BECKLES WILLSON
By chartering the original English East India Company, Queen Elizabeth took the first step toward establishing that empire in the Orient which has since become such an important appanage of the British crown. This oldest English company in India is also called the "Mother Company" and the "John Company." It began English trade with India, and its operations prepared the way for British government in that vast country.
After the Portuguese discovery of the passage round Africa, toward the end of the fifteenth century, other European nations for some time appeared to recognize Portugal's exclusive claim to the navigation of that route. In 1510 the Portuguese made a permanent settlement in India at Goa. But during this century the Dutch obtained a foothold in the country, and in 1580 Portugal was conquered by Spain.
Dutch enterprise and the Spanish absorption of Portugal's Indian establishments aroused the commercial spirit of England. In 1599 an English association was formed, with a large fund, "for trade to the East Indies." In December, 1600, Queen Elizabeth granted this association a charter, incorporating the "Adventurers" under the title of "the Governor and Company of Merchants of London trading into the East Indies." The company was allowed unlimited rights of purchasing lands, and a fifteen years' monopoly of trade. In 1609 the charter was renewed and made perpetual by James I; but at first the company appears to have done no very extensive business. The beginning of its more active career, in the midst of grave difficulties and conflicts, is well described by Willson, whose history thus covers an important period in the development of India and in the expansion of British power.
When the East India Company had been in existence eleven years it possessed hardly more than the rudiments of factories in the Indies, while the Dutch boasted fully a dozen regularly established trading-settlements, from most of which they had ejected the Spaniards and Portuguese.
France, no longer restrained by Spain and the Pope, naturally looked jealously on these efforts of Englishmen and Dutchmen to exploit the East to their own advantage. In 1609 we learn that the subjects of Henry IV, "who had long aspired to make themselves strong by sea," took the opportunity of a treaty made between James I and the French King to "set on foot this invention, a society to trade into the East Indies," with a capital of four million crowns. Becher, the English ambassador at Paris, wrote in 1609 to Lord Salisbury that Dutch seamen were being "engaged at great pay and many of their ships bought." The States-General strongly remonstrated against this proceeding, and threatened to "board the French ships wherever they found them, and hang all Flemings found in them." This threat appears to have been effectual, and the project was abandoned. A little later, in 1614, the French again projected taking part in the East India trade, and accounts were current in London concerning ships and patents from King Louis, but this, too, ended lamely and nothing practical was effected for full half a century.
The company always had before it the danger of attack by Spanish or Portuguese, and its captains and agents were put perpetually on their guard. But it never seems to have occurred to the court of committees that there was any danger to be apprehended from the Dutch, so that they were all the more astonished and chagrined at the failure to establish trade with the Moluccas, where the natives were so friendly to the English and offered them every facility, but, owing to Dutch oppression, in vain.
In the first voyage James Lancaster had established factories at Achin and Bantam. In the second voyage Sir Henry Middleton was instructed to endeavor to found a factory on the island of Banda. He carried on some trade, but neither he nor his successor in the third voyage, Captain Keeling, was able to override the opposition of the Dutch and secure a foothold. In the instructions issued to the last-named he was requested to establish, if possible, a factory at Aden, from whence he was to proceed to the Gulf of Cambay, seeking a good harbor there "for the maintenance of a trade in those parts hereafter in safety from the danger of the Portuguese, or other enemies, endeavoring also to learn whether the King of Cambay or Surat, or any of his havens, be in subjection to the Portuguese—and what havens of his are not?—together with the dangers and depths of the water, there for passage, that by this certain notice and diligent inquiry—which we wish to be set down in writing for the company's better information—whereby we may hereafter attempt further trade there, or otherwise desist."
In no fighting mood, therefore, was the company—whatever their servants' views—but prudently inclined to keep out of the way of the once terrible and still dreaded Portuguese. In vain, as we have seen, did Captain Hawkins exert himself to obtain concessions from the Grand Mogul which would survive the displeasure of his European rivals, who had by their ships, arms, and intrigues completely terrified the governors and petty rajahs of the coast.
