Remonstrantie 6.1.1

6.1.1

Our trade in this country can be conducted with great profit, honour, and reputation to the Honourable Company, if our employers will place reliance on the proposals put forward as a matter of duty by their servants, whether based on credible testimony, intrinsically sound arguments, or personal experience. The spice trade in particular can be adequately maintained if our employers will believe us, because they control the whole produce of the trees, produce which is yielded in sufficient quantities nowhere in the world except in the Moluccas and Banda. What I want to urge is that our employers should send to the Coromandel Coast only so much spice as is consumed locally in the Carnatic, Golconda, and the vicinity, an amount which I conjecture to be less than 200 maunds, or 10,000 [lb.] of cloves, and as much nutmeg, with six sockels of mace. This is probably an over-estimate rather than too little, for the whole [population] of the Carnatic consists of Klings, or Hindus, who use little or no spice, while in Golconda, and also in Malik Ambar's camp, the people are as poor as they are haughty — almost like Spaniards in the street, but thrifty and mean in their kitchens. The Mogul soldiers on the other hand differ little from Europeans, who eat spiced food very readily, and consequently their consumption is proportionately greater.