File:Map of Bombay and the Adjacent Coast.jpg

English: Identifier: comprehensivehis01beve

Title: A comprehensive history of India, civil, military, and social, from the first landing of the English to the suppression of the Sepoy revolt; including an outline of the early history of Hindoostan Year: 1900 (1900s) Authors: Beveridge, Henry, 1837-1929 Subjects: Publisher: London, Blackie Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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Text Appearing Before Image: beenbefore by an event to which it is nownecessary to attend. In June, 1661,two months after granting the abovecharter, Charles II. married the In-fanta Catherine of Portugal, andobtained, as part of her doAvry, theport and island Bombay in the EastIndies, together with all the rights,profits, teiTitories, and appurtenancesthereof whatsoever. The island ofBombay, stretching eight miles fromnorth-east to south-west, with anaverage breadth of three miles, hasan estimated area of Httle more thaneighteen square miles. Its value,however, must not be judged by itssuperficial extent. By land-lockinga deep bay in a central locality, itforms the very best harbour in India.The use of such a harbour had longbeen earnestly desired by the Company; and it was now secured in the be.stpossible form by becoming the property of the Briti.sh crown, and consequentlynot liable to be interfered with on any pretext by the native powers. In March, 1662, the English government de.spatched to the East Indies a

Text Appearing After Image: Chap. V.] ACQUISITION OF BOMBAY. 815 fleet of five men-of-war, under the conmiand of the Earl of AJarlboroimh. On ad. iooj. o boaid the fleet were a viceroy from Portugal, authorized formally to completethe cession of the island, and Sir Abraham Shipman, with 500 soldiers, to takepossession and thereafter remain as the first English governor. No opposition Difficulties in obtaining appears to have been anticipated; but the Portuguese at Bombay, naturally ixjssossionunwilHng to be handed over to a foreign powei, took advantage of someambiguities in the treaty by which the island was ceded, and refused to dtdiverit up. The English were themselves partly to blame for the unexpected oppo-sition, because instead of being satisfied with the port and island Bombay,which was all that the treaty with Portugal expressly granted, they insistedthat this grant conferred with it a right to all the Portuguese stations in thatlocality, and more especially to the i.sland of Salsette, only separated fr

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