of "the Daring in War" animated other British officers in different parts of India: and Calliaud, Forde, Coote, and men like them, soon gained advantages on the side of Madras almost equal to those obtained by Clive himself in Bengal.*

* While passing these sheets through the press, we have received a letter from a young officer of the 1st European Bengal Fusiliers, who, at the time of writing, was descending the river to Calcutta, there to embark for the war in Burmah. He says: "In the rainy season, the steamers do not go round through the Sunderbunds to Calcutta, but make a much shorter cut through the river which they now call the Bogherette river, and which leads from the Ganges into the Hooghly. This Bogherette is rather a pretty little stream; but it is navigable only in the rainy season. Moorshedabad is on the left bank of this stream. We passed the well-known city at about 10 o'clock in the morning; and, in the afternoon, we passed the famous field of Plassey. Lord Clive, and all the stirring scenes which were enacted there, came forcibly to my memory as we glided by in our steamer. They say that "here is one tree left of the memorable mango grove in which brave Clive encamped the evening before the celebrated battle."

manner he could, more like friends and allies than as enemies to him and his country."

In three or four days, Clive received a letter from the Nabob, informing him that he had thought proper to grant some indulgence to the Dutch in their trade, and that the Dutch, on their part, had engaged to leave the river with their ships and troops as soon as the season would permit. But this reference to the seasons was unfortunate, inasmuch as, at the time of his writing, the season permitted their departure with the greatest safety. Clive, from the tenor of the letter, and the whole course of the Nabob's conduct, felt assured that the Dutch had no intention to quit the river, and that Meer Jaffier had given his permission to them to bring up their troops if they could. This Clive was determined they should not do; and the council at Calcutta heartily agreed with him. The Nabob had not ventured to withdraw the orders he had given to the English to oppose the Dutch. A very few days later, intelligence was received that the Dutch armament was actually moving up the river towards Calcutta, and that the Dutch agents were enlisting troops of every denomination at Chinsura, Cossimbuzar, and even as far up the country as Patna, and this plainly with the connivance of Meer Jaffier, and the more open assistance of his son Meeran. Clive saw that the junction of the armament from below, and the troops from above, with the force already collected within the walls of Chinsura, would be followed by the declaration of the Nabob in favour of the Dutch, and an immediate movement upon the English settlements. His force in Europeans was, at the moment, actually inferior in number to that of the Dutch on board the seven ships alone, without counting those in garrison at Chinsura; for the force from Batavia, now accurately reported, consisted of 700 Europeans and 800 Malays-the latter a far braver race of men than the natives of Bengal. There was no time to be lost-this was no season for indulging in subtleties and nice distinctions, or for turning over the pages of Grotius and Puffendorf-and Clive resolved to proceed at once against the Dutch, as if they were open instead of secret enemies. At the critical moment, some of the council were startled by

Account from a MS. entitled "A Narrative of the Disputes of the Dutch in Bengal," found by Sir John Malcolm among Clive's papers.

ing them in the bottom of native boats; but Clive issued his mandate that every Dutch and native boat should be stopped and searched. The gentlemen at Chinsura remonstrated and protested against these proceedings on the part of a friendly power; but Clive continued to stop their soldiers, and to send them back to their ship, telling the gentlemen of the factory that he was in Bengal in a double capacity: that as an English officer, while England was engaged in a war with France, he was justified by the laws of nations in searching all vessels whatever, not knowing but that they might introduce French troops into the country; and that, as an auxiliary to the Great Mogul, he was under the necessity, by solemn treaty, to oppose the introduction of any European or foreign troops whatsoever into Bengal. The Dutch, perhaps proud of their great writers on that subject, cited the laws of nations on their own side, and kept pressing their warlike preparations all the time; and the mind that can condemn Clive's conduct in this particular, and call it an attacking" without provocation the ships and troops of a nation in friendship with this country," must previously have lost its perception in the muddiest mazes of metaphysics. If Clive had seen with such organs all would have been lost.

