Page:Dupleix and the Struggle for India by the European Nations.djvu/176

Rh as a man with respect to whom 'it needed only that success should be possible for him to succeed.' The illustrious Voltaire, who had, by desire of the Minister, worked with him a month, recorded that he 'had found in him a stubborn fierceness of soul, accompanied by great gentleness of manners.' In fact, he was universally regarded in France as the man who could take up the dropped thread of the work of Dupleix, and carry it to a successful issue.

It had been originally intended that Lally should sail for India immediately, with a force of 3000 men. The number he actually took fell somewhat short of that total, and what was worse, the delays, caused to a great extent by the incompetence of the Admiral who commanded the fleet which was to co-operate with him, so influenced his proceedings that it was the 28th of April, 1758, before he arrived off Pondichery.

Meanwhile, the treaty concluded between the French and English by Godeheu and Saunders had long since become a dead letter. De Leyrit, noticing the continued infraction of that treaty by his rivals, had been compelled, much against his will, to resume the policy of Dupleix. Rousing the gouty old D'Auteuil from his lethargy, he had despatched him with a superior force to surprise the English at Trichinopoli. D'Auteuil acted as a gouty invalid will always act. Wanting energy, fire, and the sense of the value of prompt action, he, with the most brilliant opportunities before him, allowed himself to