of the field. Unfortunately for him,
however, his opportunity was also the opportunity of the young writer
and ensign who had already won the admiration and the esteem of Major
Lawrence, then looked upon as the first English officer in India.

While the French still held Madras, before the Treaty of
Aix-la-Chapelle compelled the reluctant Dupleix to restore it to the
English, a military episode, which might almost be called an accident,
had helped to confirm enormously the influence of France in India. The
Nabob of {261} the Carnatic, offended by the action of the English
governor of Madras, who had omitted to send him those presents which
are essential to all stages of Oriental diplomacy, had practically
winked at the action of the more liberal-handed Dupleix in his movement
against Madras. When, too late, the Nabob heard of the fall of Madras,
he sent an army to recapture the town, and called upon the French
governor to surrender it. The governor was Duval D'Espremesnil, the
father of that mad D'Espremesnil who fuliginates through a portion of
the French Revolution. He refused to obey the Nabob, opened fire upon
his forces, and repulsed them. The repulse was followed a little later
by a vigorous attack of the French troops under Paradis, which smashed
the armament of the Nabob to pieces at St. Thome on November 4, 1746.
This victory gave the French a prestige of which Dupleix was the very
man to appreciate the full importance. When, in 1748, Nizam-Al-Mulk,
the Viceroy of the Deccan, died, there arose at once pretenders not
merely to the Deccan viceroyalty, but also to the government of the
Carnatic. The first was claimed by Mirzapha Jung; the second by Chunda
Sahib. Mirzapha Jung and Chunda Sahib, profoundly impressed by the
triumph of French arms two years earlier, appealed to Dupleix to help
them, joined their forces, and invaded the Carnatic.

Dupleix was not unwilling to listen to the appeal of the invaders. He
saw that the chance had arisen for him to constitute himself the
Warwick, the king-maker, of India. He lent all the force of his
European troops, of his native troops trained in the European fashion,
and of the prestige of France to the invaders. The old Nabob of the
Carnatic, Anaverdi Khan, was defeated and killed. His son fled with
his broken army to Trichinopoly, and the invaders nominally, and
Dupleix actually, reigned supreme in the Carnatic.

At that moment the sun of Dupleix's fortunes