ny to secure a foothold in India. The
Ostend Company was formed in 1722-1723, and with a capital of less than a
million sterling founded two settlements, one at Coblom (Covelong) on the
Madras coast between the English Madras and the Dutch Sadras, and the other
on the Hugli between the English Calcutta and the Dutch Chinsura. Both
English and Dutch were offended and in 1727, in order to obtain the
European guarantee for the Pragmatic Sanction, the court of Vienna resolved
to sacrifice the Company and suspended its charter. It became bankrupt in
1784 and ceased to exist in 1793. But in the meantime in 1733 the English
and Dutch stirred up the Mahommedan general at Hugli to pick a quarrel. He
attacked Bankipur and the garrison of only fourteen persons set sail for
Europe. Thus German interests disappeared from India.

BANK-NOTES. For our present purpose we include in this description all
paper substitutes for metallic currency whether issued by banks,
governments or other financial institutes.

Early bank-notes were simply printed forms in which the amounts were
written by hand. They were usually for large amounts (L40 and upwards) and
were printed upon water-marked paper; and, although no precautions were
taken in the engraving to prevent fraudulent imitation, forgeries were
comparatively rare. But, when at the end of the 18th century small notes
for L1 and L2 were put in circulation, forgery became rife, as many as 352
persons being convicted of this crime in England in a single year; and from
that time to the present a constant trial of skill has been going on
between the makers of bank-notes and the counterfeiters. Engine-turned
ornaments and emblematical figures or views introduced in the engraving, in
conjunction with special water-marks in the paper, held the forgers
somewhat in check until the discovery of photography put into the hands of
the counterfeiter a most dangerous weapon, by the aid of which complicated
patterns and vignettes could be perfectly reproduced. To prevent such
reproduction Henry Bradbury in 1856 introduced anti-photographic bank-note
printing, in which the essential portions of the note were printed in one
colour and over this another protective colour was placed. A photograph of
a note printed in this way presented a confused mingling of the two
colours; but with the advance of photographic knowledge means were found of
obtaining a photograph of either colour separate from the other, and it