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Chittagong, and to do such further violence as might be practicable to those amongst whom they had hitherto dwelt in peace. This premature attempt at open aggression failed; had it succeeded it might have opened the eyes of the Governments generally in Hindustan to the danger and folly of temporising conduct. But it was fated otherwise; and after seizing the island of Jjellee and burning the town of Balasore, the raiders suffered a severe reverse; and the loss of their factories at Patna and Cosimbuzar reduced them to seek for terms of accommodation.1

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From that day the designs of the Company were changed from the mere pursuit of commerce to those of territorial acquisition. In the instructions sent out from England in 1689, we find the following significant expressions: The increase of our revenue is the subject of our care as much as our trade: it is that must maintain our force, when twenty accidents may interrupt our trade; it is that must make us a nation in India; without that we are a great number of interlopers united by charter, fit only to trade where nobody thinks it their interest to prevent us." And undeviatingly were these instructions followed by successive generations of "Company's servants," as they were styled. Thenceforth trade was valued less for its own sake than as a diplomatic agent, or a well-appointed pioneer to prepare the way for dominion. The experience which had been lost upon the Padishah in their recent conflict with him was not thrown away on them. In 1699 they persuaded him to grant them liberty to found several new factories, and to erect forts beside them. "This, however," says their historian, "they began cautiously, so as not to alarm the native Governments.'

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The closing days of the century were spent by the

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Company's servants at the mouths of the Hooghly in establishing themselves in three villages, Chuttanatti, Calcutta, and Govindpur, which had been granted them as a jaghire on the customary terms of fealty and tribute by Azîm-shâh, when Soubahdar of Bengal. A rich present had induced the grandson of Aurungzebe to make them this concession; and, with or without his leave, they lost no time in erecting works, to which, in compliment to their sovereign at home, they gave the name of Fort William.

Since the wolf's cub leaped over the mud wall on the banks of Tiber, nothing so pregnant with consequences had happened in the history of empire-building; yet few things attracted less of notice among the Whig politicians of St James's, or the Tory politicians of St Germain ;-so little, indeed, that the date is erroneously given in many popular histories, the matter not having been thought apparently worth accurately searching out. The Mogul, living far inland at Delhi, probably heard no more for some time of his new tenants-in-fee, who had come over the dark waters, and humbly craved his permission to squat near the seashore. If he was told of their planting stockades, and putting a sort of fortification there, why should he trouble himself regarding it? Likely enough his native subjects around them were jealous and disposed to be quarrelsome. Why should not Feringhees defend themselves as best they might? Poor people! they had come a long way, and seemed to work hard-he would not interfere.

CHAPTER III.

BEGINNINGS OF AGGRESSION.

1701-1756.

"A new scene is now to open in the history of the East India Company. Before this period they had maintained the character of mere traders, and by humility and submission endeavoured to preserve a footing in that distant country, under the native powers. We shall now behold them entering the lists of war, and mixing with eagerness in the contests of princes."

AT

-JAMES MILL.1

T the beginning of the eighteenth century, the ties which had held together the dominions of Aurungzebe were visibly beginning to decay. As in the dependencies of Spain under Philip II., the infatuation of proselytism had tended only to work the disintegration of the scattered realm. In Bengal especially this species of impolicy had served to shake the loyalty of the people. The poorer and more ignorant sort yielded to the harsh dictates of their masters, and to some extent conformed to the Mohammedan faith. The more subtle intellects of the Brahmins resorted to evasion, and the wealthier classes were able to purchase the luxury of keeping a conscience, and of transmitting to their children the traditions of Vishnu. Elsewhere the bulk of the population adhered to the rites and tenets of their fathers; but throughout Southern India, the silent process of alienation had set in. 1 History of British India, book I. chap. ii.

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Wherever the Mahrattas came, they unfurled the flag of religious deliverance; and to drive them back, the great lieutenants of the empire found it expedient to revert to the old ways of toleration.

From the death of Aurungzebe the strength and unity of the empire thawed more rapidly. His successors were still honoured with the title of "the Sun," but the power to wither or bid flourish they had once possessed grew feebler day by day. Large and remote provinces became unmanageable; and being handed over to individuals of influence. and ability, were governed by them as tributary States. The title of Soubahdar or viceroy and the language of political trusteeship, were scrupulously preserved; but inquiry into misrule was too easily evaded, too easily defied, to be attempted frequently; and the reality of control was silently abandoned by the Imperial Durbar, in the hope of preserving the fragile show of supremacy. Taking advantage of the circumstances of the time, and of the errors of their suzerain, the Soubahdars gradually sought to become more independent of the court at Delhi. The Nizam, who ruled over the Deccan, the Vizier of Oude, and the NawabNazim of Bengal, aspired to found viceregal dynasties in their respective provinces. They never tried to throw off their allegiance to the Mogul, to refuse him tribute, or to question the validity of his acts of occasional interference and supreme interposition; but, like the African Beys of our own time, they succeeded in asserting a qualified independence within their respective pashalics. They took the title the Padishah conferred on them, not that of Majesty, which would have been incompatible with the idea and duty of their station; but practically they exercised over their people all the real authority of government. The English at Madras found that it was with the Nizam

primarily and principally they must deal if they would dwell securely; and their fellow-countrymen at Calcutta understood, in like manner, that a good understanding with the court of Moorshedabad or of Lucknow was of more importance to them than friendship, however unruffled, with that of Delhi.

In each of the Presidencies, power had been given them to employ civil servants in their foreign settlements, to raise such troops as might be necessary for their defence, and to determine, without previous reference to the Government at home, what native powers were to be regarded as enemies. or friends. The continual wars between England and France had led both Governments to send, from time to time, portions of their disposable force to India; and thus were the means afforded to the ambitious governors in those remote possessions, of intermeddling in the contests of the native chiefs. To reckless and irresponsible men with arms at their disposal, a pretext will not long be wanting for employing them.

The French were perhaps the first to conceive the project of founding a territorial empire in the Indian peninsula. For a long period their settlements were presided over by Dupleix, a man thirsting for power, and eminently qualified, by his subtle and adventurous disposition, to extend the dominion of his employers. He had married a native of rank, who beside her fortune brought him the accession of local knowledge, and acquaintance with the ways and aims of the subordinate courts of the empire. Her natural abilities, it is said, were good; and, educated in a school of political intrigue, she was able to conduct for her husband the daily correspondence and diplomacy which no European at that time could have attempted. The struggle for ascendancy between the English and French settlers was long

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