and prudent man who governed it, despite the neglect of the Company at Paris, it prospered. The village was gradually transformed into a handsome town with regular streets. This, too, whilst receiving no increase of Europeans from home. On the contrary, in 1689, the sixty Martin had brought with him had diminished by deaths to thirty-six. Thanks to permission granted by the son of Sivájí, regular fortifications, laid out it is recorded by a Capuchin monk, were at this period added to the town. The settlement began to be talked about by the sailors who visited the coast as a place of great future promise. Its trade increased. The one thing it required was attention from home.
The reputation it had acquired became at length a cause of peril. In 1693, the Dutch, determined to root out the traders of rival powers, fitted out and despatched to the Indian seas a fleet of nineteen sail of the line, having on board 1,500 infantry besides sailors. It was the most imposing armament which had ever been despatched to India. At the end of August, of the same year, it appeared before Pondichery. The resources of Martin were quite inadequate to meet the threatened attack. He had thirty-six Europeans, from 300 to 400 drilled native troops, and six guns. However, he prepared for a vigorous defence. But the odds were too great. On the 6th of September, after a resistance which had lasted twelve days, he was forced to demand a parley. The parley resulted two days later in a
