Excerpt from Records of Fort St. George, Vol. 80: Diary and Consultation Book (Public Department), 1752; With an Introduction and Notes At Fort St. David itself besides the measures taken for the transfer of the Presidency to Madras, several matters awaited the Board's attention. The first and most important of these related to finance. It was the period of great expenditure brought on by the continual warfare, of the scarcity of gold and. The depreciation of silvery engendered by various causes which had already been examined by the Board in 17507. The expenses of the army in the Carnatic, though promised to be discharged by the Nawab, had, actually, in the first instance, to be provided by the Presidency. The subordinate settle ments also had to be frequently supplied with money to carry on the invest ment or to meet special difficulties presented by the ccuntry troubles and the anglo-french rivalry.. A welcome supply of gold arrived from Canton by a China ship, early in January. It was ordered to be coined with all expeditions. But the supply was insufficient. The result was that rupees had to be sold9 and pagodas, which were the current coin with which all payments were made, had to be purchased at 8-2; and per cent battal. Nor was this the only embarrassment. Gunpowder which was then in great demand could not be readily procured. It was partly supplied by Bengal and Bombay and by the ships from Home. But large quantities of it had to be made in Fort St. David itself. Brohier the Engineer requested that barrels should always be in store for the use of the Presidency and its Subordinate Factories. It was, . However, soon found that what was made at St. David's under the supervision of the Military Storekeeper was much inferior to what came from Europe. Brohier represented that it was necessary to have at least 400 barrels annually from England and these could be easily procured if the Company sent about 50 or 60 barrels on each out-going ship. The matter was therefore urged on the Home authorities. And in the meanwhile Brohier was directed to superin tend the making of gunpowder. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.