Page 315 - Early English Adventurers in the Middle East_Neat

THE ADVENTURERS AND THEIR TIMES 315

munities are testified to by Bernier and other writers who
visited India at this period. In the case of seamen especi­
ally it was a fruitful source of mortality as it is unfor­
tunately still to-day amongst the careless Jacks of the mer­
cantile marine who are stranded for a period in one or
other of the great Indian ports.
If Bacchus was at times unduly worshipped the gods of
learning and literature were not entirely neglected. There
is evidence in the correspondence of the period that men
kept up their acquaintance with the classics, and that
they took a real pleasure in intellectual pursuits. At the
W
Surat factory, quite early in its history, a library was
formed with the Company’s assistance. The collection *r
of books furnished was, perhaps, not exactly of the kind
which would have appealed to the tastes of the average
i
man. What it was like may be gathered from a communi­
cation from Sir George Oxenden to the directors in the
year 1666. “ Your library here,” wrote the President, \
“ is carefully looked after and preserved, and we could -
wish it were better furnished with books. It consists for
!
the main of English treatises and is almost totally de-
furnisht of the works of the ancient writers. We find
none of the Fathers’ works, any more than the Epistles of
Clemens Romanus. Here are Epistles of Ignatius. The
works of Epiphanius and St. Augustine, with some im­
!
perfect pieces of other Fathers, only belonging to a private
library.”
The suggestion made as to the deficiencies of this Surat
library conveys rather a terrifying impression of the read­
ing tastes of that far-off Anglo-India. Nor does it appear
that addiction to “ heavy ” literature was a peculiarity
of the generation of exiles to which Sir George Oxenden