Page:Our Indian Army.djvu/288

264 ponderance among the native states. Their only rival now was the foreign power that had subverted the dynasty of Hyder; and the question soon arose, Which of the two was to rule Hindostan? But before we come to the final struggle, we must offer a brief retrospect of some of their previous transactions with the English presidencies.

The successors of Sevajee were far from possessing the active and daring hardihood of their progenitor. Indulging in ease and voluptuousness, they gradually intrusted the arduous concerns of government and war to their ministers and generals. Then followed a consequence almost inevitable in Oriental dynasties: the minister, or still more the general, in whose hands the actual administration was lodged, and who had the disposal of all favours and offices, soon became the real depository of power, and the master both of the kingdom and its sovereign. But as a certain veneration was attached to the original race, making it unsafe actually to depose the legitimate Bajah, he was maintained in ease and luxury as a splendid pageant, while the real authority was exercised in his name by the individual who presided in the council or army.

The first person of this character of any note was Ballajee Wishwanath, who in 1708 was raised by Shao, the then reigning Bajah, to the dignity of Peishwa – an office which seems to be analogous to that of Vizier in the Ottoman empire. On his death in 1720, he was succeeded in office by his son Bajee Bao, who was also succeeded by his eldest son Ballajee; the office of Peishwa being thus rendered hereditary, while the dignity of Bajah sank into total insignificance. Having transferred the seat of government from Sattara to Poonah, the Peishwa became the sole and undisputed head of the Mahratta confederation; and for several years he was involved in foreign connexions that gave rise to certain achievements of a memorable description, in which the English bore the most conspicuous part.