In 1611 Anthony Hippon, in the Globe, sailed for the Coromandel (or Madras) coast with the object of setting a factory, if possible, at Pulicat, and sharing in the port-to-port trade which the Dutch had lately built up there. The idea seems to have originated with a couple of Dutchmen, named Floris and Antheunis, formerly in the Dutch service, who were charged with the management of the business. So far as Pulicat was concerned, the scheme failed, but the captain of the Globe, resolved to land his factory somewhere, lit upon Pettapoli, farther up the coast, where he arrived on August 18, 1611. This was the company's first settlement in the Bay of Bengal. But although the reception from the local governor and the King of Golconda was friendly, yet the place proved to be a deadly swamp and the trade was small.
When the landing of certain factors and merchandise had thus taken place at Pettapoli, Captain Hippon set sail farther northward to the ancient port of Masulipatam, which, forming "a coveted roadstead on the open coast line of Madras," was destined to be the theatre of much truculent rivalry between the European traders on the Coromandel coast. Here, on the last day of August, Hippon and Floris landed, and a factory was set up. A cargo of calicoes was duly obtained, whereupon the Globe departed for Bantam and the Far East to seek spices and pepper in exchange. Such were the beginnings of English trade on the east of the Indian peninsula. Two years later the company's servants received from the Hindu King of Vitayanagar a firman to build a fort, written on a leaf of gold—a document which was preserved at Madras until its capture by the French in the next century.
Following hard upon their summary dismissal from Surat, Middleton, Hawkins, and the rest, disinclined for their masters' sake to come to close quarters with the Dutch in the Spice Islands, directed their views to the establishment of a factory at Dabul. In this likewise they failed. In despair at not procuring a cargo, they went in for piracy and fierce retaliation upon the Turkish authorities for their treatment of them in the Red Sea. A couple of vessels hailing from Cochin were captured, and some cloves, cinnamon, wax, bales of china silk, and rice were taken out of them and removed to the ship Trade's Increase.
In the midst of a lively blockade of the Red Sea ports they were joined by Captain John Saris, with four ships, belonging to the company's eighth voyage, who agreed to lend his forces for whatever the combined fleets undertook, if granted a third of the profits for the benefit of his particular set of subscribers. All this anomalous confusion between the various interests within the same body corporate could have but one issue. The rival commanders took to quarrelling over the disposition of the hundred thousand pieces-of-eight which Middleton hoped to squeeze out of the Governor of Mocha for outrages upon the English fleet. Strife ran high between them, and in the end Saris in the Clove and Towerson in the Hector sailed away from the Red Sea, leaving Middleton and Downton to settle matters on their own account.
Powerless to obtain compensation from the Governor of Mocha, Middleton proceeded to make unceremonious levy on all the shipping he could lay his hands upon. On August 16th the Trade's Increase set sail, in company with the Peppercorn, for Tiku, where two others of the company's ships were anchored. Middleton very soon discovered that the Trade's Increase was in a leaky condition; he had hardly got her out of Tiku when she ran aground—for the second time in her brief history. She was floated and brought opposite Pulo Panzang, in Bantam Bay, where the cargo was taken out and stored on shore. The ship, which King James had christened and in which Sir Henry Middleton took such pride, was careened on the beach for repairs. During the process a renegade Spaniard formed a plot to burn her to the water's edge, and one night carried it successfully into execution—a catastrophe which is said to have so affected the doughty old commander, Sir Henry Middleton, that he sickened and died at Bantam, May 24, 1613.
The many exploits of Middleton, the doyen of the company's servants in the East, well deserve to be read: the hardships he had suffered, the difficulties he had to contend with, the jealous cabals of which he had been the victim. Among the many insubordinates that prevailed, Captain Nicholas Downton, one of the ablest commanders in the service, was not to be persuaded, despite the plots and schemes occasionally undertaken for that purpose, to abandon the respect and loyalty he owed the old sea-dog. Once, when in the Red Sea, Middleton wrote sharply to Downton for an alleged fault; the latter was filled "with admiration and grief."
"Sir," he replied, "I can write nothing so plain, nor with that sincerity, but malicious men, when they list, may make injurious construction; but evil come to me if I meant ill to Sir Henry Middleton or any part of the business. God be judge between him and me, if ever I deserved the least evil thought from him. I desire that he were so much himself that he would neither be led nor carried by any injurious person to abuse an inseparable friend."
