dred guns, into the field), and compelled to make peace on very disadvantageous terms. Such was the dissatis was surrounded, that of necessity it was engaged in constant hostilities, and had no security for existence but in the continual extension of its domin-faction produced very naturally at the ions, or terror of its name. The East India Company had fondly flattered themselves that Tippoo, being thus humbled, would lay aside his hereditary hostility to the English powerjust as the Roman senate believed, after the first Punic war, that the jealousy of the Carthaginians was allayed; or as Napoleon imagined that, after the spoliation of Tilsit, he might rely upon the forced submission or cured inveteracy of Prussia;-and the result in all the instances was the same. 50. Sir John Shore, a most respectable civil servant of the Company, who was appointed governor-general after the retirement of Lord Cornwallis, was strongly imbued with those maxims of the necessity of pursuing a pacific policy in India, and avoiding all causes of collision with the native powers, which were so general both with the government, the directors, and the people at home, and which had been so strongly enforced upon the local authorities by the board of control. Ample opportunities soon occurred for putting the expedience of their apparently reasonable and just principles to the test. Shortly after the conclusion of the peace with Tippoo, differences broke out between the Mahrattas and the Nizam; and the English government, as the old ally of the latter prince, were strongly urged by his partisans to support him, as they had done the Rajah of Travancore, in the contest. This, however, Sir John Shore, acting on the pacific system refused, and even declined to permit the Nizam to employ in his warfare with the Mahrattas the battalions which were placed as a protecting force in his territories. 51. The consequences of this temporising conduct might easily have been foreseen. The Nizam, after a short contest, was overthrown by the superior force of the Mahrattas, (who could bring twenty thousand cavalry, forty thousand infantry, and two hun court of that chieftain, by this desertion of their ally by the English government, at the most perilous crisis, that he soon after signified a wish to be relieved of the presence of the British subsidiary force, which was complied with; and the Nizam immediately threw himself without reserve into the arms of the French resident, M. Raymond. By his advice he augmented the organised force in his dominions, under the direction of European officers under his orders, to twenty-three battalions and twelve pieces of artillery. These troops carried the colours of the French republic, and the cap of liberty was engraven on their buttons. Thus, by the timid policy of the British government at that crisis, not only was the power and influence of the Mahrattas materially increased, but their old and faithful ally, the Nizam, was converted from a faithful friend into an imbittered foe, and the moral sway resulting from the glorious termination of the war with Mysore seriously impaired. 52. Tippoo was not slow in using to the best advantage this unexpected turn of events in his favour. Already had exaggerated reports of the growing power and conquests of the great republic reached the courts of Hindostan; and numerous French agents had found their way to all the native powers, who represented in glowing colours the favourable opportunity which now presented itself for expelling the English from the peninsula, and re-establishing, on a durable basis, the independence of all the Indian states. The Mysorean chief, whose cunning and perfidy were equal to his ability, strove, in the first instance, by professions of eternal gratitude and attachment, to disarm the suspicions of the British government; and he succeeded so far, that, in two years after the treaty of Seringapatam, his two sons were restored to his em braces. No sooner had he got free from the restraint imposed on him by their captivity, than he sent a secret circular to the different native powers of India, proposing to them all to unite in a common league for the expulsion of the English from Hindostan; received with unbounded confidence the agents who had been despatched to the court of Seringapatam by the French directory; and even sent emissaries to the distant court of Cabul, beyond the Himalaya_snows, to confirm Zemaun Shah, the restless and ambitious chief of that formidable people, the Affghauns, in his declared design of invading the northern parts of India, and reinstating in its original splendour the throne of the Moguls. Meanwhile his own activity was indefatigable. Soon his preparations were complete; his army was on the best footing, and constantly ready to take the field; and ere long, while the Mahrattas and the Nizam had by mutual dissensions broken up the triple league of which he had formerly experienced the weight, and the latter had fallen entirely under the guidance of the large French force in his capital, the military strength and political consideration of Mysore were more formidable than ever. * The following were the terms of this remarkable proclamation by General Hypolite Malartie, governor of the Isle of France:"Tippoo Sultan has despatched two ambassadors to us with particular letters to the Colonial Assembly, to all the generals employed under this government, and to the Executive Directory. 