So fearful was he of exciting suspicion that he refused to confer in private with Mr. Scrafton, whom Colonel Clive had despatched to Muxadavad to explain the particulars of the two treaties, real and fictitious, and would only give him a hurried interview in his public audience-chamber.

All was now prepared for the final blow, and our chief anxiety at this crisis was to get rid of Omichund, who, as he had boasted, did but too surely hold the lives of us all in his power, and who at any moment might, by some diabolical chance, get wind of our intention to deceive him. He was a creature all eyes and ears, a plotter by nature, and so greedy of gain that he would at any moment hazard the chances of our great enterprise in the hope of some immediate profit to himself. He had done this more than once already, by carrying to the Nabob false tales of our designs against him, calculated certainly to throw him off the real scent, but also calculated to keep him in a state of alarm and watchfulness most inimical to our plans.

For such artful inventions Omichund had received either immediate payment, or promises of future reward. We knew not what mischief his lying tongue might do us if he remained longer a hanger-on of the Nabob's council-chamber, and Mr. Watts and Mr. Scrafton laid their heads together to withdraw him to Calcutta.

I think the promise of gain would have tempted him to descend into the Brahminical hell; and when it was made clear to him that there was money to be picked up at Calcutta in payment of his services there, he agreed to return with Mr. Scrafton, and Mr. Watts and myself had the pleasure of seeing him depart in his palanquin in that gentleman's company.

Mr. Scrafton related to us afterwards, with mingled laughter and vexation, the difficulties of his journey-how, on the travellers reaching Cassimbazar, the old Gentoo was missing, and how, on messengers being despatched back to the city in search of him, he was found sitting at midnight in the Nabob's treasury, trying to extort from Mohun Lall, the favourite, some more of the money he had been promised as a reward for his lies about the English. Here the messengers were fain to wait until the harpy had assured himself there was nothing to be extorted from the inflexible Mohun Lall, when they packed him into his palanquin and bore him off in triumph to Cassimbazar, whence they continued their journey at two o'clock in the morning. But at daybreak Mr. Scrafton, awaking from a peaceful slumber, had the mortification to discover that his tiresome charge was again missing, and this time knowing not where to look for him, had no help for it but to wait upon the road-side until three o'clock in the afternoon, when the old man returned from Plassy, whither he had stolen off to confer with Roydoolub, who had told him that no stipulation had been made for him in the negotiations with Meer Jaffier.

Alarmed to the last degree by this assertion, the old plotter pushed

Mr. Scrafton with the closest questions; but this gentleman was happily able to baffle him without trouble.

"You see I had only to tell the old scoundrel the truth," he said to us, in relating the adventure; "which was that Roydoolub could not possibly know the particulars of the treaty, since Mr. Watts had not yet communicated the ultimate form of the agreement even to Meer Jaffier himself. Convinced by this, he consented to continue his journey, and we jogged on in peace, though I rarely woke from a nap without expecting to miss Omichund's palanquin, and find he had played me some new trick. At Calcutta he was received with amazing cordiality; but even this could not quite conquer his suspicions, for he was seen in secret conference with our Persian scribe; but this fact luckily reaching the Colonel's ears, the scribe was employed only to draw up the fictitious treaty. Thus, you perceive, if Omichund had bribed the scribe to tell him the contents of the document-which there is little doubt he had done he would be only the more surely deceived."

One difficulty, and one only, had transpired in the preparation of this fictitious treaty, and that arose from Admiral Watson's peremptory refusal to sign it.

"Attach my signature to a lie!" cried the fiery old tar; "not for the wealth of a hundred treasuries as rich as Suraja Doulah's!"

In vain did Colonel Clive and the other gentlemen of the committee argue the point, and explain the necessity of the case. The sailor was inflexible.

"I don't know what honour may mean among you military and commercial gentlemen," he said somewhat rudely; "but if that is in your estimation an honourable deed for an Englishman to witness, I must tell you plainly we Jack-tars have a different notion of fair dealing. No, Colonel; you must manage this business without me. I had sooner cut off my hand than sign that paper."

This is a faithful record of the conversation as it was reported to me. I have since heard it stated that Admiral Watson, though he refused to sign his name to the treaty, gave full consent to his autograph being forged. But even in justification of my favourite Clive, whom I believe to have been a great and good man, I cannot bring myself to credit a statement so opposed to reason. All I can tell is, that Admiral Watson's signature was forged, and the fictitious treaty thus completed.

After the necessary delay caused by the wearisome slowness of Indian travelling,—how different from those wonders of speed, our English stage-coaches, which perform a journey of fifty miles between sunrise and sunset!—a native messenger arrived with the two treaties, the real one written on white paper, the false on red.