Wholly ignorant of the fate reserved for Middleton and the "mightie merchantman," the Trade's Increase, Downton resumed command of the Peppercorn and returned direct to England with a full cargo. Many times her timbers sprang aleak on the voyage—for she was but a jerry-built craft at best—but she finally got into the harbor of Waterford, September 13, 1613. Here the rudest of rude welcomes awaited Downton. He was visited by the sheriff and arrested on a warrant from the Earl of Ormond, charged with committing piracy. But, for the present, the plots of his and Middleton's enemies miscarried; their victim was released, and in a few weeks' time was back in the Thames. Downton's proved zeal and endurance won him the applause and favor of the merchant adventurers, and the command of the first voyage under the joint-stock system in the following year.
Meanwhile, each year the company had been sending out a small fleet of ships to the East; it was now beginning also to receive communications from its agents and factors, who, as we have seen, were being slowly distributed at various points east of Aden. Irregular as the receipt of these advices was, and incomplete and belated in themselves, they yet were a useful guide to the company in equipping its new ventures.
"We are in great hope to get good and peaceful trade at Cambay and Surat," writes Anthony Marlowe to the company from Socotra, "where our ship, by God's grace, is to ride. Our cloth and lead, we hear, will sell well there; our iron not so well as at Aden; that indigo we shall have good store at reasonable rates; and also calicoes and musk, and at Dabul good pepper; so as I hope in God the Hector shall make her voyage at those places and establish a trade there, to the benefit of your worships and the good of our country."
For Captain Keeling, Marlowe has many words of praise. "His wisdom, language, and carriage are such as I fear we shall have great want of at Surat in the first settling of our trade." Of some of the other servants of the company Marlowe is not so enthusiastic, and he does not spare his opinion of their characters. In a subsequent letter we are brought right face to face with a very pretty quarrel between Hippon, the master of the Dragon, and his mate, William Tavernour, in which Hawkins tries to act as peacemaker, but is foiled by the bloodthirsty Matthew Mullinux, master of the Hector, who had himself a private grudge against the said Tavernour, or, as is written here, "a poniard in pickle for the space of six months."
"And not contented with this (he) afterward came up upon the deck and there before the boatswain and certain of us did most unchristianlike speak these words: that if he might but live to have the opportunity to kill the said Tavernour he would think it to be the happiest day that ever he saw in his life, an it were but with a knife."
There seems to have been a surfeit of these internecine brawls for some time to come, and, indeed, stories of dissensions among the servants of the company in the East are plentifully sprinkled throughout its history, both in this century and the next. Of hints for trade the company's agents are profuse in this growing correspondence.
"There is an excellent linen," writes one of them, "made at Cape Comorin, and may be brought hither from Cochin in great abundance if the Portugals would be quiet men. It is about two yards broad or better and very strong cloth, and is called cachade Comoree. It would certainly sell well in England for sheeting." Here we see the genesis of the calico trade.
The company is informed that "if Moorish girdles, Turks, and cloaks will yield any profit, I pray give advice. They are here in abundance and the great chief merchandise. There is also a market for cloth of all kinds of light and pleasing colors, pleasing to the eye, as Venice reds, stamels, some few scarlets for presents, and also to sell to great men, popinjay greens of the brightest dye, cinnamon colors, light dove colors, peach colors, silver colors, light yellows with others like, but no dark or sad colors, for here they are not vendible. Those of the last voyage are yet upon our hands and will not be sold for the monies that they cost in England." Thenceforward, it is to be supposed, the company bought no more of the "suitings of the Puritans," then growing to be the vogue at home.
"Of new drinking-glasses, trenchers for sweetmeats, but especially looking-glasses of all sorts and different prices—but not small baubles—some reasonable quantity would be sold to good profit, and I verily suppose that some fair large looking-glass would be highly accepted of this King, for he affects not the value in anything, but rarity in everything, insomuch that some pretty new-fangled toys would give him high content, though their value were small, for he wants no worldly wealth or riches, possessing an inestimable treasury, and is, it is thought, herein far exceeding the Great Turk."
Throughout all their reports and epistles the captains and factors appear above all anxious to establish themselves on the mainland, and express much indignation at the conduct of Macarab Khan, the Mogul's vizier, at his juggling with their hopes.
"If it please God we attain Surat," sighs one of the factors, "how comfortable it will be to those there, beneficial to the trade, and commodious to your worship." Jostled aside, tormented by the Dutch in the eastern archipelago and by the Turks in the Red Sea, what wonder that the company and its servants now longed to displace the Portuguese in India itself?
