the reader picture to himself the situation. To wake up in darkness
and find an enemy, whose numbers were unknown, practically in
possession of the centre of the town, in the native inn of which he
had gone peacefully to sleep but two hours before; his followers
being shot down; some of them scared; all just awakening; none of
them cognizant of the cause of the uproar; many of the intruders of
the same nation, speaking the same language as himself; all this
occurring in the sandy plains of India: surely such a situation was
sufficient to test the greatest, the most self-reliant, of warriors.
It did not scare Clive. In one second his faculties were as clear as
they had ever been in the peaceful council chamber. He recognized, on
the instant, that the attackers had missed their mark. They had
indeed fired a volley into the caravanserai in which he had lain with
his officers, and had shattered the box which lay at his feet and
killed the sentry beside him, but they had not stopped to finish
their work. Instantly Clive ran into one of the pagodas, ordered the
men there, some two hundred, to follow him, and formed them alongside
of a large body of sipahis who were firing volleys in every
direction, whom he believed to be his own men. To them he went,
upbraided them for their purposeless firing, and ordered them to
cease. But the men were not his men, but French sipahis. Before he
had recognized the fact, one of them made a cut at him with his
talwar, and wounded him. Still thinking they were {72}his own men,
Clive again urged them to cease fire. At the moment there came up six
Frenchmen, who summoned him to surrender. Instantly he recognized the
situation. Instantly his clear brain asserted itself. Drawing himself
up he told the Frenchmen that it was for them and not for him to talk
of surrender; bade them look round and they would see how they were
surrounded. The men, scared by his bearing, ran off to communicate
the information to their commander. Clive then proceeded to the other
pagoda to rally the men posted there. The French sipahis took
advantage of his absence to evacuate the town. The Frenchmen and the
European deserters meanwhile had occupied the lesser pagoda. They had
become by this time more scared than the surprised English. Their
leader had recognized that he was in a trap. His mental resources
brought to him no consolation in his trouble. He waited quietly till
the day broke, and then led his men into the op