Early in October, Meer Jaffier arrived in person at Calcutta, as if merely intending to honour Clive with a visit. A day or two after advices came from below of the arrival of six more Dutch ships of a large size, and crammed with troops, partly Europeans and partly Malays, from Batavia and other Dutch settlements in the islands. "Now," says Clive, or a pen that wrote for him, "the Dutch mask fell off, and the Nabob (conscious of his having given his assent to their coming, and at the same time of our attachment and his own unfaithful dealings with us) was greatly confused and disconcerted. He, however, seemed to make light of it; and told the governor (Clive) he was going to reside three or four days at his fort of Hooghly, where he would chastise the insolence of the Dutch, and drive them soon out of the river again. On the 19th of October he left Calcutta; and in place of his going to his fort at Hooghly, he took up his residence at Cojah Wazeed's garden, about half-way between that and Chinsura; a plain indication that he had no apprehensions from the Dutch, whom he received there in the most gracious

posable force, consisting only of about 320 English, 1,200 sepoys, and three of the Company's ships, which were all that were then in the river. Just at this juncture, Colonel Forde returned to Calcutta, from his career of conquest in the Northern Circars and the Deccan: he had quitted his command on account of ill-health, and with the intention of returning to England by the first opportunity; but at the invitation of his friend and patron Clive, who entertained the highest opinion of his bravery and abilities, he readily agreed to take the command of part of the forces.

On the 19th of November, Forde moved from Calcutta to the northward, took the Dutch settlement at Barnagore, on the left bank of the Hooghly, crossed the river the next day with his troops and four pieces of artillery, and marched towards Chandernagore, to strike terror into the factory of Chinsura, and to be ready to intercept the Dutch troops in case they should land. The rest of his troops, and the best and largest proportion, with many volunteers draughted from the militia, and part of an independent company mounted as cavalry, Clive sent down to the forts on the river under the command of Captain Knox. Mr. Holwell took charge of Fort William with the militia, consisting of about 250 Engish and a few Portuguese. Clive remained at Calcutta, but went and came, dividing his attention and presence between the two divisions of his army under Forde and Knox. It was noticeable that men who had been absolute cowards under Governor Drake, and the other imbeciles that presided over the defence of Calcutta at the time of Suraj-u-Dowlah's siege, were now brave, alert, and confident. The three English East Indiamen which had arrived after the Dutch, were lying in the lower part of the river, between that squadron and the sea; but, as the Dutch ships now began to ascend the river, these Indiamen were ordered to pass them and station themselves above the English batteries at Charnoc and Tanna, where fire-boats had been prepared to assist in destroying them. The Dutch commodore, at sight of the three Indiamen coming up, sent to tell Commodore Wilson that if he attempted to pass he would fire upon him. On the 21st of November, the Dutch cast anchor within range of the English cannon on the batteries; on the 23rd, they landed on the Chinsura side of the river their army of 1,500

men, and then dropped down with their ships to a place called "Melancholy Point"-for them appropriately so named— where the three English ships were lying ready for action.

The moment the Dutch troops were landed, Clive sent Captain Knox across the river to reinforce Colonel Forde and ordered Commodore Wilson to demand immediate restitution of our vessels, subjects, and property, and, on their refusal, to fight, sink, burn, and destroy the Dutch squadron. The next day (the 24th) the demand was made and refused. The Dutch had seven ships, four of them being called "capital ships;" the English had only three, and they appear to have derived no assistance whatever either from the land batteries, which were too far off, or from the fire-boats. Nevertheless Commodore Wilson, who began the attack, ended it in two hours with the total defeat of the enemy: the Dutch commodore, who had thirty men killed and many wounded, struck, and the rest followed the example, all except his second, who cut and ran down the river as far as Culpee, thirty-three miles in a straight line below Calcutta, when she was stopped short, intercepted, and taken by the Orford and Royal George, which had just arrived from England. Apparently alarmed and stupified by the loss of their squadron, the Dutch and their Malays halted and wavered on their march to Chinsura, and on the 25th, the day after the fight on the river, they blundered upon a wretched position, from which retreat was difficult and a further advance impracticable. Forde with the quick eye of a soldier saw their blunder-saw that he had them upon the hip; but there came over him a doubt and a misgiving; and, hesitating to attack the troops of a European nation not in a state of declared war, he sent a hasty messenger across the river with a note to Clive, saying, "that if he had the order of council he could attack the Dutch, with a fair prospect of destroying them." Clive, who was playing a quiet game at cards when the note reached him, took out his pencil, and, without quitting the table, wrote on the back of it-"Dear Forde, fight them immediately. I will send you the order of council to-morrow."

Accordingly Forde fought the Dutch; and the engagement was short, bloody, and decisive. It took place in the * Sir John Malcolm, Life of Clive.

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