LORD CLIVE

(January 1840)

_The Life of Robert Lord Clive; collected from the Family Papers,

communicated by the Earl of Powis. By MAJOR-GENERAL SIR JOHN MALCOLM,

K.C.B. 3 vols. 8vo. London: 1836._

WE have always thought it strange that, while the history of the Spanish

empire in America is familiarly known to all the nations of Europe,

the great actions of our countrymen in the East should, even among

ourselves, excite little interest. Every schoolboy knows who imprisoned

Montezuma, and who strangled Atahualpa. But we doubt whether one in ten,

even among English gentlemen of highly cultivated minds, can tell who

won the battle of Buxar, who perpetrated the massacre of Patna, whether

Sujah Dowlah ruled in Oude or in Travancore, or whether Holkar was a

Hindoo, or a Mussulman. Yet the victories of Cortes were gained over

savages who had no letters, who were ignorant of the use of metals,

who had not broken in a single animal to labour, who wielded no better

weapons than those which could be made out of sticks, flints, and

fish-bones, who regarded a horse-soldier as a monster, half man and

half beast, who took a harquebusier for a sorcerer, able to scatter the

thunder and lightning of the skies. The people of India, when we subdued

them, were ten times as numerous as the Americans whom the Spaniards

vanquished, and were at the same time quite as highly civilised as the

victorious Spaniards. They had reared cities larger and fairer than

Saragossa or Toledo, and buildings more beautiful and costly than the

cathedral of Seville. They could show bankers richer than the richest

firms of Barcelona or Cadiz, viceroys whose splendour far surpassed

that of Ferdinand the Catholic, myriads of cavalry and long trains of

artillery which would have astonished the Great Captain. It might have

been expected, that every Englishman who takes any interest in any part

of history would be curious to know how a handful of his countrymen,

separated from their home by an immense ocean, subjugated, in the course

of a few years, one of the greatest empires in the world. Yet, unless

we greatly err, this subject is, to most readers, not only insipid,

but positively distasteful. Perhaps the fault lies partly with the

historians. Mr. Mill’s book, though it has undoubtedly great and rare

merit, is not sufficiently animated and picturesque to attract those who

read for amusement. Orme, inferior to no English historian in style

and power of painting, is minute even to tediousness. In one volume he

allots, on an average, a closely printed quarto page to the events of

every forty-eight hours. The consequence is, that his narrative, though

one of the most authentic and one of the most finely written in our

language, has never been very popular, and is now scarcely ever read.

We fear that the volumes before us will not much attract those readers

whom Orme and Mill have repelled. The materials placed at the disposal

of Sir John Malcolm by the late Lord Powis were indeed of great value.

But we cannot say that they have been very skilfully worked up. It

would, however, be unjust to criticise with severity a work which, if

the author had lived to complete and revise it, would probably have

been improved by condensation and by a better arrangement. We are more

disposed to perform the pleasing duty of expressing our gratitude to

the noble family to which the public owes so much useful and curious

information.

The effect of the book, even when we make the largest allowance for the

partiality of those who have furnished and of those who have digested

the materials, is, on the whole, greatly to raise the character of Lord

Clive. We are far indeed from sympathising with Sir John Malcolm, whose

love passes the love of biographers, and who can see nothing but wisdom

and justice in the actions of his idol. But we are at least equally far

from concurring in the severe judgment of Mr. Mill, who seems to us to

show less discrimination in his account of Clive than in any other part

of his valuable work. Clive, like most men who are born with strong

passions and tried by strong temptations, committed great faults. But

every person who takes a fair and enlightened view of his whole career

must admit that our island, so fertile in heroes and statesmen, has

scarcely ever produced a man more truly great either in arms or in

council.

The Clives had been settled, ever since the twelfth century, on an

estate of no great value, near Market-Drayton, in Shropshire. In the

reign of George the First this moderate but ancient inheritance was

possessed by Mr. Richard Clive, who seems to have been a plain man of

no great tact or capacity. He had been bred to the law, and divided

his time between professional business and the avocations of a small

proprietor.

He married a lady from Manchester, of the name of Gaskill, and became

the father of a very numerous family. His eldest son, Robert, the

founder of the British empire in India, was born at the old seat of his

ancestors on the twenty-ninth of September, 1725.

Some lineaments of the character of the man were early discerned in the

child. There remain letters written by his relations when he was in his

seventh year; and from these letters it appears that, even at that

early age, his strong will and his fiery passions, sustained by a

constitutional intrepidity which sometimes seemed hardly compatible with

soundness of mind, had begun to cause great uneasiness to his family.

“Fighting,” says one of his uncles, “to which he is out of measure

addicted, gives his temper such a fierceness and imperiousness, that

he flies out on every trifling occasion.” The old people of the

neighbourhood still remember to have heard from their parents how Bob

Clive climbed to the top of the lofty steeple of Market-Drayton, and

with what terror the inhabitants saw him seated on a stone spout near

the summit. They also relate how he formed all the idle lads of the town

into a kind of predatory army, and compelled the shopkeepers to submit

to a tribute of apples and half-pence, in consideration of which he

guaranteed the security of their windows. He was sent from school to

school, making very little progress in his learning, and gaining for

himself everywhere the character of an exceedingly naughty boy. One of

his masters, it is said, was sagacious enough to prophesy that the idle

lad would make a great figure in the world. But the general opinion

seems to have been that poor Robert was a dunce, if not a reprobate.

His family expected nothing good from such slender parts and such

a headstrong temper. It is not strange therefore, that they gladly

accepted for him, when he was in his eighteenth year, a writer-ship in

the service of the East India Company, and shipped him off to make a

fortune or to die of a fever at Madras.

Far different were the prospects of Clive from those of the youths whom

the East India College now annually sends to the Presidencies of our

Asiatic empire. The Company was then purely a trading corporation. Its

territory consisted of few square miles, for which rent was paid to the

native governments. Its troops were scarcely numerous enough to man the

batteries of three or four ill-constructed forts, which had been

erected for the protection of the warehouses. The natives who composed a

considerable part of these little garrisons, had not yet been trained in

the discipline of Europe, and were armed, some with swords and shields,

some with bows and arrows. The business of the servant of the Company

was not, as now, to conduct the judicial, financial, and diplomatic

business of a great country, but to take stock, to make advances to

weavers, to ship cargoes, and above all to keep an eye on private

traders who dared to infringe the monopoly. The younger clerks were so

miserably paid that they could scarcely subsist without incurring debt;

the elder enriched themselves by trading on their own account; and

those who lived to rise to the top of the service often accumulated

considerable fortunes.

Madras, to which Clive had been appointed, was, at this time, perhaps,

the first in importance of the Company’s settlements. In the preceding

century Fort St. George had arisen on a barren spot beaten by a raging

surf; and in the neighbourhood a town, inhabited by many thousands

of natives, had sprung up, as towns spring up in the East, with the

rapidity of the prophet’s gourd. There were already in the suburbs many

white villas, each surrounded by its garden, whither the wealthy agents

of the Company retired, after the labours of the desk and the warehouse,

to enjoy the cool breeze which springs up at sunset from the Bay of

Bengal. The habits of these mercantile grandees appear to have been more

profuse, luxurious, and ostentatious, than those of the high judicial

and political functionaries who have succeeded them. But comfort was

far less understood. Many devices which now mitigate the heat of the

climate, preserve health, and prolong life, were unknown. There was far

less intercourse with Europe than at present. The voyage by the Cape,

which in our time has often been performed within three months, was then

very seldom accomplished in six, and was sometimes protracted to more

than a year. Consequently, the Anglo-Indian was then much more estranged

from his country, much more addicted to Oriental usages, and much

less fitted to mix in society after his return to Europe, than the

Anglo-Indian of the present day.

Within the fort and its precinct, the English exercised, by permission

of the native government, an extensive authority, such as every great

Indian landowner exercised within his own domain. But they had never

dreamed of claiming independent power. The surrounding country was ruled

by the Nabob of the Carnatic, a deputy of the Viceroy of the Deccan,

commonly called the Nizam, who was himself only a deputy of the mighty

prince designated by our ancestors as the Great Mogul. Those names, once

so august and formidable, still remain.

There is still a Nabob of the Carnatic, who lives on a pension allowed

to him by the English out of the revenues of the provinces which his

ancestors ruled. There is still a Nizam, whose capital is overawed by a

British cantonment, and to whom a British resident gives, under the

name of advice, commands which are not to be disputed. There is still

a Mogul, who is permitted to play at holding courts and receiving

petitions, but who has less power to help or hurt than the youngest

civil servant of the Company.

