The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c23.s2.14

v4.c23.s2.14

After that the Portuguese ceased to be his enemies and became his tools. They centred at Chittagong and intermarried with the people there. They served the Arakanese in holding Sandwīp island, Noākhāli and Backergunge districts, and the Sunderbans delta south of Calcutta, and raiding up to Dacca and even Murshidābād, while Tippera sent propitiatory tribute. After they had sacked Dacca, his capital, in 1625, the Moghul governor felt so unsafe that for a time he lived farther inland. For generations an iron chain was stretched across the Hooghly river between Calcutta and Sibpur to prevent their entrance. In a single month, February 1727, they carried off 1800 captives from the southern parts of Bengal; the king chose the artisans, about one-fourth, to be his slaves, and the rest were sold at prices varying from 20 to 70 rupees a head and set to work on the land as slaves;¹ sometimes the sales were to Dutch, English and French merchants in the Indian ports. They would pierce the hands of their captives, pass a strip of cane through the hole, and fling them under the deck strung together like hens; a baby which cried would be decapitated under its mother's eyes, and its body flung overboard. A favourite formation was to sweep the sea in line, so as to cover a large area, but a hundred Bengal ships would flee at the sight of four Magh ships, and if they found they were being overtaken, the crews would fling themselves overboard and drown sooner than meet the Arakanese hand to hand.²