the English heard of these new negotiations, they considered the proposals for a neutrality to be a mere blind; they forgot the kindness shown by the French to English refugees at Dacca, Cossimbazar, and Chandernagore, and determined that, as a permanent peace with the Nawab was out of the question, they would, whilst he hesitated as to his course of action, anticipate him by destroying the one element of force which, if added to his power, might have made him irresistible.  They continued the negotiations for a neutrality on the Ganges only until they were reinforced by a body of 500 Europeans from Bombay, when they sent back the French envoys and exacted permission from the Nawab to attack Chandernagore.  Clive marched on that town with a land force of 4000 Europeans and Sepoys, and Admiral Watson proceeded up the river with a small but powerful squadron.

Thus began the ruin of the French in Bengal.  The chief French Factories were, as I have said, at Chandernagore, Cossimbazar, and Dacca.  The Chiefs of these Factories were M. Renault, the Director of all the French in Bengal; M. Law, a nephew of the celebrated Law of Lauriston, the financier; and M. Courtin.  It is the doings and sufferings of these three gallant men which are recorded in the following chapters.  They had no hope of being able to resist the English by themselves, but they hoped, and actually believed, that France would send them assistance if they could only hold out till it arrived.  Renault, whose case was the most desperate, perhaps thought that the Nawab would, in his own interest, support him if the English attacked Chandernagore; but knowing the Nawab as well as he did, and reflecting that he had himself refused the Nawab assistance when he asked for it, his hope must have been a feeble one.  Still he could not, with honour, give up a fortified position without attempting a defence, and he determined to do his best.  When he failed, all that Law and Courtin could expect to do was to maintain their personal liberty and create a diversion in the north of Bengal when French forces attacked it in the south.  It was not their fault that the attack was never made.

I shall make no mention of the fate of the Factories at Balasore and Jugdea.  At these the number of Frenchmen was so very small that resistance and escape were equally hopeless.  Patna lay on the line of Law’s retreat, and, as we shall see, he was joined by the second and other subordinate officers of that Factory.  The chief, M. de la Bretesche, was too ill to be moved, but he managed, by the assistance of his native friends, to secure a large portion of the property of the French East India Company, and so to finance Law during his wanderings.

FOOTNOTES: 

[Footnote 1:  Aliverdi Khan entered Muxadavad or Murshidabad as a conqueror on the 30th of March, 1742.  He died on the 10th of April, 1756. (Scrafton.)]