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Imperial Gazetteer of India, v. 2, p. 451.

XMI] EARL Y EUROPEAN SETTLEAEL.STS 451 artillery. When, in I578, Malacca was again besieged by the king of Achin, the small Portuguese garrison destroyed io,ooo of his men, and all his cannon and junks. Twice again, in i6I5 and for the last time in i628, Malacca was besieged, and on each occasion the Achinese were repulsed with equal bravery. But the increased military forces sent out to resist these attacks proved an insupportable drain on the revenues and population of Portugal. In I580 the Portuguese Crown was united with that of Spanish Spain, under Philip II. This hastened the ruin of the mari- influence, time and commercial supremacy of Portugal in the East. The 158°-'64° . interests of Portugal in Asia were henceforth subordinated to the European interests of Spain; and the enemies of Spain, the Dutch and the English, preyed on the Portuguese as well as on the Spanish commerce. In I640 Portugal again became a separate kingdom. But in the meanwhile the Dutch and English had appeared in the Eastern Seas; and before their indomitable competition the Portuguese empire of the Indies withered away as rapidly as it had sprung up. Between I64I Downfall and I664 the Dutch captured almost all their stations in of Portu- guese in Ceylon and on the coast of Malabar. In I683 the MarAthas India, plundered to the gates of Goa, and in I739 they captured Bas- I641-1739. sein, the northern capital. The further history of the Portu- guese in India is a distressing chronicle of pride, poverty, and misfortune. The native princes pressed upon them from the land. On the sea they gave way to more vigorous European nations. The Dutch were the first European nation who broke The Dutch through the Portuguese monopoly. During the sixteenth in India, century Bruges, Antwerp, and Amsterdam became the great 59 24 emporia whence Eastern produce, imported by the Portuguese, was distributed to Germany, and even to England. At first the Dutch, following in the track of the English, attempted to find their way to India by sailing round the northern coast of Europe and Asia. William Barents is honourably known as the leader of three of these Arctic expeditions, in the last of which he perished. The first Dutchman to double the Cape of Good Hope was Dutch Cornelius Houtman, who reached Sumatra and Bantam in ICdia I596. Within the next five years no less than sixty-five vessels panics. sailed to the Indies. Private companies for trade with the East were formed in many parts of Holland; but in I602 they were all amalgamated by the States-General into 'The United East India Company of the Netherlands,' which was granted Gg2