At home the company had despatched, in 1612, as its tenth expedition, three vessels. They comprised the stout old Dragon, commanded by Captain Thomas Best; the Solomon, alias the James, and the Hoseander. Was the new effort of Best and Kerridge, one of his supercargoes, to establish a factory at Surat to be more successful than that of Middleton in 1610?
While the Solomon was forthwith ordered elsewhere in search of trade, Best, with the other two vessels, reached Swally, near the mouth of the Surat River, early in the month of September, 1612. Here Kerridge, disembarking with several companions, was well received by the native merchants and inhabitants, although gaining the disapprobation of the Portuguese. He obtained permission to land some broadcloths, lead, iron, and quicksilver, procuring in exchange for these such Surat merchandise as the company had recommended him to acquire as suitable for the purchase of pepper and spices at Achin and Bantam.
In the midst of these agreeable transactions the Portuguese swept down upon the company's men, with four ships, mounting one hundred twenty-four guns, besides a large flotilla of small native galleys. As they advanced, thinking to cut him off and board him, Captain Best perceived, with the intuition of the trained mariner, the weakness of their formation. He called out to Captain Pettie, of the Hoseander, to follow him, and, singling out the two largest of the Portuguese vessels, prepared to dash straight for them, his gunners, half naked, standing ready and alert for the word of command which should begin the fray.
But to Best's confusion the Hoseander budged not a rod, being gripped fast by her anchors. In this predicament there was nothing for it. Best must close with the enemy single-handed. Placing his Red Dragon between the Portuguese admiral and vice-admiral, the company's commander gave orders to the gunners, and the battle commenced by the firing of a double broadside, which "well peppered" the enemy, who responded by splintering the Englishman's mainmast and sinking his long-boat.
"Having exchanged some forty great shot of each side," reports an eye-witness of the battle to the company, "the night being come they anchored in sight of each other, and the next morning our ships weighed again and began their fight again, which continued some three hours, in which time they drove three of their galleons on the sands. And so our ships came to anchor, and in the afternoon weighed anchor, in which time the flood being come the galleons, with the help of the frigates, were afloat again."
Yet there was to be more and fiercer fighting against even greater odds before the Portuguese had had their fill of the English off Swally. After an attempt on their part to set fire to the Hoseander by means of a fire-ship, which utterly failed, and cost the Portuguese a hundred lives, the company's ships sailed away on December 1st, thinking to draw the enemy after them. But not succeeding in this, Best anchored at Moha to await their pleasure. It was not until December 22d that the enemy bore up, having been strengthened by ships and men from Diu. The shores were lined with spectators to see Best gallantly front them with his two ships' colors flying.
This time it seemed as if Best and his men were doomed, yet to the astonishment, not merely of the natives and Portuguese, but of the company's servants themselves, they were victorious in this engagement. On the following day, at the close of another battle, the enemy, dazed and staggering from so much fighting and bloodshed, abruptly turned and fled, trailing their wrecked flotilla behind them. Nothing can convey a better idea of the overwhelming superiority of the company gunners and ordnance, as well as of the matchless audacity of their onslaught, than the fact of their having lost but three slain, while the Portuguese list of killed was upward of three hundred. Not only this, but Best's two ships were still in good condition.
On December 27th the Dragon and the Hoseander returned triumphantly to Surat, where a number of the company's factors and supercargoes were, as may be imagined, anxiously awaiting them. It was felt by most, on hearing the good news, that the promised firman of the Great Mogul would not be long delayed; but Best, worn out with fighting, was by no means so sanguine, and ordered Aldworth and the other factors to repair on board the fleet at once, with such merchandise as they had. But Aldworth, even after most of the others had given in to the "General's" views, insisted that Best's victory over the Portuguese had removed the opposition of the Mogul, who would surely despatch his firman. This was corroborated by Kerridge, who had gone to Agra to deliver a letter from King James to the Mogul. But Best had no relish for Aldworth's stubbornness, as he called it, and summoned a council "and so required the said Thomas Aldworth to come on board, which he again refused to do, for that he heard certainly the firman was coming."
