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A DUTCH SETTLEMENT AT PULICAT 219 most lasting settlements on the Bombay side; the Dutch, reverting westwards from their Spice Island dominions, established themselves chiefly on the Bay of Bengal. In 1609 they obtained a settlement at Puli- cat, a long, low isle with the surf breaking on its outer shores, and a sheltered lagoon stretching inwards to the mainland, about twenty-three miles north of Madras city. Its great backwater, or " Pulicat Lake," formed by the sea bursting through the sand-dunes of the coast in some ancient cyclonic storm, afforded a haven for the shipping of those days. In 1611 Captain Hippon and Peter Floris in The Globe of our seventh Separate Voyage essayed a land-
