e garden of the seraglio. The chaplain of the thirty-ninth regiment
conducted the service, and I caused a slab of marble to be set up to
mark the grave, inscribed simply with her name and the date of her
death. This tomb, I have been told, still stands, and is pointed out
to English visitors to Moorshedabad as the grave of the Englishwoman
who was imprisoned in the Black Hole.

The following day, having received Colonel Clive's letter, and bidden
him an affectionate farewell, I embarked with Rupert upon one of the
barges which were carrying the treasure down to Calcutta. The fleet
started in procession, and went down the river, with music playing on
deck, flying flags by day, and coloured lanterns by night, till we
reached the English settlement. There I found old Muzzy, patiently
waiting for me, and full of pride in the victory, in which he was
prone to attribute a great share to me.

Five months later we sailed up the Thames, and set foot once more on
English soil.

One thing only detained me in London. This was the delivery of the
letter which Colonel Clive had entrusted to me for Mr. Pitt.

It was a privilege which I could not rate too highly to be thus made
the intermediary between the two greatest Englishmen of my time, men
of a type that seems now to be lost among us. Since Colonel Clive we
have had no victorious captain, and since Mr. Pitt, no mighty
minister, and hence it is that our country, which under the rule of a
Cromwell or a Pitt, hath risen to be the arbiter of Europe, and held
all nations in awe, is now sunk, under the sway of feeble intellects,
to a precarious position, the mock of every power, and saved only by
her fleets from absolute destruction.

I do not find it easy to describe my sensations when I was ushered
into the presence of the Great Commoner, and saw before me that
majestic figure, with the profile of a Roman conqueror, and a glance
hardly less terrible to encounter than the full blaze of the sun. When
I have stood before the Nabob of Bengal, throned in the midst of his
Court, I have seen in front of me nothing but a peevish, debauched
young man, but when I came into the room where Mr. Pitt was I felt
that I was in the presence of a ruler of men. His attitude, his
commanding gestures, and the stately manner he had of slowly moving
his head round upon his neck to look at you, made a most tremendous
impression; and I found it easy to believe the stories of men having
risen to speak a