Lavish life of Englishmen
A slice of history
By Pramod Sangar

AS a great entrepot of the Mughal Empire on the western coast of India, Surat was in the words of a contemporary traveller "a city of very great trade in all classes of merchandise, a very important seaport and frequented by many ships from Malabar and other parts". Thomas Ald-Worth, the president of English East India Company, felt that through the whole Indies there cannot be any place more beneficial for our country than this, being the only key to open all rich and best trade of the Indies for the sale of our commodities especially cloth." Surat during the 17th century rose to be a premier trading centre and coastal town due to its strategic position. The English and the Dutch lost to no time in establishing their settlements at Surat. The English factory at Surat was visited by a number of European travellers, including Pietro Della Valle (1624), Thomas Herbert (1629), Tevernier (1635), Mandelslo (1628), Bernier (1644) and Thevenot in (1666). But the detailed accounts of the everyday life of the Englishmen at Surat and the working of the factory can be found in the pages of John Fryer, an English surgeon at Surat and Bombay. Another important personality was Padre J. Ovington, a chaplin who made a brief stay at Surat. He gave a graphic description of the various aspects of the English trade and the social and cultural life led by Englishmen at Surat.

The German traveller Mandelslo, who visited Surat in 1638, has corroborated the early accounts and has given us first-hand information about Englishmen’s sojourns at Surat. He stayed at Surat for only five months but has furnished some interesting details. The town, according to the learned traveller, had three gates, one of which led to Cambay and Ahmedabad after crossing the Tapti river. The second led to Burhanpur and the third to Navsari. The castle had a spacious maidan (ground) in front of it. Nearby was the governor’s palace and adjoining it was the bazaar for foreign as well as local merchants. The Mughal governor was in charge of the city. It was his business to administer justice and look after the customs on goods imported and exported. The duty was three-and-a-half per cent ad valorem on all commodities, except gold and silver.

Mandelslo writes further that the English president lived in great style and was assisted by a retinue of servants. The English and the Dutch had spacious and well-built houses known as lodges.

The English president managed the affairs of the company with the help of 20 to 24 merchants and officers, and had under his superintendence the factories at Agra, Ahmedabad, Baroda and Broach. Dr Fryer, in an eye-witness account of the day-to-day functioning of the English factors, writes that the president had his own suite "with noble rooms for counsel and entertainment, and seldom dined in the hall". Another important aspect noticed by a contemporary writer was that the English factory was made like a college monastery, a house under religious order than any other". The factors, as at college in Oxford or Cambridge, dined together in the Hall, and attended daily prayers in the chapel. Discipline was strictly observed. The company tried its best to repress all "disorderly and un-Christian behaviour". Ovington rightly remarked that "the Agents and chiefs, in their several factories, take care to prevent all profane swearing and taking the name of God in vain by cursed oaths, all drunkenness and intemperance, all fornication and uncleanliness".

The wrongdoers were severely reprimanded for their rude behaviour and as a punishment were sent to England by "the next ship". Marriages, adds the Ovington, with the nationals of the country were strictly forbidden.

The staff of the factory consisted of the president, ware-house keeper, secretary, senior factors, chaplin, surgeon, the junior factor and writers or apprentices.

The office of the president was of immense dignity and importance. The president controlled all the English factories in western India and Persia and Bantam for a considerable time. The president was usually appointed from England and enjoyed great authority at the company’s headquarters. He received a salary of £ 500 per annum. He served for three to five years. He lived in state, he dined in his own apartment except on festive occasions and went out in a palanquin preceeded by guarded flagmen and mace bearers, with an ostrich feather fan, like the noblemen of the Mughal Court. Mandelslo too testifies the account of the various travellers about the majestic position enjoyed by the president of the English East India Company.

John Fryer remarks that English factors began their day with the prayers. Then business was transacted. Trade was principally in the hands of baniyas or brokers. Tavernier described baniyas as the crafty race of merchants, who were experts in handling any complicated business transaction. The company had on its rolls her own brokers — who were supposed to supply the goods collected from the local merchants or artisans much before the shipping season. For that the advance money was doled out to them by the English factors. The principal exports collected from various parts of the country, main were various kinds of collection goods, calicoes, Baftas etc.

At noon the office was closed and the factors went to the dining hall. For the most part, the English enjoyed such food at Surat as they had in England. The food consisted of beef, mutton, chicken meat of pigeons dressed by the English cooks in their own manner. Dinner was a grand affair. Padre Ovington, a priest who had evidently not learnt to abandon the pleasures of the table, describes it with evident gusto and involvement. All the dishes and cups were of pure silver, "massy and substantial". Before lunch a large silver ewer and basin for washing hands was taken round by a peon. Indian, Portuguese and English cooks were employed to "please the curiosity of every palate." Ovington further goes on to add that pilaus (pulao), cabab, curries with plenty of chutneys and fowl stewed in butter and stuffed with almonds and raisins were ordinary dishes. This was "washed down with plenty of generous shiraj" and arrack served round the table. On Sundays and holidays, the meal was made more large. Persian fruits such as apricots, plums and cherries were also enjoyed by the English. European wines and bottled beer were also added and served with regularity. A wealthy Indian who sometimes ate at the factory premises was pleasantly surprised to know that sometimes the meal ran to 16 courses. But the fatal consequences of consuming wine and eating meat led to sickness and premature deaths of various Englishmen at Surat, Calcutta and Bombay.

Peter Mundy also mentions that occasionally the English were also served the flesh of fowls, antelopes and wild boar. Occasionally, however they had dopiaza and rice, khichri and pickled mangoes. The author further adds that the English used arrack as a strong drink and beer made of sugar. Sometimes they used a composition of arrack, water, sugar and lime juice which was called charebockhra (char-bakhra, four portions divisions). After lunch, all retired for a siesta. Work started again at four. At six, the factory was cleared of outsiders and the gates were closed. Prayers were again read, after which supper was served. At supper, the president often made his appearance; the meal was an informal one, and on sultry nights were often laid in the groves or garden near the water side. After this, no one was allowed to stir out until the gates were opened at dawn the following morning. The English also owned a fair garden outside the town to which all the factors went on Sundays, after the sermon. Mandelslo and other visitors have given a detailed account of the Surat garden which was a happy meeting place of English factors.

Taken as a whole, the life in a factory in the East was both dangerous and wearisome. Between the departure of the one annual fleet and the arrival of the next, the factors were entirely cut off from the outer world. The mortality, especially in a place like Bombay, was very high. This was partly due to the excessive indulgence of the factors in meat and liquor. This brings us to the last scene in the factors’ lives. The tombs in the English cemetry at Surat are unique in many ways. They were evidently constructed to catch the attention of sightseers and stand as monuments to the respectability and dignity of company’s servants.