Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/729

Book XIII Madura, who beat them off the ground, and drove them back to Dindigul, with the loss of 50 men killed and wounded. The colleries of Nattam, encouraged by this renewal of hostilities, made incursions into the northern districts of Madura, and stopped the whole road of the pass with trees, which they felled on either side, and with much labour dragged and laid them across the road with so much contrivance, that a single person could not pass without continual difficulty.

No events of great importance had happened during the course of this year, in the country of Tinivelly. The commandant, Mahomed lssoof, after the repulse before Washinelore in the end of the preceding year, was from the want of battering cannon, no longer in a condition to attack the stronger holds of the polygars; and contented himself, until supplied, with posting the greatest part of his army in stations to check the Pulitaver and the eastern polygars; but remained himself with the rest at Tinivelly, watching Catabominaigue and the Western. The departure of Maphuze Khan from Nellitangaville in the month of January, left the Pulitaver and his allies no longer the pretext of opposing the authority of the Nabob in support of the rights of his elder brother; and they debated whether they should treat with Mahomed lssoof, or wait the event of Maphuze Khan's journey, who they supposed would return to them, if not received on his own terms by the Nabob. In this uncertainty, they formed no vigorous designs, and employed their colleries in night robberies, wherever they could elude the stations of Mahomed lssoof; but attempted nothing in the open field or day. Nevertheless, their depredations were so ruinous to the cultivation, that Mahomed lssoof thought it worth the expence, to draw off some of their dependants and entertain them in the Company's service, as best able to retaliate the same mischief on those by whom they had been employed; and towards the end of April, several of these petty leaders, with their followers, amounting in the whole to 2000 colleries, joined him at Tinivelly, and faithfully entered on the duties for which they had engaged. Nothing, however, like regular fighting happened until the end of May, when Catabominaigue appeared at the head of two or three thousand men, near