delivered
at Surat, there is represented on the margin, a figure of the eighth
part of a cubit of the town of Surat, divided into three tasus.
I
ought to commence this list of goods with the most precious of all,
namely diamonds and coloured stones ; but, as that subject is somewhat
extensive, and is the most important of my accounts, I shall give it
separate treatment, and mention is this chapter only silks, cloths,
cottons, spices, and drugs, which five classes include all the kinds of
merchandise obtained from India.
Concerning Silks.
Kasimbàzar1
a village in the Kingdom of Bengal, can furnish about 22,000 bales of
silk annually, each bale weighing 100 livres. The 22,000 bales weigh
2,200,000 livres at 16 onces to the livre. The Dutch generally took,
either for Japan or for Holland, 6,000 to 7,000 bales of it, and they
would have liked to get more, but the merchants of Tartary and of the
whole Mogul Empire opposed their doing so, for these merchants took as
much as the Dutch, and the balance remained with the people of the
country for the manufacture of their own stuffs. All these silks are
brought to the Kingdom of Gujarat, and the greater part come to
Ahmadâbâd and Surat, where they are woven into fabrics.
Firstly,
carpets of silk and gold, others of silk, gold, and silver, and others
altogether of silk, are made in Surat. As for the woollen carpets, they
are made at Fatehpur,2 12 coss from Agra.
1
Kasembazar in original, elsewhere Cosenbazar, for Käsimbäzär. The decay
of Käsimbäzär, in the Murshidäbäd District, Bengal, dates from the
beginning of the nineteenth century, when its climate, once celebrated
for its salubrity, underwent an unexplained change for the worse, so
that the margin of cultivation receded and wild beasts increased (Imperial Gazetteer, xi. 23). The trade in Indian silk has recently declined according to the figures given by Watt (Commercial Products, 1024 ff.).
a
Vettapour in the original, Fatehpur Sikri, which is 23 miles W.S.W. of
Agra. See vol. i, p. 73. It was founded as the Metropolis of the Mogul
Empire by Akbar in 1570. Previously it bore the name of Sikri. Its
magnificence is testified by the ruins of palaces and mosques, which
stul attract many visitors. Its industries were numerous, including
silk-spinning, weaving, and stone-cutting. At present the carpets
produced there are of an inferior and coarse kind. For the building of