1. He desires an alliance offensive and defensive with the French, and proposes to maintain at his charge, as long as the war shall last in India, the troops which may be sent him. 2. He declares that he has made every preparation to receive the succours which may be sent to him. 3. In a word, he only waits the moment when the French shall come to his assistance, to declare war against the English, whom he ardently desires to expel from India. 4. This power desires also to be assisted by the free citizens of colour; we therefore invite all such, who are willing to serve under his flag, to enrol themselves."-WELLESLEY'S Despatches. On the 20th July 1790, Tippoo transmitted to the Directory at Paris a note of proposals for an alliance offensive and defensive, "in order to obtain such an accession of force as, joined to mine, may enable me to attack and annihilate for ever our common enemies in Asia; and may the heavens and the earth meet ere the alliance of the two nations shall suffer the smallest diminution." The proposals were, -1. That the French should | 53. Matters were at length brought to a crisis, by the Sultan's taking the extraordinary step, in spring 1798, of sending ambassadors to the Isle of France to negotiate with the French authorities for the expulsion of the English from India, and effect the levy of a subsidiary European force to assist him in his designs. He afterwards publicly received the troops raised in pursuance of this plan, at Mangalore, and conducted them with great pomp to his capital. It was impossible to doubt, after this decisive step, that he was only awaiting the favourable moment for commencing his operations; the more especially when, at the very same period, a French armament, of unprecedented magnitude, sailed from Toulon for the Nile, and both the Directory and Napoleon publicly spoke of their communications with the redoubted Mysorean chief as their principal inducement for giving it that direction, and "Citizen Tippoo" was openly announced as the powerful ally who was to co-operate in the ultimate objects of the expedition. It was evident, therefore, that a crisis of the most dangerous kind furnish a subsidiary force of ten or fifteen thousand troops of every description, with an adequate naval force. 2. That the Sultan should furnish military stores, horses, bullocks, provisions, and all other necessaries: that the expedition should be directed to Porto Novo, or some other point on the coast of Coromandel, where it will be joined by an army under the command of the king in person. 3. All conquests which shall be made from the common enemy, excepting the dominions of the Sultan which have been wrested from him by the English, shall be equally divided between the two contracting parties.-WELLESLEY'S Despatches, i. 711, 712, Appendix. Napoleon's letter to Tippoo, upon landing in Egypt, already alluded to, [Ante, Chap. XXVI. 75], was in the following terms:"Cairo, 25th Jan. 1799. You have already been made acquainted with my arrival on the shores of the Red Sea, with an innumerable and invincible army, filled with the desire to deliver you from the iron yoke of England. I hasten to convey to you my desire, that you should give me, by the way of Muscat, or Mokha, intelligence of the political circumstances in which you find yourself placed. I desire even that you will send to Suez, or Grand Cairo, some able man in whom you have confidence, with whom I may confer. BUONAPARTE."-Corresp. Confid. de Napoleon, vii, 192. was approaching, and that, too, at the very time when the diminution in the consideration of the English in India, and the weakening of their alliances among the native powers, had rendered them least capable of bearing the shock. But the hand of fate was upon the curtain. At this perilous moment the sons of Britain were not wanting to herself. Sprung from one family, two illustrious men were now entering upon the scene, who were destined to carry its glory to the highest point of exaltation, and leave an empire, both in the East and West, unrivalled in the extent of its dominion, and unequalled in the impression it was destined to produce upon the fortunes of mankind. CHAPTER XLIX. ADMINISTRATION OF MARQUIS WELLESLEY, AND FIRST APPEARANCE OF WELLINGTON IN INDIA. was afterwards created MARQUIS WELLESLEY; so that one family enjoyed the rare felicity of giving birth to the statesman whose energetic councils established the empire of England in the Eastern, and the warrior whose immortal deeds proved the salvation of Europe in the western hemisphere. 