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172 difficulty both Gudalur and Fort St. David. He then wished to march on Madras. But he had no money; the magazines and arsenals were empty. Instead of a Dupleix to supply the one and fill the other, he had a De Leyrit, who met all his requisitions by pleading the impossibility of complying with them. Strange reversal of position! From 1752 to 1756 Dupleix had improvised the most ample resources for an army: he only wanted the army and the general. In 1758 the army and the general were there, but the incapable successors of Dupleix were unable to furnish them with a single article necessary for the movement of troops or to give him the smallest information. At length, Lally, driven by the indifference of De Leyrit to extremities, endeavoured to raise funds from the Rájá of Tanjore. The Rájá amused him with promises until Captain Calliaud had sent him some trained sipáhis from Trichinopoli. Then he threw off the mask and bade defiance to the French army. Lally was about to assault the place when a message reached him that the French fleet had been beaten off the coast, and that the English were threatening his base. He returned then to Pondichery without risking an assault, found there three lakhs of rupees which the Admiral had taken from a Dutch vessel which he had plundered, then despatching orders to Bussy to join him, marched to Arcot. Arcot fell without a blow. Bussy joined him from Aurangábád, Moracin with 250 men and 100,000 rupees from the Northern Sirkars; he himself, by