Travels in India (Tavernier) 85.2.3

85.2.3

The cargo of the vessels will be in readiness before they arrive in port. Being quickly laden they will be able to seize the good season for their return. The Company will not be compelled by necessity to sell at a bad price to three or four local wholesale merchants who have made themselves masters of the trade, whereas its brokers will be enabled to await the arrival of foreign merchants who will come to carry away its goods, or rather, because they will have the means to have them exported to the places where they will themselves be able to dispose of them. It should be remarked, besides, that it is profitable to carry gold and silver to India in bullion rather than in coin, because gold and silver are not valued in India except by their standard, and because there is always a deduction on coined money on account of the cost of minting. Should the broker be unfaithful, he is, moreover, able to come to an understanding with the master of the Mogul’s mint, established in every port in the Empire, and to value the gold or silver, coined or in bars, at a lower standard than it really is, by telling the Commander and his Council that in the assay which has been made at the mint it is found to be only of such a standard.