Chapter FACTOR to FACTORY of F by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

FACTOR to FACTORY

FACTOR, s. Originally a commercial agent; the executive head of a factory. Till some 55 years ago the Factors formed the third of the four classes into which the covenanted civil servants of the Company were theoretically divided, viz. Senior Merchants, Junior Merchants, factors and writers. But these terms had long ceased to have any relation to the occupation of these officials, and even to have any application at all except in the nominal lists of the service. The titles, however, continue (through vis inertiae of administration in such matters) in the classified lists of the Civil Service for years after the abolition of the last vestige of the Company’s trading character, and it is not till the publication of the E. I. Register for the first half of 1842 that they disappear from that official publication. In this the whole body appears without any classification; and in that for the second half of 1842 they are divided into six classes, first class, second class, &c., an arrangement which, with the omission of the 6th class, still continues. Possibly the expressions Factor, Factory, may have been adopted from the Portuguese Feitor, Feitoria. The formal authority for the classification of the civilians is quoted under 1675.

1501.—“With which answer night came on, and there came aboard the Captain Mór that Christian of Calecut sent by the Factor (feitor) to say that Cojebequi assured him, and he knew it to be the case, that the King of Calecut was arming a great fleet.’ —Correa, i. 250.

1582.—“The Factor and the Catuall having seen these parcels began to laugh thereat.”—Castañeda, tr. by N. L., f. 464.

1600.—“Capt. Middleton, John Havard, and Francis Barne, elected the three principal Factors. John Havard, being present, willingly accepted.”—Sainsbury, i. 111.

c. 1610.—“Les Portugais de Malaca ont des commis et facteurs par toutes ces Isles pour le trafic.”—Pyrard de Laval, ii. 106. [Hak. Soc. ii. 170].

1653.—“Feitor est vn terme Portugais signifiant vn Consul aux Indes.”—De la Boullaye-le-Gouz, ed. 1657, p. 538.

1666.—“The Viceroy came to Cochin, and there received the news that Antonio de Sà, Factor (Fator) of Coulam, with all his officers, had been slain by the Moors.”— Faria y Sousa, i. 35.

1675–6.—“For the advancement of our Apprentices, we direct that, after they have served the first five yeares, they shall have £10 per annum, for the last two yeares; and having served these two yeares, to be entertayned one year longer, as Writers, and have Writers’ Sallary: and having served that yeare, to enter into y^e degree of Factor, which otherwise would have been ten yeares. And knowing that a distinction of titles is, in many respects necessary, we do order that when the Apprentices have served their times, they be stiled Writers; and when the Writers have served their times, they be stiled Factors, and Factors having served their times to be stiled Merchants; and Merchants having served their times to be stiled Senior Merchants.”—Ext. of Court’s Letter in Bruce’s Annals of the E.I. Co., ii. 374–5.

1689.—“These are the chief Places of Note and Trade where their Presidents and Agents reside, for the support of whom, with their Writers and Factors, large Privileges and Salaries are allowed.”—Ovington, 386. (The same writer tells, us that Factors got £40 a year; junior Factors, £15; Writers, £7. Peons got 4 rupees a month. P. 392.)

1711.—Lockyer gives the salaries at Madras as follows: “The Governor, £200 and £100 gratuity; 6 Councillors, of whom the chief (2nd?) had £100, 3d. £70, 4th. £50, the others £40, which was the salary of 6 Senior Merchants. 2 Junior Merchants £30 per annum; 5 Factors, £15; 10 Writers, £5; 2 Ministers, £100; 1 Surgeon, £36.

“Attorney- General has 50 Pagodas per Annum gratuity.

“Scavenger 100 do.” (p. 14.)

c. 1748.—“He was appointed to be a Writer in the Company’s Civil Service, becoming … after the first five (years) a factor.”—Orme, Fragments, viii.

1781.—“Why we should have a Council and Senior and Junior Merchants, factors and writers, to load one ship in the year (at Penang), and to collect a very small revenue, appears to me perfectly incomprehensible.” —Corresp. of Ld. Cornwallis, i. 390.

1786.—In a notification of Aug. 10th, the subsistence of civil servants out of employ is fixed thus:—

A Senior Merchant—£400	sterling per ann.
A Junior Merchant—£300	sterling per ann.
Factors and Writers—£200	sterling per ann.

In Seton-Karr, i. 131.

FACTORY, s. A trading establishment at a foreign port or mart (see preceding).

1500.—“And then he sent ashore the Factor Ayres Correa with the ship’s carpenters … and sent to ask the King for timber … all which the King sent in great sufficiency, and he sent orders also for him to have many carpenters and labourers to assist in making the houses; and they brought much plank and wood, and palm-trees which they cut down at the Point, so that they made a great Campo,¹ in which they made houses for the Captain Mór, and for each of the Captains, and houses for the people, and they made