that stately salutation, and perpetual and fruitless contentions between the Dutch and English companies went on the same as ever. Up to that time the English company did not possess any portion of territory in sovereign right in the Indies, excepting in the island of Lantore or Great Banda. That island was governed by a commercial agent of the Company, who had under him thirty Europeans as clerks, over- j seers, and warehousemen ; and these, with two hundred and fifty ] armed Malays, constituted the only force by which it was protected. In the islands of Banda and Pulo Roon and Rosengyn the Company possessed factories, in each of which were ten agents. At Macassar and Achinalso they possessed factories or agencies, the whole being subordinate to Bantam. Such was the precarious situation of the English Company in the East at the commencement of their long struggle for commercial equality with the Dutch, whose ascendency in the Indian Archipelago was already firmly established on the basis of territorial dominion and authority. In 1620 the Dutch, notwith standing the Treaty of Defence concluded the previous year, expelled the English from Palo Roon and Lantore, and in 1621 from Bantam. The fugitive factors attempted to establish themselves first at Pnlicat and afterwards at Masulipatam on the Coromandel coast, but were effectually opposed by the Dutch. In 1620 also the Portuguese made an attack upon the English fleet under Captain Shillinge, but were again defeated with great loss, and from that time the estima tion in which the Portuguese were held by the natives of India steadily declined, while that of the English was proportionately raised. In that year the Company established agencies at Agra and Patna. In 1622 the English, joining with the Persians, attacked and took Ormuz from the Portuguese, and obtained from Shah Abbas a grant in perpetuity of the customs of Gombroon. This was the first time that the English took the offensive against the Portuguese. In the same year the Company succeeded in re-establishing their factory at Masulipatam. &quot;On the 17th February 1623 occurred the Massacre of Amboyna; and from that time the Dutch remained masters of Lantore and the neighbouring islands, and of the whole trade, of the Indian Archipelago, until these islands were recaptured by the English in the great naval wars which commenced in 1793. In 1624 the English, unable to oppose the Dutch, withdrew nearly all their factories from the Archipelago, the Malay peninsula, Siam, and Japan. Some of the factors and agents retired to the island of Lagundy in the Strait of Sunda, but were forced, by its unhealthi- ness, to abandon it. lish &quot; In 1625-26 a factory was established at Armagaon on the Coro- i K-ies. mandel coast, subordinate to Masulipatam ; but in 1628 Masulipatam was, in consequence of the oppressions of the native governor, for a time abandoned in favour of Armagaon, which then mounted twelve guns and had twenty-three factors and agents. In 1629 the factory at Bantam was re-established as an agency subordinate to Surat ; and in 1630 Armagaon, reinforced by twenty soldiers, was placed under the presidency of Surat. In 1632 the factory was re-estab lished at Masulipatam, by a firman, known as the Golden Firman, from the king of Golconda. In 1634, by a firman dated February 2, the Company obtained from the Great Mughal liberty to trade in Bengal, without any other restriction than that their ships were to resort only to Pippli in Orissa. The Portuguese were in the same year expelled from Bengal. In 1634-35 Bantam was again raised to an independent presidency, and an agency was established at Tatta, or Scindy. In 1637 Courten s Association (chartered 1635) settled agencies at Goa. Baticola, Karwar (Carwar), Achin, and Rajapur. Its ships had in 1636 plundered some native vessels at Surat and Diu, which disgraced the Company with the Mughal authorities (who could not comprehend the distinction between the Company and the Ass ciation), and depressed the English trade with Surat, while that of the Dutch proportionately increased. In 1638 Armagaon was abandoned as unsuited for com merce ; and in 1U39-40 Fort St George, Maderaspatam ( Chinee- patam ), was founded by Francis Day, and the factors at Armagaon were at once removed to it. It was made subordinate to Bantam, until raised in 1633 to the rank of a presidency. In 1640 the Company established an agency at Bussorah, and a factory at Karwar. Trade having much extended, the Company s yard at Deptford was found too small for their ships, and they pur chased some copyhold ground at Blackwall, which at that time was a waste marsh, without an inhabitant ; and there they opened another dockyard, in which was built the Royal George, of 1200 &amp;gt;ghly tons, the largest ship yet seen in England. In 1642 the factories wy. at Balasore and Hugli (Hooghly) were established, hi 1645, in consequence of services rendered by Dr Gabriel Broughton, surgeon of the Hopewell, to the emperor Shah Jahan, additional privileges were granted to the Company ; and in 1646 the governor of Bengal, who had also been professionally benefited by Broughton, made cm- cessions which placed the factories at Balasore and llooglily on a more favourable footing. In 1647 Courten s Association established its colony at