XXI.]

DISTRIBUTION OF THE CONQUERED TERRITORY.

161

on his deathbed, and expired four days after the war began. His son, Secunder Jah, was placed on the musnud by the decision of Lord Wellesley. But though the Hyderabad forces were sent to co-operate with Colonel Stephenson, the stipulations of the treaty were scandalously violated by the Nizam's civil and military officers, whose sympathies were entirely with the confederates. Every obstacle was thrown in the way of military operations. The provision of grain for the army was purposely neglected, and permission was refused to purchase it in the Nizam's dominions. The officers and men wounded at Assye were denied an asylum in the fort of Dowlutabad, and one of the Hyderabad commanders had the audacity to fire on the British troops from the guns of his fort. The Nizam had thus forfeited all claim to share in the spoils of war, but Lord Wellesley generously bestowed on him the rich province of Berar, lying to the west of the Wurda. The fortress and the district of the Ahmednugur, acquired from Sindia, were transferred to the Peshwa, notwithstanding the perfidy of his conduct. The province of Cuttack, the conquests in Guzerat, and the valuable districts in Hindostan were incorporated with the Company's dominions. These last, together with the province ceded by the Nabob Vizier, were formed into the separate government of the north-west provinces, and now constitute the Agra Presidency. The territory which Lord Wellesley had annexed two years before to the Madras Presidency, and that which he now added to Bengal, was estimated at the annual value of six crores of rupees,- -an amusing comment on the Parliamentary denunciation of territorial aggrandisement. Having thus reduced the power of the Mahrattas, alliance in the Lord Wellesley was anxious to prevent the revival of their influence in Hindostan by establishing a barrier between their possessions and those of the Company. With this view, General Lake concluded treaties of alliance and mutual defence with the Jaut prince of Bhurtpore, and with the Rajpoot princes of Jeypore, Joudhpore, Machery, and Boondee, who were thereby absolved from all allegiance to

Treaties of

north, 1803.

162

ALLIANCE WITH THE NORTHERN STATES.

[CHAP. the Mahratta powers. Sindia had entrusted the fortress of Gwalior and some of his districts in that quarter to Ambajee Inglia, who, after the battle of Laswaree, in which he took an active part, offered to desert his master, and transfer the fort and half the territory to the British Government, on condition of being acknowledged the independent ruler of the remainder. A treaty was accordingly drawn up and signed, to which, however, he did not long adhere. His commandant refused to surrender Gwalior, which was besieged and captured by an English force. Ambajee returned soon after to Sindia's court, and was restored to favour. The rana of Gohud, whose dominions Sindia had appropriated to himself twenty years before, was reputed to possess great influence among the Jauts, and Lord Wellesley resolved to grant him the territory of which he had been dispossessed, together with the fort of Gwalior, on his engaging to subsidize three English battalions. The complications which arose out of this anomalous transaction we shall have occasion to notice hereafter. By the treaty of Bassein, the Peshwa had assigned for the maintenance of the subsidiary force districts in the Deccan yielding twenty-six lacs of rupees, but this arrangement was found inconvenient to both parties, and, upon the advice of General Wellesley, he was permitted to exchange them for territories in Bundelkund of the value of thirty-six lacs a-year; but as his authority in that province was merely nominal, the transaction was more advantageous to him than to the British Government, upon whom it entailed a long and harassing conflict. Lord Wellesley was, moreover, bent on establishing a subsidiary treaty with Sindia, and Major Malcolm was engaged for many months in a tedious negotiation, which, though eventually successful, produced no result, inasmuch as the quota of troops, 6,000 in number, was not to be stationed within his dominions, and their support was to be derived from the territories which he had already ceded unconditionally to the Company.

The Guickwar,

It only remains to notice the progress of events 1800-1803. in Guzerat, the greater portion of which was in

XXI.]

THE GUICKWAR.

