Page:History of the French in India.djvu/336

 312 THE STRUGGLES OF DUPLE1X WITH ADVERSITY. chap, which he is made. Law failed because, with all his vu. ^_, pomposity and arrogance, he was essentially a man of a 1752. limited intellect and narrow views.* His next measures appear to have been conceived in no abler spirit. Receiving intimation from the com- mandant of the detachment at Koiladi that he had been unsuccessful in preventing the advance of the English, it was even then possible for him, commanding as he did thi high road from that place to Trichinapalli, as well as the country in its neighbourhood, to atone, by a combined attack, for his previous inaction. But, although he had for some time been well acquainted with all the move- ments of Major Lawrence, he had made no effort to mass his forces. They lay scattered in the various posts he had assigned them. When, therefore, the news reached him that the English had passed Koiladi, he was for the moment, thanks to his own negligence, entirely without the means of offering an instantaneous obstruction to their further advance. Seeing nevertheless the great advantage over him which the English would certainly obtain, should they effect a junction with the garrison of Trichinapalli, he hastily called in his scattered detach- ments, prepared, when too late, to risk a general action. Such a resolution, taken twenty-four hours earlier, might have saved his army, and even have gained Trichinapalli. This movement could not be effected till the follow- ing morning. All that night the detachments moved into camp, and at daylight the force proceeded to take up the position assigned to it by Law, and upon which he fondly hoped the English general would march. Yet this position, although strong, was in a certain point of view almost necessarily ill-chosen. Law was too close his Plainte contre le Sieur JDupIeix, preferable to that which he adopted, attempts to justify himself ; but ad- But it is clear from the number he mitting his facts, he must still be had with him at the time of his sur- condemned. Had he, as he asserts, render — e early 800 — that the number only 000 Europeans, he should have of his force of Europeans on April 7 marched with those to crush Law- is understated at 900.
 * We are well aware that Law, in rence. Any course would have been