ing been
set aside, he again turned his thoughts toward India, where both the
company and the government were eager to avail themselves of his
services. The directors appointed him governor of Fort St. David; the
king gave him the commission of a lieutenant-colonel in the British
army; and thus doubly authorized, he returned to Asia in 1755.

The first service on which he was employed after his return to the
East was the reduction of the stronghold of Gheriah. This fortress,
built on a craggy promontory, and almost surrounded by the ocean, was
the den of a pirate named Angria, whose ships had long been the terror
of the Arabian seas. Admiral Watson, who commanded the English
squadron, burned Angria's fleet, while Clive attacked the fastness by
land. The place soon fell, and a booty of a hundred and fifty thousand
pounds sterling was divided among the conquerors.

About two months after Clive had entered on his government at Fort St.
David, intelligence was received of the destruction of the English
settlement at Calcutta by Surajah Dowlah, the Nabob of Bengal.
Although scarcely any resistance had been made, the English prisoners,
146 in number, were all thrust into a close and narrow apartment
called the Black Hole, which, in such a climate, would have been too
close and too narrow for a single prisoner. Their sufferings during
the dreadful night, until death put an end to the misery of most,
cannot be described; 123 perished before morning, and the survivors
had to be dug out of the heap formed by the dead bodies of their
companions.

The authorities at Madras, on receiving this intelligence, resolved to
avenge the outrage; 900 Europeans and 1,500 Sepoys, under the command
of Clive, were embarked on board Admiral Watson's squadron; the
passage was rendered tedious by adverse winds, but the armament
arrived safely in Bengal. Clive proceeded with his usual promptitude;
he routed the garrison which the nabob had placed in Fort William,
recovered Calcutta, and took Hoogly by storm. Surajah Dowlah, who was
as cowardly as he was cruel, now sought to negotiate peace, but at the
same time he secretly urged the French to come to his assistance. This
duplicity could not be concealed from Clive and Watson. They
determined accordingly to attack Chandernagore, the chief possession
of the French in Bengal, before the force there could be strengthened
by new arrivals either from the South of India or Europe. Watson
directed the e