A History of the Mahrattas v1.c22.72

v1.c22.72

Although Bombay was then insignificant, it afterwards became a great English settlement, and the subtle part which its chief² acted on that occasion, leaves room to regret that political animosity and the spirit of commercial rivalry should have tended to a conduct which certainly in some degree detracts from our national reputation. Like everything of the kind it was exaggerated by the exasperated feelings of the other party, and although it must be admitted that the Portuguese had great reason to complain, their assertion that the English assisted the Mahrattas in the defence of Tannah, and that an English gunner pointed the cannon which killed their commander,¹ appears from all contemporary authority to be totally unfounded. We are also bound in justice to add, in regard to such part of the conduct of the English as deserves censure, that it was principally to be ascribed to the treatment they had experienced from the Portuguese. Bombay, with its dependencies, was ceded by the crown of Portugal to Charles II, in 1661, as the dowry of his queen. In the year following, when the English appeared and demanded possession, the Portuguese refused to give up Salsette, which they, contrary to what had always been understood, declared was not a dependency of Bombay. The English at first declined receiving any part of the cession, and the troops they had brought, five hundred in number, were landed on the island of Aujeedeva. But three hundred and eighty-one of them having fallen a sacrifice to the climate of that unhealthy spot, Ensign Humphray Cooke, who became the surviving commander, was glad to accept of Bombay on any terms. When the Portuguese, therefore, were dispossessed of Salsette by the Mahrattas, it was natural for the English, in a public point of view,² to regard their misfortunes without regret, especially as it afforded a better chance of one day obtaining or conquering from the Mahrattas what they could not recover as their just rights from the Portuguese.³