CHAPTER X
NEAR AND FAR
WHEN the English arrived in Bengal, in the seventeenth century, they first settled in Hughly, in the year 1633, nearly sixty years before Calcutta was founded. The Portuguese, who were the earliest European traders in India in modern times, had been in Bengal a hundred years before the English, and it was they who founded the town of Hughly, on the bank of the new course of the Ganges. In process of time the new town drew away the trade of the ancient city of Satgaon, which, deserted by the main stream of the river, was growing yearly more difficult of access for merchant vessels, as the old bed of the stream silted up more and more; and the Portuguese grew rich and powerful, and made their influence felt throughout the land.
It is said that it was in the early years of
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