Clive’s voyage was unusually tedious even for that age. The ship

remained some months at the Brazils, where the young adventurer picked

up some knowledge of Portuguese, and spent all his pocket-money. He did

not arrive in India till more than a year after he had left England. His

situation at Madras was most painful. His funds were exhausted. His pay

was small. He had contracted debts. He was wretchedly lodged, no small

calamity in a climate which can be made tolerable to an European only by

spacious and well placed apartments. He had been furnished with letters

of recommendation to a gentleman who might have assisted him; but when

he landed at Fort St. George he found that this gentleman had sailed

for England. The lad’s shy and haughty disposition withheld him from

introducing himself to strangers. He was several months in India before

he became acquainted with a single family. The climate affected his

health and spirits. His duties were of a kind ill-suited to his ardent

and daring character. He pined for his home, and in his letters to his

relations expressed his feelings in language softer and more pensive

than we should have expected either from the waywardness of his boyhood,

or from the inflexible sternness of his later years. “I have not

enjoyed” says he “one happy day since I left my native country”; and

again, “I must confess, at intervals, when I think of my dear native

England, it affects me in a very peculiar manner.... If I should be

so far blest as to revisit again my own country, but more especially

Manchester, the centre of all my wishes, all that I could hope or desire

for would be presented before me in one view.”

One solace he found of the most respectable kind. The Governor possessed

a good library, and permitted Clive to have access to it. The young man

devoted much of his leisure to reading, and acquired at this time almost

all the knowledge of books that he ever possessed. As a boy he had been

too idle, as a man he soon became too busy, for literary pursuits.

But neither climate nor poverty, neither study nor the sorrows of a

home-sick exile, could tame the desperate audacity of his spirit.

He behaved to his official superiors as he had behaved to his

schoolmasters, and he was several times in danger of losing his

situation. Twice, while residing in the Writers’ Buildings, he attempted

to destroy himself; and twice the pistol which he snapped at his own

head failed to go off. This circumstance, it is said, affected him as a

similar escape affected Wallenstein. After satisfying himself that the

pistol was really well loaded, he burst forth into an exclamation that

surely he was reserved for something great.

About this time an event which at first seemed likely to destroy all his

hopes in life suddenly opened before him a new path to eminence. Europe

had been, during some years, distracted by the war of the Austrian

succession. George the Second was the steady ally of Maria Theresa. The

house of Bourbon took the opposite side. Though England was even then

the first of maritime powers, she was not, as she has since become, more

than a match on the sea for all the nations of the world together; and

she found it difficult to maintain a contest against the united navies

of France and Spain. In the eastern seas France obtained the ascendency.

Labourdonnais, governor of Mauritius, a man of eminent talents and

virtues, conducted an expedition to the continent of India in spite of

the opposition of the British fleet, landed, assembled an army, appeared

before Madras, and compelled the town and fort to capitulate. The keys

were delivered up; the French colours were displayed on Fort St. George;

and the contents of the Company’s warehouses were seized as prize of

war by the conquerors. It was stipulated by the capitulation that the

English inhabitants should be prisoners of war on parole, and that

the town should remain in the hands of the French till it should be

ransomed. Labourdonnais pledged his honour that only a moderate ransom

should be required.

But the success of Labourdonnais had awakened the jealousy of his

countryman, Dupleix, governor of Pondicherry. Dupleix, moreover, had

already begun to revolve gigantic schemes, with which the restoration

of Madras to the English was by no means compatible. He declared that

Labourdonnais had gone beyond his powers; that conquests made by the

French arms on the continent of India were at the disposal of the

governor of Pondicherry alone; and that Madras should be razed to the

ground. Labourdonnais was compelled to yield. The anger which the breach

of the capitulation excited among the English was increased by the

ungenerous manner in which Dupleix treated the principal servants of

the Company. The Governor and several of the first gentlemen of Fort St.

George were carried under a guard to Pondicherry, and conducted through

the town in a triumphal procession under the eyes of fifty thousand

spectators. It was with reason thought that this gross violation of

public faith absolved the inhabitants of Madras from the engagements

into which they had entered with Labourdonnais. Clive fled from the town

by night in the disguise of a Mussulman, and took refuge at Fort St.

David, one of the small English settlements subordinate to Madras.

The circumstances in which he was now placed naturally led him to adopt

a profession better suited to his restless and intrepid spirit than the

business of examining packages and casting accounts. He solicited and

obtained an ensign’s commission in the service of the Company, and at

twenty-one entered on his military career. His personal courage, of

which he had, while still a writer, given signal proof by a desperate

duel with a military bully who was the terror of Fort St. David,

speedily made him conspicuous even among hundreds of brave men. He soon

began to show in his new calling other qualities which had not before

been discerned in him, judgment, sagacity, deference to legitimate

authority. He distinguished himself highly in several operations against

the French, and was particularly noticed by Major Lawrence, who was then

considered as the ablest British officer in India.

Clive had been only a few months in the army when intelligence arrived

that peace had been concluded between Great Britain and France. Dupleix

was in consequence compelled to restore Madras to the English Company;

and the young ensign was at liberty to resume his former business. He

did indeed return for a short time to his desk. He again quitted it

in order to assist Major Lawrence in some petty hostilities with the

natives, and then again returned to it. While he was thus wavering

between a military and a commercial life, events took place which

decided his choice. The politics of India assumed a new aspect. There

was peace between the English and French Crowns; but there arose between

the English and French Companies trading to the East a war most eventful

and important, a war in which the prize was nothing less than the

magnificent inheritance of the house of Tamerlane.

The empire which Baber and his Moguls reared in the sixteenth century

was long one of the most extensive and splendid in the world. In no

European kingdom was so large a population subject to a single

prince, or so large a revenue poured into the treasury. The beauty and

magnificence of the buildings erected by the sovereigns of Hindostan

amazed even travellers who had seen St. Peter’s. The innumerable

retinues and gorgeous decorations which surrounded the throne of Delhi

dazzled even eyes which were accustomed to the pomp of Versailles. Some

of the great viceroys who held their posts by virtue of commissions from

the Mogul ruled as many subjects as the King of France or the Emperor

of Germany. Even the deputies of these deputies might well rank, as

to extent of territory and amount of revenue, with the Grand Duke of

Tuscany, or the Elector of Saxony.

There can be little doubt that this great empire, powerful and

prosperous as it appears on a superficial view, was yet, even in its

best days, far worse governed than the worst governed parts of Europe

now are. The administration was tainted with all the vices of Oriental

despotism, and with all the vices inseparable from the domination of

race over race. The conflicting pretensions of the princes of the royal

house produced a long series of crimes and public disasters. Ambitious

lieutenants of the sovereign sometimes aspired to independence. Fierce

tribes of Hindoos, impatient of a foreign yoke, frequently withheld

tribute, repelled the armies of the government from the mountain

fastnesses, and poured down in arms on the cultivated plains. In spite,

however, of much constant maladministration, in spite of occasional

convulsions which shook the whole frame of society, this great monarchy,

on the whole, retained, during some generations, an outward appearance

of unity, majesty, and energy. But, throughout the long reign of

Aurungzebe, the state, notwithstanding all that the vigour and policy of

the prince could effect, was hastening to dissolution. After his death,

which took place in the year 1707, the ruin was fearfully rapid. Violent

shocks from without co-operated with an incurable decay which was fast

proceeding within; and in a few years the empire had undergone utter

decomposition.

The history of the successors of Theodosius bears no small analogy

to that of the successors of Aurungzebe. But perhaps the fall of the

Carlovingians furnishes the nearest parallel to the fall of the Moguls.

Charlemagne was scarcely interred when the imbecility and the disputes

of his descendants began to bring contempt on themselves and destruction

on their subjects. The wide dominion of the Franks was severed into a

thousand pieces. Nothing more than a nominal dignity was left to the

abject heirs of an illustrious name, Charles the Bald, and Charles the

Fat, and Charles the Simple. Fierce invaders, differing, from each other

in race, language, and religion, flocked, as if by concert, from the

farthest corners of the earth, to plunder provinces which the government

could no longer defend. The pirates of the Northern Sea extended their

ravages from the Elbe to the Pyrenees, and at length fixed their seat in

the rich valley of the Seine. The Hungarian, in whom the trembling monks

fancied that they recognised the Gog or Magog of prophecy, carried back

the plunder of the cities of Lombardy to the depths of the Pannonian

forests. The Saracen ruled in Sicily, desolated the fertile plains of

Campania, and spread terror even to the walls of Rome. In the midst of

these sufferings, a great internal change passed upon the empire. The

corruption of death began to ferment into new forms of life. While the

great body, as a whole, was torpid and passive, every separate member

began to feel with a sense and to move with an energy all its own.

Just here, in the most barren and dreary tract of European history, all

feudal privileges, all modern nobility, take their source. It is to this

point, that we trace the power of those princes who, nominally vassals,

but really independent, long governed, with the titles of dukes,

marquesses, and counts, almost every part of the dominions which had

obeyed Charlemagne.

