Page:History of the French in India.djvu/356

 332 THE STRUGGLES OF DUPLEIX WITH ADVERSITY. ch^p. fortunes of French India, we propose to examine his 1752. recounted. In what a position was he then ! Law, with the main body of the French troops, beaten and taken prisoners ; d'Auteuil, with the relieving force consisting of the only French troops available for garri- son purposes, beaten and taken prisoners ; Bussy, with all that yet remained, far off at Aurangabad ; Chanda Sahib, his trusted ally, murdered, and his levies dis- persed. To Dupleix then there remained at this crisis merely Pondichery, Jinji, and the French possessions on the coast, without garrisons to defend them, still less with troops available for operations in the field. His enemies, on the contrary, triumphant, possessors now of the influence and of the material advantages for which he had toiled, had it in their power apparently utterly to overwhelm him. They had not only an army and numerous native allies, but a Lawrence and a Clive to command them. Dupleix had no longer an army, no longer an ally ; since the departure of Bussy he had never had a general: he had to depend upon no one but himself, — and one other trusted and indefa- tigable councillor,— his own wife. Let us watch now how this man, thus overmatched, thus driven into a corner, made head against the enormous difficulties with which he had to contend. His own experiences and alliances with native chief- tains had satisfied Dupleix, that to such men there was no such disorganiser as victory. Prepared after defeat to sacrifice in appearance even their just claims, if by so doing they could retain a basis for future action, they would on a change of fortune, however occurring, show an absolute forgetfulness of past admissions, and increase their demands to a most exaggerated degree. If this were the case when a native prince might be in alliance with a European power, to a much more extended and dangerous degree would it occur when three or four
 * , conduct after the occurrence of the misfortunes we have