Page:History of the French in India.djvu/473

 CHARACTER OF DE LEYRIT 447 of his treaty. On February 16, 1755, after holding chap. office little more than six months, he embarked for v — Europe, leaving the affairs of the French settlement to 1755. be administered by a secret committee, composed of MM. Barthelemy, Boileau, and Guillard, until the arrival of the officer nominated to be his successor, M. Duval de Leyrit. His departure was hailed by the colony as a national benefit. That alone, of all his acts, produced a good effect for French interests throughout Southern India, for it gave rise to the rumour, artfully encouraged by Bussy, that it was but the prelude to the return of Dupleix. But the recall of that statesman had had more than a transient effect. The members of the secret committee, having before them his example, and ignorant of the political views of M. de Leyrit, would do nothing. Writing to Bussy, who pressed the Pondichery govern- ment for instructions as to the course of conduct he should adopt in the difficult circumstances we shall have to record, they could only reply that they had received all the letters he had addressed to M. Godeheu ; that they had not answered them, because certain points in them were of too delicate a nature to allow them to arrive at a fixed decision ; but that M. de Leyrit, on his arrival, would probably explain himself fully upon all the questions at issue.* The same conduct was pur- sued in every other subject of importance, the conse- quence being, that from February 16, the date of the departure of Godeheu, to the arrival of de Leyrit on March 25 of the same year, the government of French India was but a blank. De Leyrit, though a very ordinary man, was an im- provement on the secret committee. He too had been trained in India in the civil branch of the service, and had been a contemporary of Dupleix. At the time of the expedition of La Bourdonnais, he had been the
 * M. Barthelemy to Bussy, February 28, 1755.