Such or nearly such was the change which passed on the Mogul empire

during the forty years which followed the death of Aurungzebe. A

succession of nominal sovereigns, sunk in indolence and debauchery,

sauntered away life in secluded palaces, chewing bang, fondling

concubines, and listening to buffoons. A succession of ferocious

invaders descended through the western passes, to prey on the

defenceless wealth of Hindostan. A Persian conqueror crossed the Indus,

marched through the gates of Delhi, and bore away in triumph those

treasures of which the magnificence had astounded Roe and Bernier,

the Peacock Throne, on which the richest jewels of Golconda had been

disposed by the most skilful hands of Europe, and the inestimable

Mountain of Light, which, after many strange vicissitudes, lately

shone in the bracelet of Runjeet Sing, and is now destined to adorn the

hideous idol of Orissa. The Afghan soon followed to complete the work

of the devastation which the Persian had begun. The warlike tribes of

Rajpootana, threw off the Mussulman yoke. A band of mercenary soldiers

occupied Rohilcund. The Seiks ruled or the Indus. The Jauts spread

dismay along the Jumna. The highlands which border on the western

sea-coast of India poured forth a yet more formidable race, a race

which was long the terror of every native power, and which, after many

desperate and doubtful struggles, yielded only to the fortune and genius

of England. It was under the reign of Aurungzebe that this wild clan

of plunderers first descended from their mountains; and soon after his

death, every corner of his wide empire learned to tremble at the mighty

name of the Mahrattas. Many fertile viceroyalties were entirely subdued

by them. Their dominions stretched across the peninsula from sea to sea.

Mahratta captains reigned at Poonah, at Gualior, in Guzerat, in Berar,

and in Tanjore. Nor did they, though they had become great sovereigns,

therefore cease to be freebooters. They still retained the predatory

habits of their forefathers. Every region which was not subject to their

rule was wasted by their incursions. Wherever their kettle-drums were

heard, the peasant threw his bag of rice on his shoulder, hid his

small savings in his girdle, and fled with his wife and children to the

mountains or the jungles, to the milder neighbourhood of the hyaena and

the tiger. Many provinces redeemed their harvests by the payment of an

annual ransom. Even the wretched phantom who still bore the imperial

title stooped to pay this ignominious black-mail. The camp-fires of

one rapacious leader were seen from the walls of the palace of Delhi.

Another, at the head of his innumerable cavalry, descended year after

year on the rice-fields of Bengal. Even the European factors trembled

for their magazines. Less than a hundred years ago, it was thought

necessary to fortify Calcutta against the horsemen of Berar, and the

name of the Mahratta ditch still preserves the memory of the danger.

Wherever the viceroys of the Mogul retained authority they became

sovereigns. They might still acknowledge in words the superiority of the

house of Tamerlane; as a Count of Flanders or a Duke of Burgundy might

have acknowledged the superiority of the most helpless driveller among

the later Carlovingians. They might occasionally send to their titular

sovereign a complimentary present, or solicit from him a title of

honour. In truth, however, they were no longer lieutenants removable

at pleasure, but independent hereditary princes. In this way originated

those great Mussulman houses which formerly ruled Bengal and the

Carnatic, and those which still, though in a state of vassalage,

exercise some of the powers of royalty at Lucknow and Hyderabad.

In what was this confusion to end? Was the strife to continue during

centuries? Was it to terminate in the rise of another great monarchy?

Was the Mussulman or the Mahratta to be the Lord of India? Was another

Baber to descend from the mountains, and to lead the hardy tribes of

Cabul and Chorasan against a wealthier and less warlike race? None of

these events seemed improbable. But scarcely any man, however sagacious,

would have thought it possible that a trading company, separated from

India by fifteen thousand miles of sea, and possessing in India only a

few acres for purposes of commerce, would, in less than a hundred

years, spread its empire from Cape Comorin to the eternal snow of the

Himalayas; would compel Mahratta and Mahommedan to forget their mutual

feuds in common subjection; would tame down even those wild races which

had resisted the most powerful of the Moguls; and, having united under

its laws a hundred millions of subjects, would carry its victorious

arms far to the east of the Burrampooter, and far to the west of the

Hydaspes, dictate terms of peace at the gates of Ava, and seat its

vassal on the throne of Candahar.

The man who first saw that it was possible to found an European empire

on the ruins of the Mogul monarchy was Dupleix. His restless, capacious,

and inventive mind had formed this scheme, at a time when the ablest

servants of the English Company were busied only about invoices and

bills of lading. Nor had he only proposed to himself the end. He

had also a just and distinct view of the means by which it was to be

attained. He clearly saw that the greatest force which the princes of

India could bring into the field would be no match for a small body of

men trained in the discipline, and guided by the tactics, of the West.

He saw also that the natives of India might, under European commanders,

be formed into armies, such as Saxe or Frederic would be proud to

command. He was perfectly aware that the most easy and convenient way in

which an European adventurer could exercise sovereignty in India, was

to govern the motions, and to speak through the mouth of some glittering

puppet dignified by the title of Nabob or Nizam. The arts both of war

and policy, which a few years later were employed with such signal

success by the English, were first understood and practised by this

ingenious and aspiring Frenchman.

The situation of India was such that scarcely any aggression could be

without a pretext, either in old laws or in recent practice. All rights

were in a state of utter uncertainty; and the Europeans who took part

in the disputes of the natives confounded the confusion, by applying to

Asiatic politics the public law of the West, and analogies drawn

from the feudal system. If it was convenient to treat a Nabob as an

independent prince, there was an excellent plea for doing so. He was

independent, in fact. If it was convenient to treat him as a mere deputy

of the Court of Delhi, there was no difficulty; for he was so in theory.

If it was convenient to consider his office as an hereditary dignity, or

as a dignity held during life only, or as a dignity held only during the

good pleasure of the Mogul, arguments and precedents might be found for

every one of those views. The party who had the heir of Baber in their

hands, represented him as the undoubted, the legitimate, the absolute

sovereign, whom all subordinate authorities were bound to obey. The

party against whom his name was used did not want plausible pretexts for

maintaining that the empire was in fact dissolved, and that though it

might be decent to treat the Mogul with respect, as a venerable relic of

an order of things which had passed away, it was absurd to regard him as

the real master of Hindostan.

In the year 1748, died one of the most powerful of the new masters of

India, the great Nizam al Mulk, Viceroy of the Deccan. His authority

descended to his son, Nazir Jung. Of the provinces subject to this high

functionary, the Carnatic was the wealthiest and the most extensive. It

was governed by an ancient Nabob, whose name the English corrupted into

Anaverdy Khan.

But there were pretenders to the government both of the viceroyalty and

of the subordinate province. Mirzapha Jung, a grandson of Nizam al Mulk,

appeared as the competitor of Nazir Jung. Chunda Sahib, son-in-law of

a former Nabob of the Carnatic, disputed the title of Anaverdy Khan. In

the unsettled state of Indian law it was easy for both Mirzapha Jung and

Chunda Sahib to make out something like a claim of right. In a society

altogether disorganised, they had no difficulty in finding greedy

adventurers to follow their standards. They united their interests,

invaded the Carnatic, and applied for assistance to the French, whose

fame had been raised by their success against the English in a recent

war on the coast of Coromandel.

Nothing could have happened more pleasing to the subtle and ambitious

Dupleix. To make a Nabob of the Carnatic, to make a Viceroy of the

Deccan, to rule under their names the whole of Southern India; this was

indeed an attractive prospect. He allied himself with the pretenders,

and sent four hundred French soldiers, and two thousand sepoys,

disciplined after the European fashion, to the assistance of his

confederates. A battle was fought. The French distinguished themselves

greatly. Anaverdy Khan was defeated and slain. His son, Mahommed Ali,

who was afterwards well known in England as the Nabob of Arcot, and who

owes to the eloquence of Burke a most unenviable immortality, fled with

a scanty remnant of his army to Trichinopoly; and the conquerors became

at once masters of almost every part of the Carnatic.

This was but the beginning of the greatness of Dupleix. After some

months of fighting, negotiation and intrigue, his ability and good

fortune seemed to have prevailed everywhere. Nazir Jung perished by the

hands of his own followers; Mirzapha Jung was master of the Deccan;

and the triumph of French arms and French policy was complete. At

Pondicherry all was exultation and festivity. Salutes were fired from

the batteries, and Te Deum sung in the churches. The new Nizam came

thither to visit his allies; and the ceremony of his installation was

performed there with great pomp. Dupleix, dressed in the garb worn by

Mahommedans of the highest rank, entered the town in the same palanquin

with the Nizam, and, in the pageant which followed, took precedence of

all the court. He was declared Governor of India from the river Kristna

to Cape Comorin, a country about as large as France, with authority

superior even to that of Chunda Sahib. He was intrusted with the command

of seven thousand cavalry. It was announced that no mint would be

suffered to exist in the Carnatic except that at Pondicherry. A large

portion of the treasures which former Viceroys of the Deccan had

accumulated had found its way into the coffers of the French governor.

It was rumoured that he had received two hundred thousand pounds

sterling in money, besides many valuable jewels. In fact, there could

scarcely be any limit to his gains. He now ruled thirty millions of

people with almost absolute power. No honour or emolument could be

obtained from the government but by his intervention. No petition,

unless signed by him, was perused by the Nizam.

Mirzapha Jung survived his elevation only a few months, But another

prince of the same house was raised to the throne by French influence,

and ratified all the promises of his predecessor. Dupleix was now the

greatest potentate in India.

His countrymen boasted that his name was mentioned with awe even in

the chambers of the palace of Delhi. The native population looked with

amazement on the progress which, in the short space of four years,

an European adventurer had made towards dominion in Asia. Nor was the

vainglorious Frenchman content with the reality of power. He loved to

display his greatness with arrogant ostentation before the eyes of his

subjects and of his rivals. Near the spot where his policy had obtained

its chief triumph, by the fall of Nazir Jung, and the elevation of

Mirzapha, he determined to erect a column, on the four sides of which

four pompous inscriptions, in four languages, should proclaim his glory

to all the nations of the East. Medals stamped with emblems of his

successes were buried beneath the foundations of his stately pillar,

and round it arose a town bearing the haughty name of Dupleix Fatihabad,

which is, being interpreted, the City of the Victory of Dupleix.

