Page:A Comprehensive History of India Vol 1.djvu/726

 G92

HISTORY OF IM>IA.

[Book JJI

A D. 1765.

Olive's vi»it to Allahabad.

had ceased to liave any real authority within tiiern. It wa.s desirable, therefore, that the Company, in apjjropriating the whole civil and military power of the three provinces, should obtain his sanction. In this there was little difficulty, as he had voluntarily offered, when he threw himself on their protection, to comply with any terms which they might be pleased to dictate. Clive accord- ingly after accomplishing liis (jliject at Moorshedabad, by reducing the nabob to the condition of a pensioner, pursued his tour in the direction of Allahaljad,

Tbe Palace, Allahabad.' — From Daiiiell's Views in India

Uib ;in- iiounceraeiil t.u Sliuh Alum.

that he might there, in conjunction with General Carnac, obtain from Shah Alum a formal sanction of the new revolution which he had just accomplished It is not to be denied that Shah Alum had good cause to complain of the treatment he received on this occasion. When he entered on possession of Allahabad and the adjoining districts, it was under a treaty which promised him the ultimate possession of all the territories which belonged to Sujah Dowlah. Instead of this he was now informed that he must rest satisfied with the small extent of territory already confei'i'ed upon him, and with the annual payment of twenty-six lacs of rupees from Bengal. Besides this tribute he had right to a jaghire in that country which yielded several lacs, and to a large amount of arrears, but when he claimed them, was simply told that he must look on all past arrangements as cancelled. In future he, too, was to be nothing more than a mere pensioner of the Company. There is something almost ludicrous in the double character which Shah Alum was thus made to assume. In the

' This palace "is now the arsenal; a brick wall has been run up between its outer colonnades, with windows of English architecture, and its curious pavilions and other accompaniments removed; and internally, whatever could not be conveniently cut away is carefully covered up with plaster and whitewash, and hid by stands for arms and deal fittings. Still its plan can be made out ; a square

hall supported by eight rows of columns, eight in each row, thus making in all sixty-four, surrounded by a deep verandah of double columns with groups of four at the angles, all surmounted by bracket capitals of the most elegant and richest design, and altogether as fine in style and as rich in ornament as anything in India." — Fergusson's Handbook of Architecture, vol. i.