THE ENGLISH REACH HUGLI 245 and who now repaid its confidence in the face of in- trigues against him, by rendering good service to us in Bengal. They also found a friend at the viceregal court then held at Raj Mahal, one of the shifting Ganges capitals, above the point where the mighty river splits BAJ MAHAL ON THE GANGES. up into its network of deltaic channels. Gabriel Bough- ton, doctor of the Company's ship Hopewell, had in 1645 been lent to a nobleman in the Imperial service, and was in 1650 Chirurgeon to the Moghul Viceroy of Bengal, Shah Shuja, who was a son of the reigning emperor, Shah Jahan. In or about the latter year Boughton obtained from his patron a license for free trade by the English in Bengal in return for three thou-