The English had made some feeble and irresolute attempts to stop the

rapid and brilliant career of the rival Company, and continued to

recognise Mahommed Ali as Nabob of the Carnatic. But the dominions of

Mahommed Ali consisted of Trichinopoly alone: and Trichinopoly was now

invested by Chunda Sahib and his French auxiliaries. To raise the siege

seemed impossible. The small force which was then at Madras had no

commander. Major Lawrence had returned to England; and not a single

officer of established character remained in the settlement. The natives

had learned to look with contempt on the mighty nation which was soon

to conquer and to rule them. They had seen the French colours flying on

Fort St. George; they had seen the chiefs of the English factory led in

triumph through the streets of Pondicherry; they had seen the arms and

counsels of Dupleix everywhere successful, while the opposition which

the authorities of Madras had made to his progress, had served only to

expose their own weakness, and to heighten his glory. At this moment,

the valour and genius of an obscure English youth suddenly turned the

tide of fortune.

Clive was now twenty-five years old. After hesitating for some time

between a military and a commercial life, he had at length been placed

in a post which partook of both characters, that of commissary to the

troops, with the rank of captain. The present emergency called forth all

his powers. He represented to his superiors that unless some vigorous

effort were made, Trichinopoly would fall, the house of Anaverdy Khan

would perish, and the French would become the real masters of the whole

peninsula of India. It was absolutely necessary to strike some daring

blow. If an attack were made on Arcot, the capital of the Carnatic, and

the favourite residence of the Nabobs, it was not impossible that

the siege of Trichinopoly would be raised. The heads of the English

settlement, now thoroughly alarmed by the success of Dupleix, and

apprehensive that, in the event of a new war between France and Great

Britain, Madras would be instantly taken and destroyed, approved of

Clive’s plan, and intrusted the execution of it to himself. The young

captain was put at the head of two hundred English soldiers, and three

hundred sepoys, armed and disciplined after the European fashion. Of the

eight officers who commanded this little force under him, only two had

ever been in action, and four of the eight were factors of the Company,

whom Clive’s example had induced to offer their services. The weather

was stormy; but Clive pushed on, through thunder, lightning, and rain,

to the gates of Arcot. The garrison, in a panic, evacuated the fort, and

the English entered it without a blow.

But Clive well knew that he should not be suffered to retain undisturbed

possession of his conquest. He instantly began to collect provisions,

to throw up works, and to make preparations for sustaining a siege. The

garrison, which had fled at his approach, had now recovered from its

dismay, and, having been swelled by large reinforcements from the

neighbourhood to a force of three thousand men, encamped close to the

town. At dead of night, Clive marched out of the fort, attacked the camp

by surprise, slew great numbers, dispersed the rest, and returned to his

quarters without having lost a single man.

The intelligence of these events was soon carried to Chunda Sahib,

who, with his French allies, was besieging Trichinopoly. He immediately

detached four thousand men from his camp, and sent them to Arcot. They

were speedily joined by the remains of the force which Clive had lately

scattered. They were further strengthened by two thousand men from

Vellore, and by a still more important reinforcement of a hundred and

fifty French soldiers whom Dupleix despatched from Pondicherry. The

whole of his army, amounting to about ten thousand men, was under the

command of Rajah Sahib, son of Chunda Sahib.

Rajah Sahib proceeded to invest the fort of Arcot, which seemed quite

incapable of sustaining a siege. The walls were ruinous, the ditches

dry, the ramparts too narrow to admit the guns, the battlements too low

to protect the soldiers. The little garrison had been greatly reduced by

casualties. It now consisted of a hundred and twenty Europeans and two

hundred sepoys. Only four officers were left; the stock of provisions

was scanty; and the commander, who had to conduct the defence under

circumstances so discouraging, was a young man of five-and-twenty, who

had been bred a bookkeeper.

During fifty days the siege went on. During fifty days the young captain

maintained the defence, with a firmness, vigilance, and ability, which

would have done honour to the oldest marshal in Europe. The breach,

however, increased day by day. The garrison began to feel the pressure

of hunger. Under such circumstances, any troops so scantily provided

with officers might have been expected to show signs of insubordination;

and the danger was peculiarly great in a force composed of men differing

widely from each other in extraction, colour, language, manners, and

religion. But the devotion of the little band to its chief surpassed

anything that is related of the Tenth Legion of Caesar, or of the Old

Guard of Napoleon. The sepoys came to Clive, not to complain of their

scanty fare, but to propose that all the grain should be given to the

Europeans, who required more nourishment than the natives of Asia. The

thin gruel, they said, which was strained away from the rice, would

suffice for themselves. History contains no more touching instance of

military fidelity, or of the influence of a commanding mind.

An attempt made by the government of Madras to relieve the place had

failed. But there was hope from another quarter. A body of six thousand

Mahrattas, half soldiers, half robbers, under the command of a chief

named Morari Row, had been hired to assist Mahommed Ali; but thinking

the French power irresistible, and the triumph of Chunda Sahib certain,

they had hitherto remained inactive on the frontiers of the Carnatic.

The fame of the defence of Arcot roused them from their torpor. Morari

Row declared that he had never before believed that Englishmen could

fight, but that he would willingly help them since he saw that they had

spirit to help themselves. Rajah Sahib learned that the Mahrattas were

in motion. It was necessary for him to be expeditious. He first tried

negotiation. He offered large bribes to Clive, which were rejected

with scorn. He vowed that, if his proposals were not accepted, he would

instantly storm the fort, and put every man in it to the sword. Clive

told him in reply, with characteristic haughtiness, that his father was

an usurper, that his army was a rabble, and that he would do well to

think twice before he sent such poltroons into a breach defended by

English soldiers.

Rajah Sahib determined to storm the fort. The day was well suited to a

bold military enterprise. It was the great Mahommedan festival which

is sacred to the memory of Hosein, the son of Ali. The history of Islam

contains nothing more touching than the event which gave rise to that

solemnity. The mournful legend relates how the chief of the Fatimites,

when all his brave followers had perished round him, drank his latest

draught of water, and uttered his latest prayer, how the assassins

carried his head in triumph, how the tyrant smote the lifeless lips with

his staff, and how a few old men recollected with tears that they had

seen those lips pressed to the lips of the Prophet of God. After the

lapse of near twelve centuries, the recurrence of this solemn season

excites the fiercest and saddest emotions in the bosoms of the devout

Moslem of India. They work themselves up to such agonies of rage and

lamentation that some, it is said, have given up the ghost from the mere

effect of mental excitement. They believe that, whoever, during this

festival, falls in arms against the infidels, atones by his death

for all the sins of his life, and passes at once to the garden of the

Houris. It was at this time that Rajah Sahib determined to assault

Arcot. Stimulating drugs were employed to aid the effect of religious

zeal, and the besiegers, drunk with enthusiasm, drunk with bang, rushed

furiously to the attack.

Clive had received secret intelligence of the design, had made his

arrangements, and, exhausted by fatigue, had thrown himself on his bed.

He was awakened by the alarm, and was instantly at his post. The enemy

advanced, driving before them elephants whose foreheads were armed with

iron plates. It was expected that the gates would yield to the shock

of these living battering-rams. But the huge beasts no sooner felt the

English musket-balls than they turned round, and rushed furiously away,

trampling on the multitude which had urged them forward. A raft was

launched on the water which filled one part of the ditch. Clive,

perceiving that his gunners at that post did not understand their

business, took the management of a piece of artillery himself, and

cleared the raft in a few minutes. When the moat was dry the assailants

mounted with great boldness; but they were received with a fire so

heavy and so well directed, that it soon quelled the courage even of

fanaticism and of intoxication. The rear ranks of the English kept the

front ranks supplied with a constant succession of loaded muskets, and

every shot told on the living mass below. After three desperate onsets,

the besiegers retired behind the ditch.

The struggle lasted about an hour. Four hundred of the assailants fell.

The garrison lost only five or six men. The besieged passed an anxious

night, looking for a renewal of the attack. But when the day broke, the

enemy were no more to be seen. They had retired, leaving to the English

several guns and a large quantity of ammunition.

The news was received at Fort St. George with transports of joy and

pride. Clive was justly regarded as a man equal to any command. Two

hundred English soldiers and seven hundred sepoys were sent to him, and

with this force he instantly commenced offensive operations. He took

the fort of Timery, effected a junction with a division of Morari Row’s

army, and hastened, by forced marches, to attack Rajah Sahib, who was at

the head of about five thousand men, of whom three hundred were French.

The action was sharp; but Clive gained a complete victory. The military

chest of Rajah Sahib fell into the hands of the conquerors. Six hundred

sepoys, who had served in the enemy’s army, came over to Clive’s

quarters, and were taken into the British service. Conjeveram

surrendered without a blow. The governor of Arnee deserted Chunda Sahib,

and recognised the title of Mahommed Ali.

