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 0t HISTORY OF IM>IA. [Kook III.

A D. 17.W he might be reduced after he was left to his own resources, and the urK;ertairi

support of the individual wiio might be called to occupy without being able t/j

riivoro- fill Olive's place. The shazada was again on the frontier meditating a new in-

solves to.

.iei)artfor vasion. How would he be able to repel it? Nor was this all. The a.scendeiicy which the Company had acquired had opened a door to innumeraV>le abases; and the revenues of the government, as well as the general prosperity of the popula- tion, had been seriously diminished by the preposterous exemptions claimed and the gross oppression often practised by the officials of the Company in carrying on trade, and giving pennits to others to carry on trade, for their own indi- vidual profit. All such abuses Clive had ever shown a willingness to keep within bounds. Would his successor be similarly disposed? and if lie were, would he be equal to the task? Under the influence of such considerations, Meer Jaffier would gladly have purchased Clive's continued residence in Bengal at almost any price. The leading civil servants of the Company were equally urgent in pressing him to postpone his departure. Warren Hastings, in paiticular, ad- dressed to him a long letter, in which, while expressing his belief that the nabob was "both by interest and inclination heartily attached to the English," he

Attempts argued that the people about him would use every possible means to alienate

todis-suaJo. .

him. his affections, and that as he was " but of an irresolute and unsettled temper, it

would be impossible for him, after Clive's absence emboldened them to throw off the mask, to hold out against the united influence of so many evil counsellors.' Next he reminded him of " the dangers we are threatened with from our natural enemies the French, which, by your resignation of the service, will be doubled upon us, and in which it is very probable the nabob will stand neuter." After mentioning a fact confirmatory of this view, he adds, " I do not advance this as an argument that the nabob is inclinable to the French ; but I think it would not be difficult to persuade him that it would be for his interest to suffer the French to come into this country again, both for the increase of his revenues (a very prevailing argument) and to balance the power of the English." The last argument is drawn from the state of matters at the Mogul court. " I know not," he says, " in what light you may regard the proposal lately made from Delhi, or whether the consideration of the further advantasres that mav result from a nearer connection with that court (in which your intervention appears of indispensable necessity) deserve to be thrown into the scale ; though I must own it is my opinion that nothing can contribute so much to establish the power of the English in this country on the most soHd and lasting foundation as an in- terest properly estabhshed at that court."

His letter to Nouc of thesc argumcnts had sufficient weio-ht to chansre Clive's resolution.

tlieEarlof ° ?

ciiathiini Some of them, indeed, rather tended to confirm it, as they satisfied him that some of the most important objects pointed at might be more effectually f^ecured by his presence in England than by his continued residence in Bengal. In the beginning of 1759 he addressed a letter to the celebrated British minister

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