Chapter PRAAG to PRESIDENCY of P by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

(English) President was come to Suhaly, they went ashore. … The two dayes following were spent in feasting, at which the Commanders of the two Ships treated the President, who afterwards returned to Suratta. … During my abode at Suratta, I wanted for no divertisement; for I … found company at the Dutch President’s, who had his Farms there … inasmuch as I could converse with them in their own Language.”—Mandelslo, E.T., ed. 1669, p. 19.

1638.—“Les Anglois ont bien encore vn bureau à Bantam, dans l’Isle de Jaua, mais il a son President particulier, qui ne depend point de celuy de Suratta.”—Mandelslo, French ed. 1659, p. 124.

„ “A mon retour à Suratta ie trouvay dans la loge des Anglois plus de cinquante marchands, que le President auoit fait venir de tous les autres Bureaux, pour rendre compte de leur administration, et pour estre presens à ce changement de Gouuernement.”—Ibid. 188.

1661.—“And in case any Person or Persons, being convicted and sentenced by the President and Council of the said Governor and Company, in the said East Indies, their Factors or Agents there, for any Offence by them done, shall appeal from the same, that then, and in every such case, it shall and may be lawful to and for the said President and Council, Factor or Agent, to seize upon him or them, and to carry him or them home Prisoners to England.”—Letters Patent to the Governor and Company of Merchants of London, trading with the E. Indies, 3d April.

1670.—The Court, in a letter to Fort St. George, fix the amount of tonnage to be allowed to their officers (for their private investments) on their return to Europe:

“Presidents and Agents, at Surat, Fort St. George, and Bantam. 5 tonns. Chiefes, at Persia, the Bay (q.v.), Mesulapatam, and Macassar: Deputy at Bombay, and Seconds at Surat, Fort St. George, and Bantam. 3 tonns.” In Notes and Exts., No. i. p. 3.

1702.—“Tuesday 7th April. … In the morning a Councill … afterwards having some Discourse arising among us whether the charge of hiring Calashes, &c., upon Invitations given us from the Shabander or any others to go to their Countrey Houses or upon any other Occasion of diverting our Selves abroad for health, should be charged to our Honble Masters account or not, the President and Mr. Loyd were of opinion to charge the same. … But Mr. Rouse, Mr. Ridges, and Mr. Master were of opinion that Batavia being a place of extraordinary charge and Expense in all things, the said Calash hire, &c., ought not to be charged to the Honourable Company’s Account.”—MS. Records in India Office.


The book containing this is a collocation of fragmentary MS. diaries. But this passage pertains apparently to the proceedings of President Allen Catchpole and his council, belonging to the Factory of Chusan, from which they were expelled by the Chinese in 1701-2; they stayed some time at Batavia on their way home. Mr. Catchpole (or Ketchpole) was soon afterwards chief of an English settlement made upon Pulo Condore, off the Cambojan coast. In 1704-5, we read that he reported favourably on the prospects of the settlement, requesting a supply of young writers, to learn the Chinese language, anticipating that the island would soon become an important station for Chinese trade. But Catchpole was himself, about the end of 1705, murdered by certain people of Macassar, who thought he had broken faith with them, and with him all the English but two (see Bruce’s Annals, 483-4, 580, 606, and A. Hamilton, ii. 205 [ed. 1744]). The Pulo Condore enterprise thus came to an end. 1727.—“About the year 1674, President Aungier, a gentleman well qualified for governing, came to the Chair, and leaving Surat to the Management of Deputies, came to Bombay, and rectified many things.”—A. Hamilton, i. 188.