Had the entire direction of the war been intrusted to Clive, it would

probably have been brought to a speedy close. But the timidity and

incapacity which appeared in all the movements of the English, except

where he was personally present, protracted the struggle. The Mahrattas

muttered that his soldiers were of a different race from the British

whom they found elsewhere. The effect of this languor was that in no

long time Rajah Sahib, at the head of a considerable army, in which were

four hundred French troops, appeared almost under the guns of Fort St.

George, and laid waste the villas and gardens of the gentlemen of the

English settlement. But he was again encountered and defeated by Clive.

More than a hundred of the French were killed or taken, a loss more

serious than that of thousands of natives. The victorious army marched

from the field of battle to Fort St. David. On the road lay the City of

the Victory of Dupleix, and the stately monument which was designed to

commemorate the triumphs of France in the East. Clive ordered both the

city and the monument to be razed to the ground. He was induced, we

believe, to take this step, not by personal or national malevolence, but

by a just and profound policy. The town and its pompous name, the pillar

and its vaunting inscriptions, were among the devices by which Dupleix

had laid the public mind of India under a spell. This spell it was

Clive’s business to break. The natives had been taught that France was

confessedly the first power in Europe, and that the English did not

presume to dispute her supremacy. No measure could be more effectual for

the removing of this delusion than the public and solemn demolition of

the French trophies.

The government of Madras, encouraged by these events, determined to

send a strong detachment, under Clive, to reinforce the garrison of

Trichinopoly. But just at this conjuncture, Major Lawrence arrived

from England, and assumed the chief command. From the waywardness and

impatience of control which had characterised Clive, both at school and

in the counting-house, it might have been expected that he would not,

after such achievements, act with zeal and good humour in a subordinate

capacity. But Lawrence had early treated him with kindness; and it is

bare justice to Clive, to say that, proud and overbearing as he was,

kindness was never thrown away upon him. He cheerfully placed himself

under the orders of his old friend, and exerted himself as strenuously

in the second post as he could have done in the first. Lawrence well

knew the value of such assistance. Though himself gifted with no

intellectual faculty higher than plain good sense, he fully appreciated

the powers of his brilliant coadjutor. Though he had made a methodical

study of military tactics, and, like all men regularly bred to a

profession, was disposed to look with disdain on interlopers, he had yet

liberality enough to acknowledge that Clive was an exception to common

rules. “Some people,” he wrote, “are pleased to term Captain Clive

fortunate and lucky; but, in my opinion, from the knowledge I have of

the gentleman, he deserved and might expect from his conduct everything

as it fell out;--a man of an undaunted resolution, of a cool temper, and

of a presence of mind which never left him in the greatest danger--born

a soldier; for, without a military education of any sort, or much

conversing with any of the profession, from his judgment and good sense,

he led on an army like an experienced officer and a brave soldier, with

a prudence that certainly warranted success.”

The French had no commander to oppose to the two friends. Dupleix, not

inferior in talents for negotiation and intrigue to any European who has

borne a part in the revolutions of India, was ill qualified to direct in

person military operations. He had not been bred a soldier, and had

no inclination to become one. His enemies accused him of personal

cowardice; and he defended himself in a strain worthy of Captain

Bobadil. He kept away from shot, he said, because silence and

tranquillity were propitious to his genius, and he found it difficult to

pursue his meditations amidst the noise of fire-arms. He was thus under

the necessity of intrusting to others the execution of his great warlike

designs; and he bitterly complained that he was ill served. He had

indeed been assisted by one officer of eminent merit, the celebrated

Bussy. But Bussy had marched northward with the Nizam, and was fully

employed in looking after his own interests, and those of France, at

the court of that prince. Among the officers who remained with Dupleix,

there was not a single man of capacity; and many of them were boys, at

whose ignorance and folly the common soldiers laughed.

The English triumphed everywhere. The besiegers of Trichinopoly were

themselves besieged and compelled to capitulate. Chunda Sahib fell into

the hands of the Mahrattas, and was put to death, at the instigation

probably of his competitor, Mahommed Ali. The spirit of Dupleix,

however, was unconquerable, and his resources inexhaustible. From his

employers in Europe he no longer received help or countenance. They

condemned his policy. They gave him no pecuniary assistance. They

sent him for troops only the sweepings of the galleys. Yet still he

persisted, intrigued, bribed, promised, lavished his private fortune,

strained his credit, procured new diplomas from Delhi, raised up new

enemies to the government of Madras on every side, and found tools even

among the allies of the English Company. But all was in vain. Slowly,

but steadily, the power of Britain continued to increase, and that of

France to decline.

The health of Clive had never been good during his residence in India;

and his constitution was now so much impaired that he determined to

return to England. Before his departure he undertook a service of

considerable difficulty, and performed it with his usual vigour and

dexterity. The forts of Covelong and Chingleput were occupied by French

garrisons. It was determined to send a force against them. But the

only force available for this purpose was of such a description that

no officer but Clive would risk his reputation by commanding it. It

consisted of five hundred newly levied sepoys and two hundred recruits

who had just landed from England, and who were the worst and lowest

wretches that the Company’s crimps could pick up in the flash-houses of

London. Clive, ill and exhausted as he was, undertook to make an army

of this undisciplined rabble, and marched with them to Covelong. A shot

from the fort killed one of these extraordinary soldiers; on which

all the rest faced about and ran away, and it was with the greatest

difficulty that Clive rallied them. On another occasion, the noise of

a gun terrified the sentinels so much that one of them was found, some

hours later, at the bottom of a well. Clive gradually accustomed them

to danger, and, by exposing himself constantly in the most perilous

situations, shamed them into courage. He at length succeeded in forming

a respectable force out of his unpromising materials. Covelong fell.

Clive learned that a strong detachment was marching to relieve it from

Chingleput. He took measures to prevent the enemy from learning that

they were too late, laid an ambuscade for them on the road, killed a

hundred of them with one fire, took three hundred prisoners, pursued

the fugitives to the gates of Chingleput, laid siege instantly to that

fastness, reputed one of the strongest in India, made a breach, and was

on the point of storming, when the French commandant capitulated and

retired with his men.

Clive returned to Madras victorious, but in a state of health which

rendered it impossible for him to remain there long. He married at

this time a young lady of the name of Maskelyne, sister of the eminent

mathematician, who long held the post of Astronomer Royal. She is

described as handsome and accomplished; and her husband’s letters, it is

said, contain proofs that he was devotedly attached to her.

Almost immediately after the marriage, Clive embarked with his bride for

England. He returned a very different person from the poor slighted boy

who had been sent out ten years before to seek his fortune. He was only

twenty-seven; yet his country already respected him as one of her first

soldiers. There was then general peace in Europe. The Carnatic was the

only part of the world where the English and French were in arms against

each other. The vast schemes of Dupleix had excited no small uneasiness

in the city of London; and the rapid turn of fortune, which was chiefly

owing to the courage and talents of Clive, had been hailed with

great delight. The young captain was known at the India House by

the honourable nickname of General Clive, and was toasted by that

appellation at the feasts of the Directors. On his arrival in England,

he found himself an object of general interest and admiration. The East

India Company thanked him for his services in the warmest terms, and

bestowed on him a sword set with diamonds. With rare delicacy, he

refused to receive this token of gratitude, unless a similar compliment

were paid to his friend and commander, Lawrence.

It may easily be supposed that Clive was most cordially welcomed home by

his family, who were delighted by his success, though they seem to have

been hardly able to comprehend how their naughty idle Bobby had become

so great a man. His father had been singularly hard of belief. Not

until the news of the defence of Arcot arrived in England was the old

gentleman heard to growl out that, after all, the booby had something in

him. His expressions of approbation became stronger and stronger as news

arrived of one brilliant exploit after another; and he was at length

immoderately fond and proud of his son.

Clive’s relations had very substantial reasons for rejoicing at his

return. Considerable sums of prize money had fallen to his share; and

he had brought home a moderate fortune, part of which he expended in

extricating his father from pecuniary difficulties, and in redeeming the

family estate. The remainder he appears to have dissipated in the course

of about two years. He lived splendidly, dressed gaily even for those

times, kept a carriage and saddle-horses, and, not content with these

ways of getting rid of his money, resorted to the most speedy and

effectual of all modes of evacuation, a contested election followed by a

petition.

At the time of the general election of 1754, the Government was in

a very singular state. There was scarcely any formal opposition. The

Jacobites had been cowed by the issue of the last rebellion. The Tory

party had fallen into utter contempt. It had been deserted by all the

men of talents who had belonged to it, and had scarcely given a symptom

of life during some years. The small faction which had been held

together by the influence and promises of Prince Frederic, had been

dispersed by his death. Almost every public man of distinguished talents

in the kingdom, whatever his early connections might have been, was in

office, and called himself a Whig. But this extraordinary appearance of

concord was quite delusive. The administration itself was distracted

by bitter enmities and conflicting pretensions. The chief object of

its members was to depress and supplant each other. The Prime Minister,

Newcastle, weak, timid, jealous, and perfidious, was at once detested

and despised by some of the most important members of his Government,

and by none more than by Henry Fox, the Secretary-at-War. This able,

daring, and ambitious man seized every opportunity of crossing the First

Lord of the Treasury, from whom he well knew that he had little to dread

and little to hope; for Newcastle was through life equally afraid of

breaking with men of parts and of promoting them.

