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 position of next in seniority, with the command in Leitrim. On the news of the landing of the French in Killala Bay in August, Cornwallis despatched Lake to Galway, to assume the command beyond the Shannon, while he moved forward from Dublin in support. At midnight on 29 Aug. 1798 Lake arrived at Castlebar, where General Hutchinson [see, second ] had already taken up a position. On the morrow followed the disgraceful affair remembered as ‘Castlebar Races.’ Cornwallis appears to have laid the blame on Hutchinson for his risky disposition of his untrustworthy troops (Cornwallis Correspondence, ii. 411). Lake reformed his troops at Tuam, and after four days' hard marching, in conjunction with Colonel Vereker and Cornwallis, came up with the French under Humbert, who had advanced into the country, receiving little support. Humbert's force laid down their arms to Lake at Ballinamuck, near Cloone, on 8 Sept. 1798. Lake was brought into the Irish parliament by the government as member for Armagh to vote for the union. He retained his military command until late in 1799, when he resigned it and the mastership of Kilmainham, and returned to London, in view of obtaining an Indian command, most probably through the interest of Lord Castlereagh. His relations with Cornwallis appear to have been cordial. Cornwallis, however, speaks of William Neville Gardiner [q. v.] as ‘much better than Lake as a soldier and a man of business’ (ib. iii. 77–81).

Lake was appointed commander-in-chief and second member of council in India on 13 Oct. 1800. He took over the command in succession to Sir Alured Clark [q. v.] at Calcutta on 31 July 1801, and after a tour of inspection resided near Cawnpore, and applied himself vigorously to the development of the company's military resources. Lake paid great attention to the formation and training of the Bengal native light cavalry, which did good service in his subsequent campaigns. He introduced the plan of attaching two light pieces of the newly organised horse artillery to each cavalry regiment, under the name of ‘gallopers,’ an arrangement which proved of great utility. He established a system of ‘flankers’ in each regiment of native infantry—picked shots, who, at a given signal, fell out from their respective companies and formed a company of skirmishers. No light troops had previously existed in the Bengal army, both flank companies of each native battalion then and for some years afterwards consisting of grenadiers (, pp. 274–276). Lord Wellesley's first letter to Lake, dated in February 1802, insists on the paramount necessity of military retrenchment (Wellesley Despatches in India, ii. 619, 624). Next year, however, saw the development of the marquis's plans for breaking up the great Mahratta confederacy and rendering British influence paramount in Southern India, and on 28 June 1803 Lake was ordered to have a force ready to act to the southward should Dowlut Rao Scindia, maharajah of Gwalior, who had in his service numerous battalions officered by M. Perron and other Frenchmen, attempt to oppose the measures for the restoration of the peishwa at Poonah (ib. iii. 164–7). On 27 July (after the tidings of the fresh rupture with France) Wellesley directed Lake to commence operations at once against the powers of Gwalior and Berar (ib. iii. 189). In a later despatch Wellesley testified that the subsequent successes were due to Lake's ‘matchless energy, ability, and valour’ (ib. iii. 382). Lake, indeed, had a wonderful power of infusing spirit into his subordinates, and appears from the first to have thoroughly grasped two great principles of success in Indian warfare—boldness and swiftness in striking, and tenacity in following up every advantage gained. On 7 Aug. 1803 he marched from Cawnpore with 10,500 men; on 14 Aug. he entered Mahratta territory; on 29 Aug. he drove off a large body of Mahratta horse drawn up near Alyghur, himself charging at the head of the 27th (afterwards 24th) dragoons, with some new regiments of Bengal cavalry in support. Coel was occupied, and on 4 Sept. Alyghur, the chief depôt of Perron's battalions, was stormed in the most gallant style by the 76th foot. On 11 Sept. Lake reached Delhi, and the same day his toil-worn troops, in a pitched battle, defeated the bulk of Perron's battalions, whose losses were estimated at three thousand men and sixty-eight guns. On 14 Sept. Lake was received in Delhi by Shah Allum, once the opponent of Clive; but now deprived of his sight, he had long been a puppet in the hands of the Mahrattas. Shah Allum, ‘seated in rags under a tattered canopy, the sole remnant of his former state, and surrounded by every external token of misery,’ conferred on Lake the titles of saviour of the state, the invincible in war, &c. Lake's laconic report contrasts well with the bombast of the government despatches (ib. iii. 318; cf., Hist. of India, vi. note to p. 510). Lake's successes brought the entire country between the Ganges and Jumna (the Doab), which Scindia had so laboriously annexed, under British control. On 23 Sept. the combined forces of Scindia and the rajahs of Berar were defeated at Assaye, 220 miles from