And now my patron had to arrange a secret conference with Meer Jaffier, whereat the agreement between him and the English might be

executed. This was a matter of no small difficulty. Suraja Doulah's suspicions never slept, and they had been but lately aroused against Meer Jaffier. Any open communication between the latter and ourselves was therefore impossible. After much deliberation, my patron hit on a favourite oriental stratagem. He ordered his palanquin, and caused himself to be carried to Meer Jaffier's palace, with me in another palanquin, securely shrouded by the silken curtains of the litters, and guarded by our servants, on whose fidelity we could fortunately rely. The palanquins of women are always regarded with respect, and ours were so arranged as to look like the closely-curtained litters of some eastern beauties. In this guise we were carried straight to the pretender's zenana, where it is likely the breath of slander may have followed us, but where we were safe from a suspicion of the truth.

We found Meer Jaffier and his son Meeran alone in the spacious apartment where our bearers deposited us. The elder man seemed to me a shrewd and sagacious person; but in the countenance of the younger I perceived that savageness of nature which he was too soon to exhibit.

An ample explanation took place between Mr. Watts and Meer Jaffier. The latter reluctantly confessed that in all his master's army there were but three thousand horse on whom he could rely, a somewhat small subtraction from an army of fifty thousand. Should the scene of action be this city, Meer Jaffier promised to attack the Nabob's palace at the first signal of strife. Should a battle take place on the plain, his conduct must of course be ruled by the position he might occupy. If in the van, he would advance with drums beating and standard flying at the approach of the English, and pass over to their right with all his men; if in the rear, he would display a white flag, set upon the main body of the Nabob's army as soon as the English began the attack, and if possible take him prisoner.

These explanations made, Meer Jaffier held a copy of the Koran on his own head with one hand while he laid the latter on the head of his son, and with the papers outspread before him swore, "by God, and the prophet of God," to be faithful to the treaty. It was an awe-striking ceremonial, and I wondered, as I beheld it, to think how lightly these Mahometans can break vows so solemn; yet when I bethought myself of those venal wretches who pace Westminster Hall with straws in their shoes, ready to bear false witness for the smallest consideration, I was less inclined to marvel at eastern perfidy.

The messenger who had brought the treaties carried them back to Calcutta; and now my patron's business being concluded at Muxadavad, it was high time that he should consider his personal safety. To this he had shown a noble indifference from first to last; and though he had received several warnings of danger, he had refused to abandon his post until a special letter from Clive should set him at liberty.

For this letter of release he was still waiting when a secret messenger came to us at sunset from Meer Jaffier, bidding us instantly leave the city, as the Nabob's suspicions were now thoroughly aroused, and he might at any moment open fire on the palace of his traitorous commander-in-chief, when doubtless he would also take speedy means to revenge himself upon any English plotters within convenient reach of bowstring or stake.

The warning was of so peremptory a nature that it would have been worse than folly to disregard it. Mr. Watts therefore bade me pack his papers in the smallest compass, and carrying no more than these and a change of linen, we set out at night for the factory at Cassimbazar, as it were on a business visit; but with the fixed intention to return no more to Muxadavad so long as Suraja Doulah reigned in the palace of Heraut Jeel.

We reached the factory in safety, and there met a messenger carrying the expected letter from Colonel Clive to my patron; and thus duty and honour were in no way violated by the continuance of our flight. Guided and aided by an Usbeg Tartar, whom Mr. Watts had befriended some years before, we now performed an arduous journey by land and water, carefully eschewing the main road, upon which the Nabob's emissaries were likely to travel in search of us, and going over a good deal of unnecessary ground in order to keep clear of this dangerous path. And thus on to Culna, where to our great joy we met the English army; and O, how pleasant a sight it was to us, newly escaped out of the jaws of the eastern lion, to look on the familiar uniforms, and shelter ourselves beneath the victorious flag of that dear free island in the West!

It was now the fourteenth of June. On the twelfth Colonel Clive and the troops that had been in quarters at Calcutta had set out for Chandernagore, where the remainder of the army had been left with a hundred and fifty sailors from the fleet, and the next day continued their journey with the whole force, leaving one hundred stalwart Jacktars as a garrison in the place. The Europeans, artillery, and stores made the journey up the noble Hooghley in boats, while the sepoys marched by the high-road.

In company with this gallant army we travelled pleasantly enough for two days, when we halted at Patlee, an insignificant town, whence Major Coote and a party sallied forth to the attack of the fort at Cutwah, a strong place garrisoned by a detachment of the Nabob's troops; and here, after a brief skirmish, Providence blessed our arms.

Mr. Watts and myself arrived at Cutwah soon after this victorious attack, and encamped in the plain, where I encountered a surprise which for the time distracted my attention from public affairs, and threw me back upon my own insignificant existence, with its many

sorrows.

While the army were busy with the work of encamping, Mr. Watts