Newcastle had set his heart on returning two members for St. Michael,

one of those wretched Cornish boroughs which were swept away by the

Reform Act of 1832. He was opposed by Lord Sandwich, whose influence

had long been paramount there: and Fox exerted himself strenuously

in Sandwich’s behalf. Clive, who had been introduced to Fox, and very

kindly received by him, was brought forward on the Sandwich interest,

and was returned. But a petition was presented against the return, and

was backed by the whole influence of the Duke of Newcastle.

The case was heard, according to the usage of that time, before a

committee of the whole House. Questions respecting elections were then

considered merely as party questions. Judicial impartiality was not even

affected. Sir Robert Walpole was in the habit of saying openly that, in

election battles, there ought to be no quarter. On the present occasion

the excitement was great. The matter really at issue was, not whether

Clive had been properly or improperly returned, but whether Newcastle or

Fox was to be master of the new House of Commons, and consequently first

minister. The contest was long and obstinate, and success seemed to lean

sometimes to one side and sometimes to the other. Fox put forth all his

rare powers of debate, beat half the lawyers in the House at their own

weapons, and carried division after division against the whole influence

of the Treasury. The committee decided in Clive’s favour. But when the

resolution was reported to the House, things took a different course.

The remnant of the Tory Opposition, contemptible as it was, had yet

sufficient weight to turn the scale between the nicely balanced parties

of Newcastle and Fox. Newcastle the Tories could only despise. Fox they

hated, as the boldest and most subtle politician and the ablest debater

among the Whigs, as the steady friend of Walpole, as the devoted

adherent of the Duke of Cumberland. After wavering till the last moment,

they determined to vote in a body with the Prime Minister’s friends.

The consequence was that the House, by a small majority, rescinded the

decision of the committee, and Clive was unseated.

Ejected from Parliament, and straitened in his means, he naturally began

to look again towards India. The Company and the Government were eager

to avail themselves of his services. A treaty favourable to England had

indeed been concluded in the Carnatic. Dupleix had been superseded,

and had returned with the wreck of his immense fortune to Europe, where

calumny and chicanery soon hunted him to his grave. But many signs

indicated that a war between France and Great Britain was at hand; and

it was therefore thought desirable to send an able commander to the

Company’s settlements in India. The Directors appointed Clive

governor of Fort St. David. The King gave him the commission of a

lieutenant-colonel in the British army, and in 1755 he again sailed for

Asia.

The first service on which he was employed after his return to the East

was the reduction of the stronghold of Gheriah. This fortress, built on

a craggy promontory, and almost surrounded by the ocean, was the den

of a pirate named Angria, whose barks had long been the terror of the

Arabian Gulf. Admiral Watson, who commanded the English squadron in the

Eastern seas, burned Angria’s fleet, while Clive attacked the fastness

by land. The place soon fell, and a booty of a hundred and fifty

thousand pounds sterling was divided among the conquerors.

After this exploit, Clive proceeded to his government of Fort St. David.

Before he had been there two months, he received intelligence which

called forth all the energy of his bold and active mind.

Of the provinces which had been subject to the house of Tamerlane,

the wealthiest was Bengal. No part of India possessed such natural

advantages both for agriculture and for commerce. The Ganges, rushing

through a hundred channels to the sea, has formed a vast plain of rich

mould which, even under the tropical sky, rivals the verdure of an

English April. The rice-fields yield an increase such as is elsewhere

unknown. Spices, sugar, vegetable oils, are produced with marvellous

exuberance. The rivers afford an inexhaustible supply of fish. The

desolate islands along the sea-coast, overgrown by noxious vegetation,

and swarming with deer and tigers, supply the cultivated districts with

abundance of salt. The great stream which fertilises the soil is, at the

same time, the chief highway of Eastern commerce. On its banks, and

on those of its tributary waters, are the wealthiest marts, the most

splendid capitals, and the most sacred shrines of India. The tyranny

of man had for ages struggled in vain against the overflowing bounty of

nature. In spite of the Mussulman despot and of the Mahratta freebooter,

Bengal was known through the East as the garden of Eden, as the rich

kingdom. Its population multiplied exceedingly. Distant provinces were

nourished from the overflowing of its granaries--and the noble ladies of

London and Paris were clothed in the delicate produce of its looms, The

race by whom this rich tract was peopled, enervated by a soft climate

and accustomed to peaceful employments, bore the same relation to other

Asiatics which the Asiatics generally bear to the bold and energetic

children of Europe. The Castilians have a proverb, that in Valencia

the earth is water and the men women; and the description is at least

equally applicable to the vast plain of the Lower Ganges. Whatever the

Bengalee does he does languidly. His favourite pursuits are sedentary.

He shrinks from bodily exertion; and, though voluble in dispute, and

singularly pertinacious in the war of chicane, he seldom engages in

a personal conflict, and scarcely ever enlists as a soldier. We doubt

whether there be a hundred genuine Bengalees in the whole army of the

East India Company. There never, perhaps, existed a people so thoroughly

fitted by nature and by habit for a foreign yoke.

The great commercial companies of Europe had long possessed factories in

Bengal. The French were settled, as they still are, at Chandernagore on

the Hoogley. Higher up the stream the Dutch held Chinsurah. Nearer

to the sea, the English had built Fort William. A church and ample

warehouses rose in the vicinity. A row of spacious houses, belonging

to the chief factors of the East India Company, lined the banks of the

river; and in the neighbourhood had sprung up a large and busy native

town, where some Hindoo merchants of great opulence had fixed their

abode. But the tract now covered by the palaces of Chowringhee contained

only a few miserable huts thatched with straw. A jungle, abandoned to

waterfowl and alligators, covered the site of the present Citadel,

and the Course, which is now daily crowded at sunset with the gayest

equipages of Calcutta. For the ground on which the settlement stood, the

English, like other great landholders, paid rent to the Government; and

they were, like other great landholders, permitted to exercise a certain

jurisdiction within their domain.

The great province of Bengal, together with Orissa and Bahar, had long

been governed by a viceroy, whom the English called Aliverdy Khan,

and who, like the other viceroys of the Mogul, had become virtually

independent. He died in 1756, and the sovereignty descended to his

grandson, a youth under twenty years of age, who bore the name of

Surajah Dowlah. Oriental despots are perhaps the worst class of human

beings; and this unhappy boy was one of the worst specimens of his

class. His understanding was naturally feeble, and his temper naturally

unamiable. His education had been such as would have enervated even a

vigorous intellect, and perverted even a generous disposition. He was

unreasonable, because nobody ever dared to reason with him, and selfish,

because he had never been made to feel himself dependent on the goodwill

of others. Early debauchery had unnerved his body and his mind. He

indulged immoderately in the use of ardent spirits, which inflamed his

weak brain almost to madness. His chosen companions were flatterers

sprung from the dregs of the people, and recommended by nothing but

buffoonery and, servility. It is said that he had arrived at the last

stage of human depravity, when cruelty becomes pleasing for its own

sake, when the sight of pain as pain, where no advantage is to be

gained, no offence punished, no danger averted, is an agreeable

excitement. It had early been his amusement to torture beasts and birds;

and, when he grew up, he enjoyed with still keener relish the misery of

his fellow-creatures.

From a child Surajah Dowlah had hated the English. It was his whim to

do so; and his whims were never opposed. He had also formed a very

exaggerated notion of the wealth which might be obtained by plundering

them; and his feeble and uncultivated mind was incapable of perceiving

that the riches of Calcutta, had they been even greater than he

imagined, would not compensate him for what he must lose, if the

European trade, of which Bengal was a chief seat, should be driven by

his violence to some other quarter. Pretexts for a quarrel were readily

found. The English, in expectation of a war with France, had begun to

fortify their settlement without special permission from the Nabob. A

rich native, whom he longed to plunder, had taken refuge at Calcutta,

and had not been delivered up. On such grounds as these Surajah Dowlah

marched with a great army against Fort William.

The servants of the Company at Madras had been forced by Dupleix to

become statesmen and soldiers. Those in Bengal were still mere traders,

and were terrified and bewildered by the approaching danger. The

governor, who had heard much of Surajah Dowlah’s cruelty, was frightened

out of his wits, jumped into a boat, and took refuge in the nearest

ship. The military commandant thought that he could not do better than

follow so good an example. The fort was taken after a feeble resistance;

and great numbers of the English fell into the hands of the conquerors.

The Nabob seated himself with regal pomp in the principal hall of the

factory, and ordered Mr. Holwell, the first in rank among the prisoners,

to be brought before him. His Highness talked about the insolence of

the English, and grumbled at the smallness of the treasure which he had

found, but promised to spare their lives, and retired to rest.

Then was committed that great crime, memorable for its singular

atrocity, memorable for the tremendous retribution by which it was

followed. The English captives were left to the mercy of the guards, and

the guards determined to secure them for the night in the prison of the

garrison, a chamber known by the fearful name of the Black Hole. Even

for a single European malefactor, that dungeon would, in such a climate,

have been too close and narrow. The space was only twenty feet square.