2. The young soldier was regularly educated for the profession of his 1. ARTHUR WELLESLEY, afterwards Duke of WELLINGTON, was born in Merion Street, Dublin, in the parish of St Peter's, where his birth is registered, on the 1st May 1769. He was the fourth son of Garret, second Earl of Mornington, and was descended by the mother's side from the Dungannon family, his mother having been Anne, eldest daughter of Viscount Dungannon. His father was a man of polish-choice, and received his first commised manners and kind and hospitable disposition, but not distinguished by any remarkable abilities, except a marked genius for music. His mother was a woman of uncommon vigour of mind, so that he forms, with Sir Walter Scott, Napoleon, Mr Pitt, and nearly all the illustrious persons of the last age, another instance among the many which experience must probably have furnished to every observer, that the sons of a family, at least in general, take their intellectual character from the mother's side. The Wellesleys were an old Saxon family long settled in Sussex, and the ancestor of the Irish branch had come over with Henry II. in 1172, to whom he was standard-bearer, and from whose gratitude he received extensive estates in the counties of Meath and Kildare. Wellington's elder brother, who succeeded to the hereditary honours, sion in the year 1787, being then in the eighteenth year of his age. Napoleon had entered the artillery two years before at the age of sixteen, and was then musing in lonely meditation on the heroes of Plutarch; Sir Walter Scott, at the age of seventeen, was relieving the tedium of legal education by strolling over the mountains of his native land, and dreaming of Ariosto and Amadis in the grassy vale of St Leonard's, near Edinburgh; Viscount Chateaubriand was inhaling the spirit of devotion and chivalry, and wandering, in anticipation, as a pilgrim to the Holy Land, amidst the solitude of La Vendée; Goethe, profound and ima ginative, was reflecting on the destiny of man on earth, and inhaling deep draughts of divine philosophy, destined to be wedded to immortal verse; Schiller was casting on the deathless mirror of the stage the shadows of his. tory and the creations of a noble | in no sufficient strength to face the fancy; and the ardent spirit of Nelson immense masses of the Republicans in was chafing in inaction, and counting any considerable combat; but a numthe weary hours of life, on a pacific ber of detached actions took place on West Indian station. Little did any the part of the rear-guard, in which the of them think of each other, or antici- spirit and intelligence of Colonel Welpate the heart-stirring scenes which lesley speedily became conspicuous. were so soon about to arise, in the On the river Neethe, in a warm affair course of which their names were to near the village of Boxtel, and in a hot shine forth like stars in the firmament, skirmish on the shores of the Waal, and their genius to acquire immortal the 33d did good service; the ability renown. There were giants in the earth with which they were conducted exin those days. cited general remark, and Colonel Wellesley was in consequence promoted to the command of a brigade of three regiments in the ulterior retreat from the Lech to the Yssel. They were no longer, indeed, pursued by the enemy, who had turned aside for the memorable invasion of Holland; but the rudeness of the elements proved a more formidable adversary than the bayonets of the Republicans. The route of the army lay through the inhospitable provinces of Guelderland and Overyssel; the country consisted of flat and desert heaths; few houses were to be found on the road, and these scattered, singly, or in small hamlets, affording no shelter to any considerable body of men. Over this dreary tract the British troops marched during the dreadful winter of 1794-5, 3. Arthur Wellesley, educated at Eton, studied for a short time at the military academy of Angers, in France, where Napoleon also for some time was placed; but he was soon removed from that seminary to take a part in the active duties of his profession. As subaltern and captain he served both in the cavalry and infantry: in spring 1793 he was promoted to the majority of the 33d regiment, and in autumn of the same year, he became, by purchase, its lieutenant-colonel. At the head of that regiment he first entered upon active service, by sailing from Cork, in May 1794, and landing at Ostend in the beginning of June following, with orders to join Lord Moira's corps, which was assembling in that place, to reinforce the Duke of York, who was in the field near Tournay. That ill-through an unbroken wildernessofsnow, fated prince, however, was then hard pressed by the vast army of the Republicans under Pichegru, [Ante, Chap. XVI. § 54], and as he was under the necessity of retreating, it was justly deemed unadvisable to attempt the retention of a fortress so far in advance as Ostend, and Lord Moira with great skill conducted his troops by Bruges and Ghent to the Scheldt, and, crossing that river at the Tête-deFlandre, joined the English army encamped around Antwerp. 