Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/730

706 Etiaporum, and stood the attack of seven companies of Sepoys, drawn from the limits towards Nellitangaville, by whom they were dispersed, but with little loss. In May Mahomed Issoof received intelligence of the hostilities commenced by the Mysoreans from Dindigul, and the orders of the Presidency to oppose them; in consequence of which he sent the detachment we have mentioned of 1500 Sepoys, 300 horse, and 3000 peons. They were scarcely gone, when a new and unexpected alarm arose in the Tinivelly country. The Dutch government at the island of Ceylon had received a large reinforcement of European troops from Batavia, which assembled at the port of Columbo, opposite to Cape Comorin, from whence a part of them arrived in the beginning of June at Tutacorin, a Dutch fort on the continent, 40 miles east of Tinivelly. Two hundred Europeans, with equipments, tents, and field-pieces, immediately encamped, giving out that they should shortly be reinforced by more than their own number, and that 400 other Europeans had left Batavia at the same time with themselves, and were gone to Cochin on the Malabar coast, in order to join the king of Travancore. The natives were frightened, and pretended to have discovered, that the force they saw was intended to assist the polygars in driving the English out of the country of Tinivelly, and to begin by attacking the town. Mahomed Issoof immediately sent to the Dutch chief at Tutacorin, to demand an explanation; who answered, that he should give none. A few days after the troops advanced inland, and halted at Alvar Tinivelly, a town in a very fertile district, situated 20 miles s. E of Tinivelly, and the same distance s. w. of Tutacorin; and at the same time, another body of 200 Europeans landed from Columbo at Manapar, 20 miles to the s. E. of Alwar Tinivelly. Mahomed Issoof had previously drawn troops from the eastern stations, and marching with 4000 Sepoys, and some horse, appeared in sight of the Dutch troops at Alavar Trinevelly in the evening of the 18th of June; who, in the ensuing night, decamped in strict silence, and marched back to Tutacorin; those at Manapar went away thither likewise in the same embarkations which brought them; and no more was heard of this alarm.