alling into debt, and being in danger of losing his situation, he twice
tried to shoot himself. The pistol failed to go off, however, and he
became impressed with the idea that some great destiny was awaiting him.
His feeling was fully realized as his subsequent career in India shows.
At twenty-seven, when he returned to England he had made the English the
first military power in India. On his return to India (1755-59) he took
a further step and secured for the English a political supremacy.
Finally, on his last visit, he crowned his earlier exploits by putting
the English dominance on a sounder basis of integrity than it had before
been.

The incident related in the poem by the old man, Browning heard from
Mrs. Jameson, who had shortly before heard it from Macaulay at Lansdowne
House. Macaulay mentions it in his essay: "Of his personal courage he
had, while still a writer [clerk] given signal proof by a desperate duel
with a military bully who was the terror of Fort St. David."

The old gentleman in the poem evidently mixed up his dates slightly, for
he says this incident occurred when Clive was twenty-one, and he
represents him as committing suicide twenty-five years afterwards. Clive
was actually forty-nine when he took his own life.

CLIVE

I and Clive were friends--and why not? Friends! I think you laugh,
my lad.
Clive it was gave England India, while your father gives--egad,
England nothing but the graceless boy who lures him on to speak--
"Well, Sir, you and Clive were comrades--" with a tongue thrust in
your cheek!
Very true: in my eyes, your eyes, all the world's eyes, Clive was man,
I was, am and ever shall be--mouse, nay, mouse of all its clan
Sorriest sample, if you take the kitchen's estimate for fame;
While the man Clive--he fought Plassy, spoiled the clever foreign
game,
Conquered and annexed and Englished!
Never mind! As o'er my punch
(You away) I sit of evenings,--silence, save for biscuit-crunch,
Black, unbroken,--thought grows busy, thrids each pathway of old
years,
Notes this forthright, that meander, till the long-past life appears
Like an outspread map of country plodded through, each mile and rood,
Once, and well remembered still: I'm startled in my solitude
Ever and anon by--what's the sudden mocking light that breaks
On me as I slap the table till no