4. The multiplied disasters of that unhappy campaign soon brought Colonel Wellesley into contact with the enemy, and taught him the art of war in the best of all schools, that of great operations and adverse fortune. The English army, now entirely separated from that of the Austrians, who had marched off towards the Rhine, were with the thermometer frequently down at 15° and 20° below zero of Fahrenheit, and, when it was somewhat milder, a fierce and biting north wind blowing direct in the faces of the soldiers. In this trying crisis Colonel Wellesley commanded the rear-guard; his activity and vigilance arrested in a great degree the disorders which prevailed; and during his first essay in arms, he experienced severities equal to the far-famed horrors of the Moscow retreat.* 5. Short as was the first campaign of the Duke of Wellington, it was the best school that had been presented for nearly a century for the formation of a great commander. War was there exhibited on a grand scale: it was in fell so low as in Holland during the winter "The cold in Russia, during 1812, never of 1794-5."-JOMINI, Vie de Napoleon, iv. 74. changed for the East. Colonel Wellesley arrived with his corps at Calcutta in January 1797. During the voyage out, it was observed that he spent most of his time in reading; and after he landed in India, he was indefatigable in acquiring information regarding the situation and resources of the country in which he was to serve. Such use did he make of these oppor an army of sixty-eight battalions and eighty squadrons that he had served. The indomitable courage and admirable spirit of the British soldiers had, amid its disasters, appeared in their full lustre; but the natural results of these great qualities were completely checked by the defects, at that period, of their military organisation. Total ignorance of warlike measures in the cabinet which planned their move-tunities, that when he was called, as ments; a destructive minuteness of direction, arising from too little confidence on the part of government in their generals in the field; a general want of experience in officers of all ranks in the most ordinary operations of a campaign; and, above all, the ruinous parsimony which, in all states not essentially military, subject to a really popular government, breaks down, on the return of peace, the military force by which alone, on the next resumption of hostilities, early success can be secured-paralysed all the courage of the troops. These defects appeared in painful contrast to the brilliant and efficient state of the more experienced German armies, which, with national resources nowise superior, and troops far inferior both in courage and energy, were able to keep the field with more perseverance, and, in the end, achieve successes which the British soldiers could hardly hope to accomplish. These considerations forcibly impressed themselves on the mind of the young officer; and he was early led to revolve in his mind those necessary changes in the direction and discipline of the army, which, matured by the diligence and vigour of the Duke of York, ultimately led the British nation to an unparalleled pitch of strength and glory. 6. It was not long before an opportunity presented itself for witnessing the capability of British soldiers when subjected to abler direction, and led by more experienced officers. After the return of the troops from Flanders to England, the 33d regiment was ordered to the West Indies; but contrary winds prevented the transports in which it was embarked from sailing, and their destination was soon after he early was, to high command, he was perfectly acquainted, as his correspondence from the first demonstrates, both with the peculiarities of Indian warfare, and the intricacies of Indian politics. At his first interview with Sir John Shore after he landed, that experienced observer showed his discernment of character by the remark, "If Colonel Wellesley should ever have the opportunity of distinguishing himself, he will do it, and greatly." And when his division of the army took the field in January 1799, against Tippoo Sultan, the fine condition and perfect discipline of the men, as well as the skill and judgment of the arrangements made for their supplies, called forth the warm commendations of the commander-in-chief, who little thought of what a hero he was then ushering the name into the world.* During the campaign which followed, he had little time for study, and still fewer facilities for the transport of books; his library consisted of only two volumes, but they were eminently descriptive of his future char * "I have much satisfaction in acquainting your Lordship, that the very handsome appearance and perfect discipline of the troops under the orders of the Hon. Col. Wellesley, do honour to themselves and to him; while the judicious and masterly arrangements as to supplies, which opened an abundant free market, and inspired confidence into dealers of every description, than advantageous to the public service, and were no less creditable to Colonel Wellesley deservedly entitle him to my marked approbation." How early is the real character of great men shown, when once thrown into important situations! This might have passed for a description of Wellington's arrangements for the supply of his army in the south of France in spring 1814.-GENERAL February 2, 1799; WELLESLEY's Despatches, HARRIS to the Governor-general in Council, i. 425. |