222 FIRST SETTLEMENTS ON THE MADRAS COAST bandar, " Fishport ") lay north of the great projection of fen-lands and mud-banks formed by the mouths of the Kistna (as Pettapoli lay to the south) and was to that extent better protected from the monsoon. Around it stretched a dreary expanse of sand, flooded into swamps during the months of the rains. To seawards, silt-bars and sand deposits make it unsafe for large modern ships to anchor within five miles of the shore, A LANDING AT MASULIPATAM. and from October to December the monsoon often ren- ders it unapproachable. Yet it formed a coveted road- stead on the open coast-line of Madras, and became the scene of bitter rivalries— English, Dutch, and French. Its earliest surviving tombstone commemorates the " Chief by Water and by Land of the Dutch India Company on the Coromandel Coast. Died August 29, 1624.' ' A later but more romantic memorial of the English settlers long shaded their dusty evening drive, and was known as "-Eliza's Tree; " after Sterne's
