chap, xii SILKEN FABRICS 3
In
the second place, satins with bands of gold and silver, some with bands
of different colours, and some all uniform are made there, and it is
the same with the taffetas.
Thirdly, patoles,1
which are stuffs of silk, very soft, decorated all over with flowers of
different colours, are manufactured at Ahmadäbäd. They vary in price
from 8 to 40 rupees the piece. This is one of the profitable
investments of the Dutch, who do not permit any member of their Company
to engage in this private trade. They are exported to the Philippines,
Borneo, Java, Sumatra, and other neighbouring countries.
As
for crude silks, it should be remarked that none of them are naturally
white except that of Palestine, of which even the merchants of Aleppo
and Tripoli experience difficulty in obtaining but a small quantity.
Thus the silk of Käsimbäzär is yellow, as are all the crude silks which
come from Persia and Sicily. But the people of Käsimbäzär know how to
bleach theirs with a lye made of the ashes of a tree which is called
Adam's fig,2 which makes it as white as the silk of
Palestine. The Dutch carry their silks and the other goods they obtain
in Bengal by the canal 3 which connects Käsimbäzär with the
Ganges ; this canal is nearly 15 leagues long. There remains an equal
distance to descend by the Ganges to Hugly, where their goods a»e
shipped on board Dutch vessels.
Fatehpur Sikr see Smith, Akbar the Great Mogul, 104 ff. : for its trade in carpets Aïn-i-Akbarï, ii. 181 ; Imperial Gazetteer, xii. 86.
1 This is from the Kanarese pattuda, ' a silk cloth ' (Yule, Bobson-Jobson, 686).
Terry calls them pintadoes, and extols the art displayed in stitching
together ' fresh coloured taffata and pintadoes, and taffata and satin,
with cotton wool between, to make quilts '. (A Voyage to East India, ed.
1777, 127.) The pintado was properly a chintz. In Bombay the term
patolâ is applied to the robe worn by a bride (T. N. Hukharji, Art Manufactures of India, 360).
* Adam's
fig is a translation of the Portuguese name for the plantain, Musa
paradisiaca. The Musalmäns believe that its leaves were used by Adam
and Eve to clothe themselves with in the Garden of Eden. Hence the
name. The ash of the plantain resembles that of the potato, as it
contains both potash and soda salts, and the percentage of phosphoric
acid and magnesia is said to be about the same in both. Ashes of the
leaves and roots of the plantain are still used in Bengal for this
purpose (Watt, Diet. Economic Products, v. 296 ; F. Buchanan, in Martin, Eastern India, iii. 964).
* Tavernier has ' canal ', probably ' channel '.
