Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/362

356 the discontent of his troops for want of pay had not rendered it dangerous to give them such a pretence of tumult, before they were satisfied. In other points of the government he was observed to assume a sterner air of authority, and told one of his favourites, who betrayed the conversation, that if a French force should come into the province he would assist them, unless the English released him from all their claims of money, territory, and exemptions.

Clive had expected this change in the Nabob's conduct, because he knew it to be none in his mind; and, in order to prevent him, at least for a while, from committing any excesses in his capital, as well as to exhibit the appearance of union and cordiality to the public, the presidency invited him, as on a visit of pleasure, and, as a compliment to Clive on his acceptance of the government, to pass some days at Calcutta. Mr. Watts was deputed to give the invitation. The Nabob saw the drift, and hesitated, but at length consented as soon as his boats should come from Dacca. They are a magnificent fleet kept at a great expence for pomp and amusement, and the Nabob, with his family and women, every year pass a month in them at this season, when the Cossimbuzar river is highest. They come from Dacca, decked and adorned, and return thither as soon as the festival is over, to remain useless until wanted for the same occasion in the next year.

Scrafton, after Clive left Muxadavad, had attended to the preservation of Roydoolub in his office; but the English themselves had unwittingly planted an engine, which was unsuspectedly undermining all his protections. Nuncomar had accompanied the army to Patna, and as a Gentoo very conversant in the revenues, was employed with confidence by Roydoolub. When the payment of the tuncaws given by the Nabob at Rajamahal began to fail, he expounded to Colonel Clive the fallacy of the excuses, and proffered, if he were empowered to act as the agent of the English, supported by the authority of the Nabob's government, to find summary means of recovering the amount, or of substituting equivalent payments. Colonel Clive not foreseeing the end, employed him as he had proposed, and without the repugnance of Roydoolub, Nuncomar, as