Aldworth's confidence was rewarded, for just as Best was about to depart, Jehangir's decree, granting the company a factory at Surat and at three other places about the Gulf of Cambay, arrived bearing joy to the bosoms of the English traders.
At Agra, it appeared from Kerridge's account, he had been admitted to the monarch's chamber, where Jehangir "sat on his bed, newly risen from sleep." In his first letters Kerridge complains of a chilly reception and attributes it to his coming empty-handed. "No other treatment," he says, "is to be expected without continual gifts both to the King and others."
The character of Jehangir was described by Kerridge as "extremely proud and covetous," taking himself "to be the greatest monarch in the world," yet a "drunkard" and "given over to vice." The Mogul, however, was very fond of music, and revelled in Robert Trulley's cornet, though virginals were not esteemed, "perhaps because the player was not sufficiently expert," and "it is thought Lawes died with conceit at the King's indifference." Nevertheless, on the whole, Jehangir behaved civilly to the company's envoy, whose success in obtaining an audience was quickly followed up by Aldworth in sending William Edwards, who took with him from Surat "great presents," including portraits of King James and his Queen, and "one that will content the Mogul above all, the picture of Tamberlane, from whence he derives himself." At last, then, the coveted firman "for kind usage of the English, free trade, and so forth," was gained, Edwards remaining in Agra as "lieger" or ambassador, "which will be needful among this inconstant people."
By the terms of the firman a duty on imports of 3-1/2 per cent. was to be exacted; but on the other hand no damages were to be claimed for Sir Henry Middleton's piratical exploits, and the company's factories were to be protected by law in event of any calamity overtaking its servants.
To Aldworth undoubtedly belongs the credit of having negotiated this concession, but it is doubtful if it would ever have received the imperial sanction had it not been for Best's victory. Even when he had the document in his hands the conqueror was diffident, and could hardly believe the good news. He was "doubtful whether it was the King's firman or not, and, being resolved, would not receive it until some of the chiefs of the city should bring it down unto him to Swally, which in fine they did. And the very day following the receipt of it, being the 4th, the galleons were again in sight, but came not near to proffer fight. Notwithstanding, the general resolved not to make any longer stay there, but took in such goods as were ready, and landed the rest of the cloth, quicksilver, and vermilion, all the elephants' teeth, and some twelve hundred bars of lead, carrying the rest along with him, as also all the pieces-of-eight and iron, and so, the 18th present, departed."
In such manner did the company gain at last a certain foothold in the Mogul empire. The factors stationed at the new post reported that Surat was the best situation in India to vend English goods, particularly broadcloths, kerseys, quicksilver, lead, and vermilion, to be exchanged for indigo, calicoes, cotton yarn, and drugs, and added a list of such goods as might annually be disposed of there. They requested the merchant adventurers in London to send them some four thousand pieces of broadcloth, sword-blades, knives, and looking-glasses. They hinted that toys and English bull-dogs should be sent as presents. But the new trade, they were careful to explain, could only be protected by stationing five or six ships in the river at Surat to defend the factory and its occupants against the Portuguese.
On his return home Best was summoned to Philport lane to give a detailed account of his exploits, and was considered by the court to have "deserved extraordinarily well." Yet his "great private trade," whereby he had enriched himself, caused some dissatisfaction, and the governor, Sir Thomas Smythe, while admitting that no one could be a fitter commander than Best, thought that "Captain Keeling was far before him for merchandise, and so should command at Surat." But this did not satisfy the victor of Swally. Unless he were allowed private trade he refused to make another voyage for the company, and finally insisted on an investigation into his conduct. The upshot was that the company was "content to remit all that is past and let these things die, which should not have been ripped up had he not called them in question himself."
The various inconveniences to the company from the separate classes of adventurers being enabled to fit out equipments on their own particular portions of stock, finally evoked a change in the constitution of the company. In 1612 it was resolved that in future the trade should be carried on by means of a joint stock only, and on the basis of this resolution the then prodigious sum of four hundred twenty-nine thousand pounds was subscribed. Although portions of this capital were applied to the fitting out of four voyages, the general instructions to the commanders were given in the name and by the authority of the governor, deputy governor, and committees of the Company of Merchants of London trading to the East Indies.
