It is curious to observe that the whole line of coast between the mouth of the Euphrates and Cape Comorin, has been infamous for the piratical propensities of the many and various tribes that inhabit it. The Persian Gulf still requires the presence of our armed cruisers; the ancient annals of Scinde enlarge upon its celebrity for robbery; the Coolies of Kutch and Guzerat were known as pirates from Marco Polo’s time till A.D. 1800; the Angria territory was a nest of thieves till we destroyed their fleet; and Tavernier testifies that the natives of Malabar were not inferior in enterprise to their northern brethren.
[5] They lie in lat. 15° 52´ 30´´, about thirty-five miles from Goa, and seven off the shore, from which they are separated by a deep channel. The group consists of more than twenty small rocks, amongst which are six or seven about as large as the Sirens Isles in the Gulf of Salerno. The Greeks called them Σησεκρειεναι, which Mr. Hamilton understands to signify “black rabbits;” and Vincent supposes them to have been so termed, because in form they may be fancied to resemble those animals crouching.
[6] Porters and labourers.
[7] The Portuguese tongue.
[8] Their other great clerical establishment being the Seminary at Rachol, a town which, when the Portuguese first came to India, was the capital of the province of Salsette. In Tavernier’s time the Jesuits had no less than five religious houses at Goa.
[9] He raised the standard of revolt against the Indian government spiritedly but unsuccessfully.
[10] “All thieves at Parga.”
[11] The name given to that breed of ponies on account of their extraordinary viciousness.
[12] At that time, however, this horrible instrument of religious tyranny seems to have lost much of its original activity. When the dungeons were thrown open there was not a single prisoner within the walls, and Mons. de Kleguen asserts that no one then living remembered having seen an Auto da Fé.
[13] About the end of the sixteenth century the Dutch sent ships round the Cape, and soon managed to secure the best part of the Eastern trade, formerly monopolized by the Portuguese.