163

cluded in the dominions of the Guickwar. It has already been told how the Mogul authority in this province ceased in 1755, when the capital Ahmedabad was captured by Damajee Guickwar. He died in 1768, and was succeeded after a long series of intrigues, by his son, Futteh Sing. On his death, in 1792, his brother mounted the throne, and died in 1800, leaving eleven children, and the country was immediately distracted by their struggles for the supreme power. Anund Rao, the eldest, though imbecile, was acknowledged as the legitimate successor to the musnud, and, having taken an able minister into his counsels, applied to the Bombay government for aid against his brothers and rivals, and offered to enter into a subsidiary alliance. This occurred at the time when Lord Wellesley was intent on extending these political arrangements throughout India, as the most effectual mode of establishing British supremacy, and the offer was cordially accepted. The subsidized force consisted of five battalions, and districts yielding between eleven and twelve lacs of rupees a-year were assigned for their support. The appearance of a British army in the field extinguished all opposition, the authority of Anund Rao was fully acknowledged, and Major Walker was appointed Resident at the court, which was now transferred to the new capital, Baroda. But the treasury was insolvent, and the finances were in a state of apparently hopeless confusion. The revenues amounted to fifty lacs of rupees a-year, and the expenditure to eighty-two. The deficiency had been made up, year after year, according to the fatal practice of native princes, by loans at extravagant interest, and mortgages and assignments, which devoured the resources of the state, and threatened the dissolution of all government. Major Walker was one of those great men to whom the Company has been indebted for the extension and the popularity of their rule. He had acquired the confidence of the natives of Guzerat even to a greater degree than that of his own Government, and with the universal consent of nobles and people, assumed the entire control of the administration. It was necessary in the first

164

ABOLITION OF INFANTICIDE.

[CHAP. instance to relieve the country from the native army, which ceased to be necessary after the establishment of the subsidiary force, but it could not be disbanded without the payment of arrears, which amounted to forty-one lacs of rupees. Major Walker prevailed on the Governor-General to advance the sum of twenty lacs, and by the extraordinary influence he had acquired among the native bankers, obtained a loan of the remainder from them, though not without a British guarantee. The troops were at length paid up in full, and the country was freed from the insolence of these Arab mercenaries. The maritime district of Kattiwar took advantage of the dissensions of the time to refuse the payment of the tribute due to the parent state, but Major Walker marched into the country and constrained the insurgents to enter into an engagement for the payment of nine lacs of tribute a-year. His expedition into that province was rendered ever memorable by the moral results which it produced. The custom of infanticide was universally prevalent among its Rajpoot inhabitants, who preferred the death of their daughters to the disgrace of an inferior alliance. By the influence of his official position, but more particularly by the weight of his personal character, Major Walker was enabled to obtain from all the principal chiefs a pledge, both on their own part and that of their fraternities, to abstain from the practice, to expel from the community all who were found guilty of it, and to submit to any penalty he might think fit to impose. The success of these efforts in the cause of humanity has shed a brighter lustre on his memory than all his political achievements, great as they were. It was through his exertions that peace and tranquillity were restored to the country, and the government of the Guick war consolidated. The connection of the state with the British Government was closely cemented, and the resources of another Mahratta prince were detached from the Mahratta cause, and placed under the control of the Company.

Abolition of infanticide, 1804.

Reflections.

The transcendent genius and energy of Lord Wellesley had thus, in the course of five years,

XXII.]

MOVEMENTS OF HOLKAR.

165

completely remodelled the whole policy of India, and placed the Company on the pinnacle of power. They had now become the masters of a great part of the continent, the protector of all the principal powers, and the acknowledged mediator in the disputes of all. Their sovereignty was greater, and their authority fixed on a firmer and more solid basis than that of Akbar or Aurungzebe. The administration of Lord Wellesley had reached its culminating point. The disasters which clouded the remaining period of his Indian career arose from the blunders of the Commander-in-chief, and not from any imperfection in his Government, though it was necessarily saddled with the obloquy they entailed.

CHAPTER XXII.

LORD WELLESLEY'S ADMINISTRATION CONTINUED, 1804-5.

Holkar's movements, 1804.

WHILE Sindia and the raja of Nagpore were involved in hostilities with the Company, Holkar was employed in predatory expeditions in Hindostan, and on the conclusion of peace marched down to Muhesur, on the Nerbudda, a great emporium of commerce, and plundered it of wealth estimated at a crore of rupees. With this treasure he was enabled not only to satisfy his own troops for the time, but to take into his pay those whom Sindia and the raja had discharged on the peace. His army was thus augmented to 60,000 horse and 15,000 foot, a force far exceeding his requirements or his resources, and which could be subsisted only by pillage. The Governor-General had sedulously avoided any collision with him during the five months of the war with the confederates; and General Wellesley had repeatedly assured him that as long as he refrained from attacking the dominions of the Company and its allies, the government would abstain from all interference with him. This assurance was also com