Page:History of India Vol 8.djvu/60

32 and St. Helena were granted in full property to the London Company.

In 1661 Charles II had granted to this Company by charter the entire English traffic in the East Indies, with license to coin money, administer justice, and punish interlopers; and he confirmed their authority to make war and peace with non-Christian states in those parts. He also adopted Cromwell's famous Navigation Law, which was devised to give British sailors and shipping a monopoly of the transport of goods interchanged with England, and was aimed chiefly at the Dutch, who were then the principal carriers of the sea-borne trade of Europe.

In this manner the commercial resources of England were formed, organized, and directed toward maintaining an equal contest against inveterate foes; nor can there be any doubt that trade monopolies were in those days essential to the existence of British commercial settlements in Asia. England then had no diplomatic representatives in non-Christian countries; the home governments paid no attention to the grievances of any single merchant or ship-master; and the Amboyna massacre is only one example of the reckless methods in use among commercial rivals in distant countries. Without large capital, an armament, and authority to use it, without some kind of rough jurisdiction over their countrymen in distant settlements, no mercantile association could preserve sufficient influence at home or security for their foreign stations and their ships at sea.