Calendar of State Papers: Colonial, East Indies, 1625-1629. (Rolls Series.) Longman & Co. 1884.
Mr. Sainsbury has brought out a fourth volume of the “Calendar of East India State Papers,” which, in point of intrinsic interest and editorial treatment, will suffer by comparison with none of its predecessors. Any authoritative compilation, dealing with the vast collection of materials available for the history of British Colonies in their official relations with the parent State, is sure to command the widest interest; and such a work, when treating of the early and truly wayward fortune of the mighty national stake contained in our Indian Empire, should be peculiarly attractive to the countrymen of Clive and Warren Hastings.
The original documents calendered in the present volume consist, as before, chiefly of the Court minutes of the East India Company, domestic State papers and correspondence, original correspondence, East India State papers, and Holland correspondence. The light which these combine to throw upon the contemporary history of our greatest trading community is sometimes almost painfully intense.
The Company in 1625 was in truth placed in both a dangerous and a helpless position. The Amboyne massacre of three years before was as yet not only unpunished, but almost unreproved, except by the voice of popular indignation in England. We may, in fact, estimate the inaction of the Government to a certain extent in proportion to the violence of this outcry against “that most bloody and treacherous villainy.” It was in the spring of this year (1625), we read here, that the crisis provoked by official supineness was reached, a popular outbreak against Dutch residents being apprehended on the approaching Shrove Tuesday. This movement had been fanned by certain incendiary pamphlets; by a picture, and by a play, each reflecting strongly upon the inhumanity of the Dutch towards English traders. The picture, in especial, appears to have been a masterpiece of animosity, for therein was “lively, largely, and artificially” set forth the interior of the supposed Torture Chamber at Amboyne. Now that a tardy justice was about to be dealt to the judicial murderers of their fellows, the Company was content to permit the picture itself to be suppressed. Yet that the members were secretly proud of their manifesto is apparent from their naïve regret that “His Majesty and their Lordships” had not been “presented with a view of this horrid spectacle.” Owing to the precautions of the Council, the fateful day passed without an outbreak, but none the less, as the editor justly observes, the sore rankled long in the hearts of true-born Englishmen. At length reprisals were instituted, and three Dutch ships were arrested at Portsmouth, only to be released, in return, as the popular rumour went, for a secret bribe of three tons of gold. Finally, the dispute was allowed to drag out its slow length in diplomatic correspondence, and a party-trial in Holland.
The remaining features of interest in this volume are connected with the private details of the Company’s financial ventures, and these reveal a state of affairs most melancholy to contemplate. To such a depth of poverty had the once flourishing Company sunk, that in 1629, with a debt of £300,000 already incurred, the Governor was compelled to confess their inability to advance £10,000 to the Crown towards the expenses of the French War. At the same time, too, every investment in the Far East turned out disastrously. The Dutch not only pillaged English factories with impunity, but openly thwarted any chance of carrying on a lucrative trade, by forcing their own spices upon English factors at ruinous prices. Moreover, the constitutions of our countrymen too often succumbed to the pestilential swamps and jungles of New Holland. Then the natives, as usual an unreliable element, both broke their contracts and ill-treated the Company’s factors, in spite of their “accursed oaths to the contrary.” Yet in the end British constancy and enterprise prevailed. Fresh subscriptions poured in, new ships were fitted out, and returned laden with ample wealth. The English merchantmen stoutly held their own against the Dutch pirates, and beat them off—one ship (the Lion) against ten—in an action that recalled the glories of Grenville and his Revenge. Therefore it will be seen that this volume closes with a happier augury of renewed peace and prosperity.
Doctor Johnson: His Life, Works and Table Talk. (Centenary edition.) T. Fisher Unwin. 1884.
It was inevitable that the Centenary of Dr. Johnson’s death should recall into existence some at least of his contributions to English literature, and Mr. Unwin has done well in publishing at this moment a choice selection from the “burly Doctor’s” works, under the above title. The little brochure on our table by no means exhausts that mine of wealth which is to be found in the writings of Dr. Johnson; but, so far as it goes, it is carefully and conscientiously selected, and ought to be most welcome to his many admirers.
Johnsoniana. Arranged by R. W. Montagu. Boot & Son. 1884.
A most appropriate and well-timed collection of the best of Dr. Johnson’s sayings and opinions, gleaned not only from Boswell but from other sources. These are arranged in chapters under separate headings. Is it by accident, or by set purpose, we wonder, that one chapter is devoted to “Love, Friendship, and Affection,” and another to “Marriage”? The life of Johnson prefixed to this little volume is a happy model of condensation. Published at a shilling, it ought to command just now a very large sale.
Pottery and Porcelaìn. By F. Litchfield. Bickers. 1884.