Page:History of the French in India.djvu/211

 THE NAWWAB ASSERTS HIS POWER. 189 and the power upon which he counted for future blows chap. against the English. Yet, damaging as had been the, , ' result in that respect, it sank into apparent insignifi- 174^. cance when contrasted with the effect it had upon the suspicious mind of the Asiati c who had trusted him, only, it would seem, to be deceived. The fact indeed that upwards of five weeks had elapsed since the French flag had first floated over the ramparts of Fort St. George, and that there were no indications of lowering it to make way for the flag of the Mughal, was in itself a circumstance more than sufficient to justify the doubt which Anwaru-dm was beginning to display. The quarrel between Dupleix and La Bourdonnais would naturally appear but a shallow and transparent artifice, invented for the pur- pose of cheating him out of his promised gains. It was enough for him that Madras continued French ; to the name of the Frenchman who commanded there he was indifferent. His engagement had been made with the governor of the French possessions in India, and to that governor he looked for its absolute and literal fulfilment. When, however, day succeeded day, and week fol- lowed week, and he received, instead of Madras, ex- cuses founded upon the alleged insubordinate behaviour of the French official in command at Madras, the patience of the Nawwab began to give way. Who were these French, he asked, these foreigners who had been so submissive and compliant, that they should thus not only beard him to his face, but should use him as a tool wherewith to effect their purposes 1 Upon what force did they rely to enable them to carry out their daring resolves? If they had a few hundred European and two or three thousand native soldiers, he could bring into the field twenty men to their one, and, against the means which the possession of a few places on the coast might make available for them, he