The air-holes were small and obstructed. It was the summer solstice, the

season when the fierce heat of Bengal can scarcely be rendered tolerable

to natives of England by lofty halls and by the constant waving of fans.

The number of the prisoners was one hundred and forty-six. When they

were ordered to enter the cell, they imagined that the soldiers were

joking; and, being in high spirits on account of the promise of the

Nabob to spare their lives, they laughed and jested at the absurdity of

the notion. They soon discovered their mistake. They expostulated;

they entreated; but in vain. The guards threatened to cut down all who

hesitated. The captives were driven into the cell at the point of the

sword, and the door was instantly shut and locked upon them.

Nothing in history or fiction, not even the story which Ugolino told in

the sea of everlasting ice, after he had wiped his bloody lips on the

scalp of his murderer, approaches the horrors which were recounted by

the few survivors of that night. They cried for mercy. They strove

to burst the door. Holwell who, even in that extremity, retained some

presence of mind, offered large bribes to the gaolers. But the answer

was that nothing could be done without the Nabob’s orders, that the

Nabob was asleep, and that he would be angry if anybody woke him. Then

the prisoners went mad with despair. They trampled each other down,

fought for the places at the windows, fought for the pittance of water

with which the cruel mercy of the murderers mocked their agonies, raved,

prayed, blasphemed, implored the guards to fire among them. The gaolers

in the meantime held lights to the bars, and shouted with laughter at

the frantic struggles of their victims. At length the tumult died away

in low gaspings and moanings. The day broke. The Nabob had slept off

his debauch, and permitted the door to be opened. But it was some time

before the soldiers could make a lane for the survivors, by piling up on

each side the heaps of corpses on which the burning climate had already

begun to do its loathsome work. When at length a passage was made,

twenty-three ghastly figures, such as their own mothers would not

have known, staggered one by one out of the charnel-house. A pit was

instantly dug. The dead bodies, a hundred and twenty-three in number,

were flung into it promiscuously and covered up.

But these things--which, after the lapse of more than eighty years,

cannot be told or read without horror--awakened neither remorse nor

pity in the bosom of the savage Nabob. He inflicted no punishment on

the murderers. He showed no tenderness to the survivors. Some of them,

indeed, from whom nothing was to be got, were suffered to depart; but

those from whom it was thought that anything could be extorted were

treated with execrable cruelty. Holwell, unable to walk, was carried

before the tyrant, who reproached him, threatened him, and sent him

up the country in irons, together with some other gentlemen who were

suspected of knowing more than they chose to tell about the treasures of

the Company. These persons, still bowed down by the sufferings of that

great agony, were lodged in miserable sheds, and fed only with grain and

water, till at length the intercessions of the female relations of the

Nabob procured their release. One Englishwoman had survived that night.

She was placed in the harem of the Prince at Moorshedabad.

Surajah Dowlah, in the meantime, sent letters to his nominal sovereign

at Delhi, describing the late conquest in the most pompous language. He

placed a garrison in Fort William, forbade Englishmen to dwell in

the neighbourhood, and directed that, in memory of his great actions,

Calcutta should thenceforward be called Alinagore, that is to say, the

Port of God.

In August the news of the fall of Calcutta reached Madras, and excited

the fiercest and bitterest resentment. The cry of the whole settlement

was for vengeance. Within forty-eight hours after the arrival of the

intelligence it was determined that an expedition should be sent to the

Hoogley, and that Clive should be at the head of the land forces. The

naval armament was under the command of Admiral Watson. Nine hundred

English infantry, fine troops and full of spirit, and fifteen hundred

sepoys, composed the army which sailed to punish a Prince who had more

subjects than Lewis the Fifteenth or the Empress Maria Theresa. In

October the expedition sailed; but it had to make its way against

adverse winds and did not reach Bengal till December.

The Nabob was revelling in fancied security at Moorshedabad. He was so

profoundly ignorant of the state of foreign countries that he often used

to say that there were not ten thousand men in all Europe; and it had

never occurred to him as possible that the English would dare to invade

his dominions. But, though undisturbed by any fear of their military

power, he began to miss them greatly. His revenues fell off; and his

ministers succeeded in making him understand that a ruler may sometimes

find it more profitable to protect traders in the open enjoyment

of their gains than to put them to the torture for the purpose of

discovering hidden chests of gold and jewels. He was already disposed to

permit the Company to resume its mercantile operations in his country,

when he received the news that an English armament was in the Hoogley.

He instantly ordered all his troops to assemble at Moorshedabad, and

marched towards Calcutta.

Clive had commenced operations with his usual vigour. He took

Budgebudge, routed the garrison of Fort William, recovered Calcutta,

stormed and sacked Hoogley. The Nabob, already disposed to make some

concessions to the English, was confirmed in his pacific disposition by

these proofs of their power and spirit. He accordingly made overtures to

the chiefs of the invading armament, and offered to restore the factory,

and to give compensation to those whom he had despoiled.

Clive’s profession was war; and he felt that there was something

discreditable in an accommodation with Surajah Dowlah. But his power was

limited. A committee, chiefly composed of servants of the Company who

had fled from Calcutta, had the principal direction of affairs; and

these persons were eager to be restored to their posts and compensated

for their losses. The government of Madras, apprised that war had

commenced in Europe, and apprehensive of an attack from the French,

became impatient for the return of the armament. The promises of the

Nabob were large, the chances of a contest doubtful; and Clive consented

to treat, though he expressed his regret that things should not be

concluded in so glorious a manner as he could have wished.

With this negotiation commences a new chapter in the life of Clive.

Hitherto he had been merely a soldier carrying into effect, with eminent

ability and valour, the plans of others. Henceforth he is to be chiefly

regarded as a statesman; and his military movements are to be considered

as subordinate to his political designs. That in his new capacity he

displayed great ability, and obtained great success, is unquestionable.

But it is also unquestionable that the transactions in which he now

began to take a part have left a stain on his moral character.

We can by no means agree with Sir John Malcolm, who is obstinately

resolved to see nothing but honour and integrity in the conduct of his

hero. But we can as little agree with Mr. Mill, who has gone so far

as to say that Clive was a man “to whom deception, when it suited

his purpose, never cost a pang.” Clive seems to us to have been

constitutionally the very opposite of a knave, bold even to temerity,

sincere even to indiscretion, hearty in friendship, open in enmity.

Neither in his private life, nor in those parts of his public life

in which he had to do with his countrymen, do we find any signs of a

propensity to cunning. On the contrary, in all the disputes in which he

was engaged as an Englishman against Englishmen, from his boxing-matches

at school to those stormy altercations at the India House and in

Parliament amidst which his later years were passed, his very faults

were those of a high and magnanimous spirit. The truth seems to have

been that he considered Oriental politics as a game in which nothing was

unfair. He knew that the standard of morality among the natives of India

differed widely from that established in England. He knew that he had to

deal with men destitute of what in Europe is called honour, with men who

would give any promise without hesitation, and break any promise without

shame, with men who would unscrupulously employ corruption, perjury,

forgery, to compass their ends. His letters show that the great

difference between Asiatic and European morality was constantly in his

thoughts. He seems to have imagined, most erroneously in our opinion,

that he could effect nothing against such adversaries, if he was content

to be bound by ties from which they were free, if he went on telling

truth, and hearing none, if he fulfilled, to his own hurt, all his

engagements with confederates who never kept an engagement that was not

to their advantage. Accordingly this man, in the other parts of his life

an honourable English gentleman and a soldier, was no sooner matched

against an Indian intriguer, than he became himself an Indian intriguer,

and descended, without scruple, to falsehood, to hypocritical caresses,

to the substitution of documents, and to the counterfeiting of hands.

The negotiations between the English and the Nabob were carried on

chiefly by two agents, Mr. Watts, a servant of the Company, and a

Bengalee of the name of Omichund. This Omichund had been one of the

wealthiest native merchants resident at Calcutta, and had sustained

great losses in consequence of the Nabob’s expedition against that

place. In the course of his commercial transactions, he had seen much

of the English, and was peculiarly qualified to serve as a medium

of communication between them and a native court. He possessed great

influence with his own race, and had in large measure the Hindoo

talents, quick observation, tact, dexterity, perseverance, and the

Hindoo vices, servility, greediness, and treachery.

The Nabob behaved with all the faithlessness of an Indian statesman, and

with all the levity of a boy whose mind had been enfeebled by power and

self-indulgence. He promised, retracted, hesitated, evaded. At one time

he advanced with his army in a threatening manner towards Calcutta; but

when he saw the resolute front which the English presented, he fell back

in alarm, and consented to make peace with them on their own terms. The

treaty was no sooner concluded than he formed new designs against them.

He intrigued with the French authorities at Chandernagore. He invited

Bussy to march from the Deccan to the Hoogley, and to drive the English

out of Bengal. All this was well known to Clive and Watson. They

determined accordingly to strike a decisive blow, and to attack

Chandernagore, before the force there could be strengthened by new

arrivals, either from the south of India, or from Europe. Watson

directed the expedition by water, Clive by land. The success of the

combined movements was rapid and complete. The fort, the garrison, the

artillery, the military stores, all fell into the hands of the English.

