Shivaji and His Times c16.3

c16.3

Early in January 1660, Shivaji's general Doroji seized the port of Rajapur, in pursuit of three junks of Afzal Khan in which Afzal's agent at Dabhol had fled there with his own and his master's property, on the capture of the latter place by the Marathas (Ch. 10.) From this incident sprang the first collision between the English and the Marathas, but its real cause was not any hindrance offered by Shivaji to the legitimate trade of the East India Company or its servants. It was solely due to the greed and crooked dealing of Mr. Henry Revington, the Chief of the Company's Rajapur factory. An Indian broker employed by him had lent some money to Rustam-i-Zaman and taken a bill for it, falsely in the Company's name as creditor. When Rustam's governor of Rajapur was trying to run away from the invaders in one of the Dabhol junks, the broker influenced Mr. Revington to assist him in getting his money back. Mr. Revington sent an English ship, the *Diamond*, to stop the junk occupied by the governor and make him pay what he falsely represented as "monies due to the Company." A part of the amount was immediately paid in goods. But just then Shivaji's horsemen appeared on the bank to seize the junks of Afzal Khan and called upon the English to give up the one in which the governor was. The English declined, and the governor gladly seized this device for escaping capture by the Marathas and urged the English "to take possession of two of these junks and own them." Mr. Revington took one of the vessels over, renamed it the *Rajapur Merchant*, and placed it under an English captain.