The French Surrender Seringham.

55

friends. Labourdonnais had left India, and had died in France of a broken heart. Bussy had marched northwards with the Nizam, and was fully employed in looking after his own interests and those of his country, at the court of that prince. Dupleix, though equal in intrigue to every European who had borne a part in any of the numerous revolutions in India, was quite incapable of conducting military operations. He was accused by his enemies of personal cowardice, and he defended himself in a way which proved there was some justice in the charge; for he said that he thought it right to keep himself out of the neighbourhood of powder and shot, as noise was unsuited to his genius, and he found it difficult to pursue his meditations amid the din of arms.

Hence, as might have been expected, the English triumphed everywhere. After a series of brilliant operations, the French and Chunda Sahib were shut up in the fort of Seringham, on an island in the river Cavery, opposite to Trichinopoly. Here they were summoned to surrender at discretion; when M. Law, the French commander, accepted the proffered terms, and six hundred Europeans besides Sepoys became prisoners of war, while thirty pieces of cannon rewarded the skill of the victors. Chunda Sahib, who had been recently lord of the Carnatic, finding himself deserted by his troops, fled to the camp of his enemies, and surrendered to Monajee, general of the Rajah of Tanjore, a wily Hindu, who promised him his protection, and then proved it by placing him in irons. A violent dispute now arose between Mohammed Ali, the Mahratta chiefs, and Monajee, who one and all claimed the person of the

prisoner. To put an end to the quarrel, Major Lawrence proposed that the fallen potentate should for the present be delivered up to the English; but the disputants separated without coming to any agreement, and before the discussion could be renewed Monajee settled the question by cutting off the head of Chunda Sahib, and sent it to his now fortunate rival, Mohammed Ali, who exhibited it in triumph throughout his army.

The English were now eager to attack the fortress of Gingee, the only strong place in the Carnatic which remained in possession of their foes; but inasmuch as their Indian auxiliaries had all retired to their homes, and the English had only their own Sepoys to assist them, their numbers were too few to warrant success, and the first attempt failed. This gave encouragement to Dupleix to renew the intrigues by means of his wife, and to inflame the dissensions which were then beginning to break out between Mohammed Ali and the Regent of Mysore. By this means Dupleix managed to form another considerable army; and the Madras Government decided on sending Lawrence, with a force of four hundred English, with six thousand Sepoys and troops in the pay of Mohammed Ali, to encounter him. Lawrence met the French on the plains of Bahoor, only two miles from Fort St. David, and obtained a decisive victory, which would have been more complete if his native auxiliaries had been less anxious to plunder than to fight.

The English general was now enabled to dispatch Clive to take Covelong, an important fort

Clive's Capture of Covelong.

57

about twenty miles south of Madras, which was garrisoned by fifty French and three hundred Sepoys. The only force which could be spared to Clive consisted of two hundred recruits just arrived from England (said to have been the very refuse of the London jails), and also of five hundred newly raised Sepoy troops, and four pieces of cannon. With these raw recruits, which no officer but Clive would risk his reputation by commanding, Clive ventured on the hazardous feat of attacking Covelong, garrisoned by Europeans, and defended by thirty pieces of cannon. A shot from the fort killed one of these London jail-birds, on which the rest flew away with all imaginable speed, and it was with the utmost difficulty that Clive could succeed in rallying them. On another occasion the noise of a gun terrified these British recruits so much, that one of them was found some hours later at the bottom of a well, which he philosophically considered the safest place from the fire of the merciless foe. Clive, by accustoming them to danger, and by exposing himself wherever the fire was hottest, gradually shamed them into courage; and by the time the siege was over, the recruits had become heroes; and Covelong surrendered to this gallant army, which must be ranked as one of the most marvellous exploits in Clive's wonderful and romantic career. Nor did it end here; for the very morning after the surrender of Covelong, a large body of the enemy's troops were seen advancing with the evident intention of relieving the fort. Clive instantly took measures to prevent the enemy from learning that they were

aloved

the songest in India:

me part of sorming priced and was

die his men. This ended the campaign of or after the most brillant and rapid series of victones on the part of Cure who soca after salled for England to recover his strength and health, which be had so nobly expended on behalf of His country in laying the foundation of the British Empire in India

CHAPTER IX.

FROM THE TREATY OF PONDICHERRY TO THE BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA.

A.D. 1754-1756.

THE Oper under Lawrence; for although there

HE operations begun under Clive were con

was peace in Europe between the French and English from the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748 to the beginning of the "Seven Years' War" in 1756, it was not so in the Carnatic, where these two nations, by their representatives, were still in arms against each other, and virtually contending for the possession of Hindostan. Clive had scarcely left for England, when Dupleix's intrigues obtained for a time the most signal triumphs. The Regent of Mysore abruptly broke off his alliance, and joined the French; while his example was followed by the Mahratta chief, Moorary Ráo, who considered that he had not obtained a fair share of the booty.

After a series of operations with varied success, which we have not time to detail, the English army under Lawrence met the allied forces at a place called "the Golden Rock," and a spirited action. took place between them, in which the Mysoreans and the Mahrattas took a less prominent part. The latter occasionally made a charge, and did