EARLY ENGLISH ADVENTURERS IN THE EAST.*
EVERY one to whom India means anything should road this hook. It " covers tho period which intervened between Drake's circum- navigation of the world at tho close of the sixteenth century and the founding of Calcutta at tho end of the seventeenth century." The merchant-adventurers who sought to found factories or simply to find fortunes stand before us in Mr. Arnold Wright's pages. What marvellous men they wore, with their froobooting instincts, their Puritan principles, their pride, their patriotism, and their humour ! Men of all sorts hoard the Eaat calling in those early days, from Sir Thomas Roo, whom Jamea I. allowed to consider himself an Ambassador (the better to impress " the Groat Mogul "), who went in command of a small fleet, to tho coachman who made part of a present of a coach and four whereby Johangir, son of Akbar, was propitiated. Between those two social extremes we find humble musicians and the immortal Coryat, who wrote the Crudities—an eccentric wit of the English Court who might almost, we suppose, be described as a Court fool. A spirit of indomitable courage inspired them all, for, between sea-fights and scurvy, a larger or smaller number always died on tho voyage. Yet, nothing daunted, thero were always men wanting to go, and grave preparations were mado by home- staying magnates for their temporal and spiritual advantage on tho journey and during their sojourn" among the Moors." " Preachers " were found on all the larger ships, and these adventurous chaplains had to preach trial sermons before the directors of the East India Company and their characters were looked into :— " One, a certain William Evans, who had practised physic for twenty years in France and England and studied divinity for eight years,' was rejected because it was found that as ill a report gooth as any about this town of his coat (cloth),' while another failed to pass Muster as it was discovered that he hath a straggling humour, can frame himself to all company as he finds men affected and delighteth in tobacco and wine. '
Certainly it would not seem desirable that at the Court of Jehangir a respectable English preacher should frame himself to his company, though how ho was to manage without doing so it is difficult to imagine. ' So far as religion went, however, the Great Mogul was no proselytizer. Coryat tells us that ho " liked not shifters in religion."
We hear of one Captain who served out lemon twice daily and kept his whole crew from scurvy ; but his precaution was evidently re- garded as a fad, and other commanders did not take his advice. Bibles and Psalm-books wore supplied to each ship in plenty, together with musical instruments and a few books—such, for instance, as Hakluyt's Voyages and Foxo's Book of Martyrs. Thus equipped for life or death, for the capture of a Portuguese treasure-ship, the chance of capture by the same, for the storm or the pestilence, some of them would arrive in safety with their English manners, customs, prejudices, and even " their coats, their hoson and their hats," intact. On the more strictly commanded of the ships no swearing was allowed, every man's property was safer than at home, no excessive drinking could take plaoe, no fighting amongst the crew, and every kind of good-fellowship and amiable behaviour was encouraged by tho officers. No doubt when fortune favoured a ship's company they enjoyed thoir dangerous journey. When the fates wore unpropitious, however, life was very hard. One gallant Captain writes sadly of his " tried, crest and decayed voyage."
