Page:History of India Vol 6.djvu/184

 THE PORTUGUESE POLICY IN THE EAST a powerful military court. The work of the community was done by slaves, whose toil chiefly supplied the in- comes of the Portuguese inhabitants; for in Goa no Portuguese of decent birth could follow a trade without disgrace, nor could his wife busy herself in domestic labours without losing her social position. The only respectable livelihoods were the Church, the army, and government employ with buccaneering and seagoing commerce in a few vigor- ous hands. The intensely military spirit, and its contempt for peaceful industry, ended in a reaction of profligacy and sloth. Portuguese society in Goa divided itself into two idle populations an idle population of men in the streets and gaming-sa- loons, and an idle popula- tion of women in the seclu- sion of their own homes. The gambling-houses, sump- tuously furnished and paying a heavy license-tax to the Government, were the resort of dancing girls, jug- glers, native actors, and buffoons haunts of iniquity, in which the more determined players stayed some- times for days together and were provided with board and lodging. The ladies of Goa soon obtained an equally unenviable name. Shut np as much as possible from THE ITALIAN TRAVELLER PIETRO BELLA VALLE. After an old woodcut.