CALCUTTA: PAST AND PRESENT
was a religious settlement of the Portuguese, founded by Augustinian friars from Goa. The Bandel church is the oldest building for Christian worship in Bengal; it was built in 1660, and contains the keystone of an earlier church, dated 1599, which was destroyed when Hughly was taken by the Mohammedans.
The French, when they arrived in Bengal, built their factory a few miles further down the river than Chinsurah, at Chandernagore, which, after many vicissitudes, is still French territory at the present day. Captain Hamilton, the free-spoken old trader, wrote severely of the French at Chandernagore, who,—
"for want of money, are not in a capacity to trade. They have a few private families dwelling near the factory, and a pretty little church to hear mass in, which is the chief business of the French in Bengal."
The matter-of-fact captain visited Chandernagore about 1720; by 1740 the town had been transformed under the energetic rule of Dupleix; and when, in 1742, the European traders were allowed, in consideration of the turbulent state of the country, to fortify their settlements, the French built an imposing fort, which they called Fort Orleans, and which was much stronger than
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