tested as his master. The sworn enemy of the Seths, and
capable of holding his own against them, I think those
bankers would not have succeeded so easily in their project
if he had been free to act, but, unfortunately for us, he had
been for some time, and was at this most critical moment
dangerously ill. He could not leave his house. I went to
see him twice with Siraj-ud-daula, but it was not possible to
get a word from him. There is strong reason to believe he
had been poisoned. Owing to this, Siraj-ud-daula saw himself
deprived of his only support.

"Coja Wajid, who had introduced me to the Nawab, and
who, it would be natural to suppose, was our patron, was a
great merchant of Hugli. He was consulted by the Nawab
only because, as he had frequented the Europeans and especially
the English, the Nawab imagined he knew them perfectly.
He was one of the most timid of men, who wanted
to be polite to everybody, and who, had he seen the dagger
raised, would have thought he might offend Siraj-ud-daula
by warning him that some one intended to assassinate him.[87]
Possibly he did not love the Seths, but he feared them,
which was sufficient to make him useless to us.

"Rai Durlabh Ram, the other _Diwan_ of the Nawab, was
the man to whom I was bound to trust most. Before the
arrival of Clive he might have been thought the enemy of
the English. It was he who pretended to have beaten them
and to have taken Calcutta. He wished, he said, to maintain
his reputation; but after the affair of the 5th of February,
in which the only part he took was to share in the flight, he
was not the same man; he feared nothing so much as to
have to fight the English. This fear disposed him to gradually
come to terms with the Seths, of whose greatness he
was very jealous. He also hated the Nawab, by whom he
had been ill-used on many occasions. In short, I could never
get him to say a single word in our favour in the _Durbar_.
The fear of compromising himself made him decide to remain
neutral for the present, though firmly resolved to join finally
the side which appeared to him to be the strongest."

This, then, was the French party, whose sole bond was dislike to the
Seths, and the members of which, by timidity or ill-health, were
unable to act. It was different with their enemies.

"The English had on their side in the _Durbar_ the terror
of their arms, the faults of S