.0844] descriptions of some of the
travellers of the 16th century. Their wars exhausted the country, and
before the end of the century it was in the greatest decay. A new dynasty
arose in Ava, which subdued Pegu, and maintained their supremacy throughout
the 17th and during the first forty years of the 18th century. The Peguans
or Talaings then revolted, and having taken the capital Ava, and made the
king prisoner, reduced the whole country to submission. Alompra, left by
the conqueror in charge of the village of Motshobo, planned the deliverance
of his country. He attacked the Peguans at first with small detachments;
but when his forces increased, he suddenly advanced, and took possession of
the capital in the autumn of 1753.

In 1754 the Peguans sent an armament of war-boats against Ava, but they
were totally defeated by Alompra; while in the districts of Prome, Donubyu,
&c., the Burmans revolted, and expelled all the Pegu garrisons in their
towns. In 1754 Prome was besieged by the king of Pegu, who was again
defeated by Alompra, and the war was transferred from the upper provinces
to the mouths of the navigable rivers, and the numerous creeks and canals
which intersect the lower country. In 1755 the yuva raja, the king of
Pegu's brother, was equally unsuccessful, after which the Peguans were
driven from Bassein and the adjacent country, and were forced to withdraw
to the fortress of Syriam, distant 12 m. from Rangoon. Here they enjoyed a
brief repose, Alompra being called away to quell an insurrection of his own
subjects, and to repel an invasion of the Siamese; but returning
victorious, he laid siege to the fortress of Syriam and took it by
surprise. In these wars the French sided with the Peguans, the English with
the Burmans. Dupleix, the governor of Pondicherry, had sent two ships to
the aid of the former; but the master of the first was decoyed up the river
by Alompra, where he was massacred along with his whole crew. The other
escaped to Pondicherry. Alompra was now master of all the navigable rivers;
and the Peguans, shut out from foreign aid, were finally subdued. In 1757
the conqueror laid siege to the city of Pegu, which capitulated, on
condition that their own king should govern the country, but that he should
do homage for his kingdom, and should also surrender his daughter to the
victorious monarch. Alompra never contemplated the fulfilment of the
condition; and having obtained possession of the town, aban