Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/331

Book IX. were to be paid as soon as the army removed ten miles from Tanjore, 150,000 were to be sent with the two French hostages as soon as it arrived before Tritchinopoly, and the remaining 150,000 were to be paid after the siege, when the king's hostages were to be surrendered, and the cavalry returned. The contingencies involved in these terms shewed, that neither side had much expectation they would be completely executed, and Mr. Lally seems to have accepted them, only because he should get some money in hand; the king because some chance might save the rest. Two hundred of the coolies were sent to the camp during the discussion of the articles which were not intirely adjusted until late in the evening of the 31st, when Mr. Dubois the commissary of the army, who had conducted the negotiation in the city, returned to the camp, accompanied by the two Tanjorine hostages, and 40 of the cavalry, being all, it was said, who were immediately ready; the delay of the rest confirmed Mr. Lally in his suspicions that the king meant only to amuse him, and induced him to shut up those who were come in a pagoda near the encampment: they not knowing what to suspect from this treatment, dreaded the worst, and sent information to the city, in consequence of which the king stopped the rest of the cavalry; and his coolies in the camp being frightened by the rumours concerning the horsemen in the pagoda, run away in the night. The next morning Mr. Lally sent Dubois to reproach the king and Monacjee for their supposed breach of faith, who retorted their own suspicions, and this altercation producing the real state of the mistakes, Dubois proffered to bring back one of the Tanjorine hostages as a conviction of security to the cavalry which had remained behind, who were then to proceed to the camp. But Mr. Lally regarded this stipulation as an indignity, and a confirmation of the king's insincerity, and summoned his council of war, who conformably to his exposition were unanimously of opinion that no reliance could be had on any professions of peace, and that it was necessary to attack the city without delay, and with the utmost vigour. In consequence of this resolution, Mr. Lally wrote a letter to colonel Kenedy, ordering him to denounce the utmost vengeance