Page:History of the French in India.djvu/99

 PRUDENCE OF M. DUMAS. 77 assistance. These ships anchored before Karikal in the chap. month of August of that year (1738).* t _ ' Meanwhile Sahuji had been using other methods 1735. more congenial to him than force. By dint of bribes and promises he had gained over the principal nobility of Tanjur, and amongst them the all-powerful Said. A plan of operations was agreed upon, in pursuance of which, the usurper, Sidaji, was suddenly seized in his palace. Intelligence of this was at once dispatched to Chelambram, and Sahuji immediately mounting his horse, returned in triumph to Tanjur. This was the intelligence that greeted the captains of the " Bourbon " and the " St. Geran," when they an- chored in the roads of Karikal. It was accompanied by an intimation that the French succours were not wanted ; that Karikal was occupied by between three and four thousand troops under Khan Sahib, a trusted officer of Sahuji ; and that any attempt to land would be con- sidered as a hostile act, and would be met accordingly. In consequence of this intimation the senior French captain determined to suspend action pending instruc- tions from Pondichery. But whilst Sahuji had transmitted instructions of the nature we have recorded to Karikal, he had written in a somewhat different strain to M. Dumas. To him he declared his perfect willingness to surrender Karikal, but the impossibility of doing so immediately. He was, he said, scarcely secure in his own capital, and he was threatened at the same time by Chanda Sahib from Trichinapalli. He pointed out the impossibility of sur- rendering, under such circumstances, resources which were essential to his safety. These excuses, plausible though they were, did not deceive M. Dumas. Yet there can be no doubt that against Karikal has been taken mainly very old paper entitled, Memoir epo*- from the statement communicated by ticuliere sur Vaquisition de Karikal.
 * The account of the expedition Dumas to the Abbe Guyon, and from a