Page:History of India Vol 7.djvu/211

POPULAR OPPOSITION TO THE COMPANY 167 the nation was assured, killed and worn out the mari- ners who formed the defence of England, and left a multitude of widows and orphans to an unhappy fate. " The whole land " was called to protest against the drain of bullion that " causeth the body of this com- monwealth to be wounded sore." As the Portuguese " were the enemies of Christendom, for they carried the treasure of Europe to enrich the heathen," so the Company was the enemy of England, which, between the export of coin and the Dutch, had become a blind Belisarius begging by the wayside. To these popular denunciations, many of them ill- founded, some of them insincere, the Company opposed an array of facts, convincing to the modern economist. But the English political economy of that day was a compound of mediaeval tradition and national prejudice; the true principles of currency and commerce emerged only in the following century. Meanwhile the ene- mies of the India trade had mediaeval tradition and national prejudice on their side. The fact that the Company's defence had to be conducted by its own servants or members deepened the popular distrust. It was in vain that Sir Dudley Digges, in 1615, proved that the statements about the consumption of timber, the loss of mariners, and the export of coin were exaggerated, or compensated by counter benefits to the nation. For Sir Dudley Digges had been a candi- date for the governorship of the Company in the pre- ceding year. He did not help his case by insulting contrasts between " the idle drone and the greedy cater-