Hero is a picture left by Hawkins (who went to India in 1609) of Jehangir sitting in durbar at Agra :— " Every day at three o'clock Jehangir sat in durbar in high state. All his nobles who happened to be in Agra at the time were expected to attend these functions, and there were present besides a great number of high officials, every man standing in his degree, the chiefest being within a red rail placed three steps above the. level of the ordinary assemblage.' In the midst of the audience chamber, .• Early Engish Adsenturere in the East. By Arnold Wright. London : Andrew Xelroae. 11.0s. 6d. net.1
mmediately in front of the Emperor, was one of his sheriffs, to- gether with his Master Hangman, who is accompanied with forty hangmen, wearing on their heads a certain quilted cap, with an hatchet on their shoulders, and others with all sorts of whips, being there ready to do what the King commandoth.' At this assemblage the Emperor was accustomed to administer justice after the manner of his father, but without the groat Akbar's acumen or his mag- nanimity and tolerance. When the official work was done he retired to his private place of prayer.' His devotions ended, he had his principal meal, which consisted of four or five sorts of roasted meat washed down with a draught of strong drink.' Thereafter he re- paired to his private room, ' where none can come but such as himself nominateth.' Hawkins, however, was regularly commanded to the imperial drinking don." •
Roe was the first of these early adventurers who conducted himself as a Prince and not as a merchant. Now and then even he had to affect a certain humility with Johangir to gain his ends ; but he hated to do it, and writes home to his " directors " : " A meaner agent would among these proud Moores better effect your business. . . . I have moderated it according to my discretion, but with a swollen heart." Jehangir, according to Roe's accounts, was a crud, drunken brute, who yet had some notion of justice,
and even, as we have seen, some idealism, especially in his cups :— " I am a King ; you shall be welcome—Christians, Moors, Jews— all shall be welcome.' He modled not with faith. They canto all in love, and he would protect them from wrong. They lived in Ilia safety and none should oppress them. And this often re- peated, but in extreme drunkenness."
Roo refused calmly to conform to Court etiquette in the matter of slavish flattery to the degenerato son of Akbar, who certainly thought the more of him for his proud bearing. He tolls in his diary of his first reception in the " inner court, where, ' high in a gallory, with a canopy over him and a carpet before him, sat in groat and barbarous state the Groat Mogul.' Proceeding towards him through a lane of people Roo was met by an official, who told him that ho must touch the ground with his head and with his hat off. Tho ambassador proudly replied that he came in honour to see the prince and was free from the custom of servants. So,' proceeds Roo, I passed on until I came to a place railed in right under him with an ascent of three stops whore I made him reverence and ho bowed his body ; and so wont within it. I demanded a chair, but was answered no man over sat in that place, but I was desired as a courtesy to ease myself against a pillar covered with silver that held up his canopy.' " Can we not see the Englishman to whom the Great Mogul, in the midst of all his theatrical display, is after all " a Moor," a man of an inferior race I He made a deep impression. Tho ladies of the harem wore keen to ace him :- "Genuine curiosity prompted some whom ho understood to bo the Emperor's principal wives to break holes in the rood screen which hung before their box in order to gaze at him. The holoa apparently wore so largo that he was able to discern the full proportion ' of the ladies. They wore,' ho states, ' indifferently white with black hair smooth up (tho forehead),' and if there had been no other light to enable him to distinguish their features the diamonds they woro would have sufficed to show them. When I looked up,' he adds, they retired, and were so merry that I suppose they laughed at me.' " Tho East remains the same, and modern Anglo-Indians still tell of the giggling which goes on among the " Purdah " ladies.
Wo could quote for ever from these delightful pages. Relations between the white merchants, the Dutch, the Portuguese, and the English, are no less exciting and no less amusing, no loss terrible in their detailed history, than those between the white and dark races Towards the end of the century we come to more settled times. Thomas Pitt, while perhaps the greatest, was almost the last of the merchant-adventurers. Tho monopoly of the Company was constantly threatened by " Interlopers " at this period. Pitt wont to India as an " Interloper " and the directors exhausted every effort to ruin him ; but he had the good fortune which so often follows immense ability, and he understood the East and its rulers. "A. gawdy show and great noise add much to a public person's credit in this country," laments one of the Company's servants, who describes in his diary tho good reception accorded to a party of " Interlopers " visiting a native Court. Pitt outdid the Company in brains as well as show. Ho gave himself out as the agent of a newly formed company that was to succeed the old organization. The native Princes believed him, and at last the directors wore thankful to make terms and take the " desperate follow " to their bosoms. In 1697 we fmd him President of Fort St. George. The genius of his illustrious grandson was foreshadowed in his adminis- tration, and he did not leave India till 1709, when he returned to England, entered Parliament, and died in his bed after seventeen tempestuous years in this country.
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