Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/380

 342 Readings in European History beginning of British control in Bengal. According to his account, Clive had about one thousand Europeans, two thousand Sepoys, and eight pieces of cannon. 371. Clive's At daybreak we discovered the nabob's army moving own account towards us, consisting, as we since found, of about fifteen at Plassey thousand horse and thirty-five thousand foot, with upwards (June 23, of forty pieces of cannon. They approached apace, and by six J 757)- began to attack with a number of heavy cannon, supported by the whole army, and continued to play on us very briskly for several hours, during which our situation was of the utmost service to us, being lodged in a large grove with good mud banks. To succeed in an attempt on their cannon was next to impossible, as they were planted in a manner round us and at considerable distances from each other. We therefore remained quiet in our post, in expectation of a successful attack upon their camp at night. About noon the enemy drew off their artillery and retired to their camp. . . . On finding them make no great effort to dislodge us, we proceeded to take possession of one or two more eminences lying very near an angle of their camp, from whence, and an adjacent eminence in their possession, they kept a smart fire of musketry upon us. They made several attempts to bring out their cannon, but our advanced fieldpieces played so warmly and so well upon them that they were always driven back. . Their horse exposing themselves a good deal on this occasion, many of them were killed, and among the rest four or five officers of the first distinction ; by which the whole army being visibly dispirited and thrown into some confusion, we were encouraged to storm both the eminence and the angle of their camp, which were carried at the same instant, with little or no loss ; though the latter was defended (exclusively of blacks) by forty French and two pieces of cannon ; and the former by a large body of blacks, both horse and foot. On this a general rout ensued, and we pur- sued the enemy six miles, passing upwards of forty pieces of cannon they had abandoned, with an infinite number of hackeries (carts) and carriages filled with baggage of all