It Is Remarkable That The Portuguese Were Allowed To Monopolize Indian
Commerce For So Long A Time As They Did;
This, however, as Dr. Robertson
observes, may be accounted for, "from the political circumstances in the
state of all those
Nations in Europe, whose intrusion as rivals the
Portuguese had any reason to dread. From the accession of Charles V. to the
throne, Spain was either so much occupied in a multiplicity of operations
in which it was engaged by the ambition of that monarch, and of his son
Philip II., or so intent on prosecuting its own discoveries and conquests
in the New World, that although by the successful enterprize of Magellan,
its fleets were unexpectedly conducted by a new course to that remote
region of Asia, which was the seat of the most gainful and alluring branch
of trade carried on by the Portuguese, it could make no considerable effect
to avail itself of the commercial advantages which it might have derived
from that event. By the acquisition of the crown of Portugal, in the year
1580, the kings of Spain, instead of the rivals, became the protectors of
the Portuguese trade, and the guardians of all its exclusive rights.
Throughout the sixteenth century, the strength and resources of France were
so much wasted by the fruitless expeditions of their monarchs to Italy; by
their unequal contest with the power and policy of Charles V., and by the
calamities of the civil wars which desolated the kingdom upwards of forty
years, that it could neither bestow much attention on commerce, nor engage
in any scheme of distant enterprize. The Venetians, how sensibly soever
they might feel the mortifying reverse of being excluded almost entirely
from the Indian trade, of which their capital had been formerly the chief
seat, were so debilitated and humbled by the league of Cambray, that they
were no longer capable of engaging in any undertaking of magnitude.
England, weakened by the long contests between the houses of York and
Lancaster, and just beginning to recover its proper vigour, was restrained
from active exertions during one part of the sixteenth century, by the
cautious maxims of Henry VII., and wasted its strength, during another part
of it, by engaging inconsiderately in the wars between the princes on the
continent. The nation, though destined to acquire territories in India more
extensive and valuable than were ever possessed by any European power, had
no such presentiment of its future eminence there, as to take an early part
in the commerce or transactions of that country, and a great part of the
century elapsed before it began to turn its attention to the East.
"While the most considerable nations in Europe found it necessary, from the
circumstances which I have mentioned, to remain inactive spectators of what
passed in the East, the seven United Provinces of the Low Countries,
recently formed into a small state, still struggling for political
existence, and yet in the infancy of its power, ventured to appear in the
Indian Ocean as the rivals of the Portuguese; and, despising their
pretensions to an exclusive right of commerce with the extensive countries
to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, invaded that monopoly which they
had hitherto guarded with such jealous attention.
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