The whole commerce of the company was now a joint concern, and the embarrassing principle of trading on separate ventures came to an end. Experience had amply demonstrated that detached equipments exposed the whole trade to danger in the East, in their efforts to establish trade. The first twelve voyages were, therefore, regarded in the light of an experiment to establish a solid commerce between England and India.
Upon such terms the period known as the first joint stock was entered upon, which comprised four voyages between the years 1613 and 1616. The purchase, repair, and equipment of vessels during these four years amounted to two hundred seventy-two thousand five hundred forty-four pounds, which, with the stock and cargoes, made up the total sum raised among the members at the beginning of the period, viz., four hundred twenty-nine thousand pounds.
Under this new system Captain Downton was given command of the fleet, in the company's merchantmen, the New Year's Gift, thus named because it had been launched on January 1st—an armed ship of five hundred fifty tons—and three other vessels. Downton went equipped with legal as well as military implements. King James made him master of the lives of the crews, and empowered him to use martial law in cases of insubordination.
"We are not ignorant," said the monarch, in the royal commission which he vouchsafed to the company's commander, "of the emulation and envy which doth accompany the discovery of countries and trade, and of the quarrels and contentions which do many times fall out between the subjects of divers princes when they meet the one with the other in foreign and far remote countries in prosecuting the course of their discoveries." Consequently Captain Downton was warned not to stir up bad blood among the nations, but if he should be by the company's rivals unjustly provoked he was at liberty to retaliate, but not to keep to himself any spoils he might take, which were to be rendered account of, as by ancient usage, to the King.
Before Downton could reach his destination, the chief energies of the company's agents in India appear to have been bent upon forming a series of exchanges between the west coast and the factory at Bantam. The little band of servants at the new factory at Surat, headed by the redoubtable Aldworth, gave it as their opinion not only that sales of English goods could be effected at this port, but that they might be pushed to the inland markets and the adjoining seaports. Aldworth stated that in his journey to Ahmedabad he had passed through the cities of Baroche and Baroda, and had discovered that cotton, yarn and "baftees" could be bought cheaper from the manufacturers in that country than at Surat. At Ahmedabad he was able to buy indigo at a low rate, but in order to establish such a trade capital of from twelve to fifteen thousand pounds was required to be constantly in the hands of the factor. It was thought at Surat that it would be expedient to fix a resident at the Mogul's court at Agra to solicit the protection of that monarch and his ministers.
Downton arrived at Surat, October 15, 1614, to find the attitude of the Portuguese toward the English more than ever hostile. At the same time trouble impended between the Portuguese and the Nawab of Surat. In order to demolish all opposition at one blow, the former collected their total naval force at Goa for a descent upon both natives and new-comers at Surat. Their force consisted of six large galleons, several smaller vessels, and sixty native barges, or "frigates" as they were called, the whole carrying a hundred thirty-four guns and manned by twenty-six hundred Europeans and six thousand natives. To meet this fleet, Downton had but his four ships, and three or four Indian-built vessels called "galivats," manned altogether with less than six hundred men. The appearance of the Portuguese was the signal for fright and submission on the part of the Nawab; but his suit was contemptuously spurned by the Viceroy of Goa, who, on January 20th, advanced upon the company's little fleet. He did not attempt to force the northern entrance of Swally Hole, where the English lay, which would have necessitated an approach singly, but sent on a squadron of the native "frigates" to cross the shoal, surround and attack the Hope, the smallest of the English ships, and board her. But in this they were foiled after a severe conflict. Numbers of the boarders were slain and drowned, and their frigates burned to the water's edge. Again and again during the ensuing three weeks did the Portuguese make efforts to dislodge the English; but the dangerous fire-ships they launched were evaded by night and their onslaught repulsed by day, and so at length, with a loss of five hundred men, the Portuguese viceroy, on February 13th, withdrew.
His withdrawal marked a triumph for the company's men. Downton was received in state by the overjoyed Nawab, who presented him with his own sword, "the hilt of massive gold, and in lieu thereof," says Downton, "I returned him my suit, being sword, dagger, girdle, and hangers, by me much esteemed of, and which made a great deal better show, though of less value."
A week later Downton set out with his great fleet for Bantam. Just off the coast the enemy's fleet was again sighted approaching from the west. For three days the English were in momentary apprehension of an attack, but the Viceroy thought better of it, and on the 6th "bore up with the shore and gave over the hopes of their fortunes by further following of us."