Assada, in Madagascar. In 1652 Cromwell declared war against the Dutch on account of their accumulated injuries against the Company. In 1653 the Company s factory at Lucknow was withdrawn. No record has been found of its establishment. In 1658 the Company established a factory at Kasimbazar (Cossim- bazar, Castle Bazaar ), and their establishments in Bengal were made subordinate to Fort St George instead of Bantam. &quot; In 1661 Bombay was ceded to the British crown as part of the Acquisi- dower of Catharine of Braganza. It was not delivered up by the tion of Portuguese until 1666, and was transferred to the East India Com- Bombay, pany in 1668. The seat of the western presidency was removed to it from Surat in 1685. At that time the Company s establishments in the East Indies consisted of the presidency of Bantam, ith ;t; dependencies of Jambee, Macassar, and other places in the Indian Archipelago ; Fort St George and its dependent factories on the Coromandel coast and Bengal ; and Surat, with its affiliated dependency of Bombay, and factories at Broach, Ahmadabad, and other places in western India, and at Gombroon and Bussorah in the Persian Gulf and Euphrates valley. In that year also (1661) the factory at Biliapatam was founded. In 1663 the factories which had been established at Patna, Balasore, and Kasimbazar were ordered to be discontinued, and purchases made only at Hooghly. In 1664 Surat was pillaged by Sivaji, but Sir George Oxenden bravely defended the English factory ; and the Mughal emperor, in admiration of his conduct, granted the Company an exemption from customs for one year. &quot;In 1681 Bengal was separated from Madras, and Mr Hodges with twenty soldiers, was to be a guard to the agent s person at the factory of Hooghly, and to act against interlopers. In 1683 FortSt George (Madras) was constituted a presidency. In 1684 Sir John Child was made captain-general and admiral of India, and Sir John Wyborne vice-admiral and deputy governor of Bombay ; and in 1685 the seat of the presidency was transferred from Snrat to Bombay. In 1686 the factory at Ilooghly was much oppressed by the governor of Bengal, and the Company s business in India generally suffered from the wars of the Mughals and Marhattas. Sir John Child was therefore appointed governor-general, with full power in India to make war or peace, and ordered to proceed to inspect the Company s possessions in Madras and Bengal, and arrange lor their safety. On the 20th of December the Company s agent and council quitted the open factory at Hooghly, and retired to Sutanati (Cal cutta). Tegnapatam (Fort St David) was first settled in this year (1686), and definitively established in 1691-92. In 1687 the Company retired from all its factories and agencies in Bengal to Madras, but established the settlement of Fort York at Bencoolen. In 1689 the Company s factories at Vixagapatam and Masulipatam were seized by the Mahometans, and the factors massacred. It was in 1689 also that at last the Company determined to consolidate their posi tion in India on the basis of territorial sovereignty, in order to acquire the political status of an independent power in their relations with the Mughals and Marhattas. To this end they passed the following resolution for the guidance of the local governments in India: The increase of our revenue is the subject of our care, as much as our trade ; tis that must maintain our force when twenty accidents may interrupt our trade ; tis that must make us a nation in India ; without that we are but a great number of interlopers, united by His Majesty s royal charter, fit only to trade where nobody of power thinks it their interest to prevent us; and upon this account it is that the wise Dutch, in all their general advices that we have seen, write ten paragraphs concerning their government, their civil and military policy, warfare, and the increase of their revenue, for one paragraph they write concerning trade. &quot; It will be conveiiient to refer in this place to the other European nations who attempted at various times to open trade with the East. The Portuguese at no time attempted to found a company, Imt always maintained their Eastern trade as a ro3 r al monopoly. The first incorporated company was the English, established in 1600, which was quickly followed by the Dutch in 1602. The Dutch conquests, however, were made in the name of the state, and rank as national colonies, not as private possessions. Next came tho French French, whose first East India Company was formed in 1604, the and second in 1611, the third in 1615, the fourth (Richelieu s) in Danish 1642, the fifth (Colbert s) in 1644. The sixth was formed by factories, the union of the French East and West India, Senegal, and China companies under the name of &quot;The Company of the Indies,&quot; in 1719. The exclusive privileges of the company were, by the king s decree, suspended in 1769, and the company was finally abolished by the National Assembly in 1796. The first Danish East India Company was founded in 1612, and the second in 1670. The settlements of Tranquebar and Serampur were both founded in 1616, and acquired by the English by purchase from Denmark in 1845. Other Danish settlements on the mainland of India were Porto Novo, and Eddova and Holcheri on the Malabar coast The com.