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 calicoes manufactured on the Indian peninsula. About the same time, as we have already seen, the heavy but enterprising Dutchmen had begun to entertain the same notions. They however directed their attention more to the Coast of Coromandel, whilst the English were more attracted by the Coast of Malabar. As early as 1610 the Dutch began to build a square fort on the Pulicat lake. The English found more difficulty in establishing themselves. The Portuguese were as yet the lords of the continental trade; but whilst they possessed settlements at St. Thomé and other spots on the Coromandel Coast as far as the mouths of the Ganges and Straits of Malacca, yet their chief trade was on the Coast of Malabar. For nearly a century, the town and fort of Goa, about half way down the Malabar side, had been the centre of their commerce and the seat of their power. There they had led a life of intolerance and luxury, of piety and oppression. They also possessed another important settlement at the ancient town of Surat ; near the top of the same coast, and about 400 miles northward of Goa. Surat, which is mentioned in the Ramayana, has been famous for its commercial wealth from time immemorial. Swarthy traders from Jerusalem and Sidon, from Memphis and Aden, from the Egean Sea and the Persian Gulf, had anchored in the river Taptee and crowded the narrow streets of Surat,—had sunned themselves in the smiles of Surat beauty, and laid their offerings upon her idol shrines, — when Priam yet reigned in Troy, when Solomon held the sceptre of Judah from his golden throne and