that of Gaya, but
was fought at Suan. The site is marked in Rennell's map of South
Bihar. It lies about six miles west of the town of Bihar, on the
river Banowra.]

[Footnote 116: The Banowra River.]

[Footnote 117: The French capital on the Madras coast. Surrendered
to Eyre Coote.]

[Footnote 118: Sepoys, so called from the Telingana district in
Madras, where they were first recruited.]

[Footnote 119: Mrs. Law. _Bibi_ is the equivalent of mistress or
lady. _Lass_ was the native version of Law. Mrs. Law's maiden name
was Jeanne Carvalho.]

[Footnote 120: Bengal Select Com. Consultations, 28th January,
1761.]

[Footnote 121: "A part of these Memoirs was written at Paris in
1703, and part at sea in 1764, during my second voyage to India, but
several of the notes were added later." _Law_.]

CHAPTER IV

M. COURTIN, CHIEF OF DACCA

Jacques Ignace, son of Francois Courtin, Chevalier, Seigneur de
Nanteuil, and of Catherine Colin, is, I believe, the correct
designation of the gentleman who appears in all the records of the
French and English East India Companies as M. Courtin, Chief of the
French Factory at Dacca.

In June 1756, when Siraj-ud-daula marched on Calcutta, he sent word
to his representative, the Nawab Jusserat Khan at Dacca, to seize
the English Factory, and make prisoners of the Company's servants
and soldiers. The English Factory on the site of the present
Government College, was--

"little better than a common house, surrounded with a thin
brick wall, one half of it not above nine foot high." The
garrison consisted "of a lieutenant" (Lieutenant John Cudmore),
"4 serjeants, 3 corporals, and 19 European soldiers,
besides 34 black Christians[122] and 60 _Buxerries_."[123]

[Illustration: DACCA, OR JEHANGIR NAGAR. (_After Rennell_.)]

On the 27th of June Jusserat Khan sent on the Nawab's order by the
English _wakil_, or agent, to Mr. Becher, the English Chief, and
informed him of the capture of Fort William and the flight of Mr.
Drake. Thinking this was merely a trick to frighten them into
surrender, the Dacca Council requested Mr. Scrafton, third in
Council, to write to M. Courtin, chief of the French Factory, for
information. In reply M. Courtin sent them a number of letters which
he had received from Chandernagore, confirming the bad news from
Calcutta. Taking into consideration the unfortified condition of the
Factory, and that Dacca was only four days by river from Murshid