Near five hundred European troops were among the prisoners.

The Nabob had feared and hated the English, even while he was still able

to oppose to them their French rivals. The French were now vanquished;

and he began to regard the English with still greater fear and still

greater hatred. His weak and unprincipled mind oscillated between

servility and insolence. One day he sent a large sum to Calcutta, as

part of the compensation due for the wrongs which he had committed,

The next day he sent a present of jewels to Bussy, exhorting that

distinguished officer to hasten to protect Bengal “against Clive,

the daring in war, on whom,” says his Highness, “may all bad fortune

attend.” He ordered his army to march against the English. He

countermanded his orders. He tore Clive’s letters. He then sent answers

in the most florid language of compliment. He ordered Watts out of his

presence, and threatened to impale him. He again sent for Watts,

and begged pardon for the insult. In the meantime, his wretched

maladministration, his folly, his dissolute manners, and his love of

the lowest company, had disgusted all classes of his subjects, soldiers,

traders, civil functionaries, the proud and ostentatious Mahommedans,

the timid, supple, and parsimonious Hindoos. A formidable confederacy

was formed against him, in which were included Roydullub, the minister

of finance, Meer Jaffier, the principal commander of the troops, and

Jugget Seit, the richest banker in India. The plot was confided to the

English agents, and a communication was opened between the malcontents

at Moorshedabad and the committee at Calcutta.

In the committee there was much hesitation; but Clive’s voice was given

in favour of the conspirators, and his vigour and firmness bore down

all opposition. It was determined that the English should lend their

powerful assistance to depose Surajah Dowlah, and to place Meer

Jaffier on the throne of Bengal. In return, Meer Jaffier promised ample

compensation to the Company and its servants, and a liberal donative

to the army, the navy, and the committee. The odious vices of Surajah

Dowlah, the wrongs which the English had suffered at his hands, the

dangers to which our trade must have been exposed, had he continued to

reign, appear to us fully to justify the resolution of deposing him. But

nothing can justify the dissimulation which Clive stooped to practise.

He wrote to Surajah Dowlah in terms so affectionate that they for a

time lulled that weak prince into perfect security. The same courier who

carried this “soothing letter,” as Clive calls it, to the Nabob, carried

to Mr. Watts a letter in the following terms: “Tell Meer Jaffier to fear

nothing. I will join him with five thousand men who never turned their

backs. Assure him I will march night and day to his assistance, and

stand by him as long as I have a man left.”

It was impossible that a plot which had so many ramifications should

long remain entirely concealed. Enough reached the ear of the Nabob

to arouse his suspicions. But he was soon quieted by the fictions

and artifices which the inventive genius of Omichund produced with

miraculous readiness. All was going well; the plot was nearly ripe;

when Clive learned that Omichund was likely to play false. The artful

Bengalee had been promised a liberal compensation for all that he had

lost at Calcutta. But this would not satisfy him. His services had been

great. He held the thread of the whole intrigue. By one word breathed in

the ear of Surajah Dowlah, he could undo all that he had done. The lives

of Watts, of Meer Jaffier of all the conspirators, were at his mercy;

and he determined to take advantage of his situation and to make his own

terms. He demanded three hundred thousand pounds sterling as the price

of his secrecy and of his assistance. The committee, incensed by the

treachery and appalled by the danger, knew not what course to take. But

Clive was more than Omichund’s match in Omichund’s own arts. The man,

he said, was a villain. Any artifice which would defeat such knavery

was justifiable. The best course would be to promise what was asked.

Omichund would soon be at their mercy; and then they might punish him by

withholding from him, not only the bribe which he now demanded, but

also the compensation which all the other sufferers of Calcutta were to

receive.

His advice was taken. But how was the wary and sagacious Hindoo to be

deceived? He had demanded that an article touching his claims should

be inserted in the treaty between Meer Jaffier and the English, and he

would not be satisfied unless he saw it with his own eyes. Clive had

an expedient ready. Two treaties were drawn up, one on white paper,

the other on red, the former real, the latter fictitious. In the former

Omichund’s name was not mentioned; the latter, which was to be shown to

him, contained a stipulation in his favour.

But another difficulty arose. Admiral Watson had scruples about signing

the red treaty. Omichund’s vigilance and acuteness were such that the

absence of so important a name would probably awaken his suspicions. But

Clive was not a man to do anything by halves. We almost blush to write

it. He forged Admiral Watson’s name.

All was now ready for action. Mr. Watts fled secretly from Moorshedabad.

Clive put his troops in motion, and wrote to the Nabob in a tone very

different from that of his previous letters. He set forth all the wrongs

which the British had suffered, offered to submit the points in dispute

to the arbitration of Meer Jaffier, and concluded by announcing that, as

the rains were about to set in, he and his men would do themselves the

honour of waiting on his Highness for an answer.

Surajah Dowlah instantly assembled his whole force, and marched to

encounter the English. It had been agreed that Meer Jaffier should

separate himself from the Nabob, and carry over his division to Clive.

But, as the decisive moment approached, the fears of the conspirator

overpowered his ambition. Clive had advanced to Cossimbuzar; the Nabob

lay with a mighty power a few miles off at Plassey; and still Meer

Jaffier delayed to fulfil his engagements, and returned evasive answers

to the earnest remonstrances of the English general.

Clive was in a painfully anxious situation. He could place no confidence

in the sincerity or in the courage of his confederate; and, whatever

confidence he might place in his own military talents, and in the valour

and discipline of his troops, it was no light thing to engage an army

twenty times numerous as his own. Before him lay a river over which it

was easy to advance, but over which, if things went ill, not one of his

little band would ever return. On this occasion, for the first and for

the last time, his dauntless spirit, during a few hours, shrank from the

fearful responsibility of making a decision He called a council of

war. The majority pronounced against fighting; and Clive declared his

concurrence with the majority. Long afterwards, he said that he had

never called but one council of war, and that, if he had taken the

advice of that council, the British would never have been masters of

Bengal. But scarcely had the meeting broken up when he was himself

again. He retired alone under the shade of some trees, and passed near

an hour there in thought. He came back determined to put everything to

the hazard, and gave orders that all should be in readiness for passing

the river on the morrow.

The river was passed; and, at the close of a toilsome day’s march, the

army, long after sunset, took up its quarters in a grove of mango-trees

near Plassey, within a mile of the enemy. Clive was unable to sleep; he

heard, through the whole night the sound of drums and cymbals from the

vast camp of the Nabob. It is not strange that even his stout heart

should now and then have sunk, when he reflected against what odds, and

for what a prize, he was in a few hours to contend.

Nor was the rest of Surajah Dowlah more peaceful. His mind, at once weak

and stormy, was distracted by wild and horrible apprehensions. Appalled

by the greatness and nearness of the crisis, distrusting his captains,

dreading every one who approached him, dreading to be left alone, he

sat gloomily in his tent, haunted, a Greek poet would have said, by the

furies of those who had cursed him with their last breath in the Black

Hole.

The day broke, the day which was to decide the fate of India. At sunrise

the army of the Nabob, pouring through many openings of the camp,

began to move towards the grove where the English lay. Forty thousand

infantry, armed with firelocks, pikes, swords, bows and arrows, covered

the plain. They were accompanied by fifty pieces of ordnance of the

largest size, each tugged by a long team of white oxen, and each pushed

on from behind by an elephant. Some smaller guns, under the direction of

a few French auxiliaries, were perhaps more formidable. The cavalry were

fifteen thousand, drawn, not from the effeminate population of Bengal,

but from the bolder race which inhabits the northern provinces; and the

practised eye of Clive could perceive that both the men and the horses

were more powerful than those of the Carnatic. The force which he had to

oppose to this great multitude consisted of only three thousand men.

But of these nearly a thousand were English; and all were led by English

officers, and trained in the English discipline. Conspicuous in the

ranks of the little army were the men of the Thirty-Ninth Regiment,

which still bears on its colours, amidst many honourable additions won

under Wellington in Spain and Gascony, the name of Plassey, and the

proud motto, Primus in Indis.

The battle commenced with a cannonade in which the artillery of the

Nabob did scarcely any execution, while the few fieldpieces of the

English produced great effect. Several of the most distinguished

officers in Surajah Dowlah’s service fell. Disorder began to spread

through his ranks. His own terror increased every moment. One of the

conspirators urged on him the expediency of retreating. The insidious

advice, agreeing as it did with what his own terrors suggested, was

readily received. He ordered his army to fall back, and this order

decided his fate. Clive snatched the moment, and ordered his troops to

advance. The confused and dispirited multitude gave way before the onset

of disciplined valour. No mob attacked by regular soldiers was ever more

completely routed. The little band of Frenchmen, who alone ventured to

confront the English, were swept down the stream of fugitives. In an

hour the forces of Surajah Dowlah were dispersed, never to reassemble.

Only five hundred of the vanquished were slain. But their camp, their

guns, their baggage, innumerable waggons, innumerable cattle, remained

in the power of the conquerors. With the loss of twenty-two soldiers

killed and fifty wounded, Clive had scattered an army of near sixty

thousand men, and subdued an empire larger and more populous than Great

Britain.