how can we account for the circumstance that the authority of this Company was submitted to by those millions, and loyally supported by the arms of the vast native army, or sepoy force? By vigour, vigilance, prudence, and integrity in the administration of government ;-contrasted with the venality, vacillation, imbecility, and utter corruption of the native governments; --by securing to every man toleration in the exercise of his religion, and protection and safety to his property, placing him under the ægis of British laws, and exhibiting to him the extraordinary, but imposing, spectacle of an upright, impartial administration of justice by judges of learning, dignity, and incorruptible honour.;-by fidelity to engagements;— by proved good faith;-by the genius, public spirit, and general capacity of the servants of the Honourable Company; —and by the valour and daring of the British soldiers, which filled the natives with awe and astonishment at the enterprising heroism of the Anglo-Saxon race, and breathed power and resolution even into the breasts of the timid dwellers on the banks of the Ganges. Lord Mornington fully appreciated the value of the splendid jewel committed to his charge;-inspired with the patriotic ardour of the antique Roman, whose character he had so ardently studied in his youth, and emulous of the renown of the Proconsuls, who carried the fame of the republic to the ends of the earth!

Lord Mornington was greeted with every mark of respect by his Excellency Sir Alured Clarke; and had the happiness of finding in Calcutta another of his brothers, Colonel Arthur Wellesley-whose great career was then about to commence under his Lordship's auspices.

1

We cannot present the scenes among which Lord Mornington now found himself more vividly to the mind of the reader, than by quoting the following beautiful lines of Bishop Heber, entitled "An Evening Walk in Bengal:"

"Our task is done!-on Gunga's breast
The sun is sinking down to rest;

And, moored beneath the tamarind bough,
Our bark has found its harbour now.
With furled sail and painted side,
Behold the tiny frigate ride:

Upon the deck, 'mid charcoal gleams,
The Moslem's savoury supper steams;
While all apart, beneath the wood,
The Hindoo cooks his simpler food.

"Come, walk with me the jungle through-
If yonder hunter told us true,

Far off, in desert dank and rude,

The tiger holds its solitude;

Now (taught by recent harm to shun
The thunders of the English gun)
A dreadful guest but rarely seen,
Returns to scare the village green.
Come boldly on; no venomed snake
Can shelter in so cool a brake-
Child of the sun, he loves to lie
'Midst Nature's embers, parched and dry,
Where o'er some tower in ruin laid,
The peepul spreads its haunted shade;
Or round a tomb his scales to wreathe,
Fit warder in the gate of Death.
Come on; yet pause! Behold us now
Beneath the bamboo's arched bough,
Where, gemming oft that sacred gloom,
Glows the geranium's scarlet bloom;
And winds our path through many a bower
Of fragrant tree and giant flower-
The ceiba's crimson pomp displayed
O'er the broad plantain's humbler shade,

And dusk anana's prickly glade;

While o'er the brake, so wild and fair,
The betel waves his crest in air;
With pendant train and rushing wings,
Aloft the gorgeous peacock springs:
And he the bird of hundred dyes,
Whose plumes the dames of Ava prize.
So rich a shade, so green a sod,
Our English fairies never trod !

Yet who in Indian bowers has stood,

But thought of England's good 'green wood ;' And blessed, beneath the palmy shade,

Her hazel and her hawthorn glade;

And breathed a prayer (how oft in vain!)
To gaze upon her oaks again?
A truce to thought-the jackal's cry
Resounds like sylvan revelry;

And through the trees yon failing ray
Will scantly serve to guide our way.
Yet mark, as fade the upper skies,
Each thicket opes ten thousand eyes—
Before, beside us, and above,

The fire-fly lights his lamp of love,
Retreating, chasing, sinking, soaring,
The darkness of the copse exploring ;
While to this cooler air confest,
The broad dhatura bares her breast,
Of fragrant scent and virgin white,
A pearl around the locks of night!
Still as we pass, in softened hum
Along the breezy alleys come

The village song, the horn, the drum :
Still as we pass, from bush and brier
The shrill cigala strikes his lyre;
And what is she, whose liquid strain
Thrills through yon copse of sugar-cane?
I know the soul-enchanting swell,

It is it must be-Philomel!

Enough, enough, the rustling trees
Announce a shower upon the breeze,
The flashes of the summer sky
Assume a deeper, ruddier dye;
Yon lamp that trembles on the stream,
From forth our cabin sheds its beam;

And we must early sleep, to find
Betimes the morning's healthy wind.
But oh! with thankful hearts confess
E'en here there may be happiness;
And He, the bounteous Sire, has given
His peace on earth-his hope of heaven."

As we shall soon see, the Governor-General forthwith entered upon the duties of his office, and became engaged in matters of the gravest importance-pregnant with the most momentous consequences to the interests of the British empire.

CHAPTER VIII.

Lord Mornington directs his attention to the Affairs of Tanjore,Geographical position of Tanjore.-Danish Settlement at Tranquebar. -The celebrated Missionary Schwarz.-Misrepresentations of Mr. Mill. -Ameer Sing, the reigning Rajah.-Serfojee, the Adopted Son of Tuljajee.-Unjust Aspersions on the East India Company and the Governor-General, in Hook's Life of Sir David Baird.-Colonel Baird at Tanjore in 1796.-His Partizanship.-Reprimanded by the Governor of Madras in Council.-Examination of the Claims of the Rival Princes.-Mr. Mill erroneously describes Ameer Sing as the Son of Tuljajee, the previous Rajah of Tanjore.-Serfojee the Adopted Son of Tuljajee.-Law of Adoption in Eastern Countries.-Adoption among the Romans, &c-Rights conferred by Adoption.-Serfojee the Pupil of Schwarz.-His Education, Acquirements, Interview with Bishop Heber.- Erects a Marble Monument to the memory of Schwarz.-Justification of Lord Mornington's Proceedings. - The Governor-General receives a copy of Malartic's Proclamation at the Isle of France respecting an Embassy from Tippoo Sultaun.-Copy of the Proclamation, and Translation.-Lord Mornington's first Impressions respecting it.-Letter to General Harris at Madras, relating to the possible assembling of the Army-Communication from Mr. Duncan, Governor of Bombay.-Dispatches from Lord Macartney and Sir Hugh Christian.-Genuineness of the Proclamation.-Lord Mornington examines upon oath Persons at the Isle of France when the Embassy arrived there.-Conclusions arrived at by his Lordship. -Dangers which menaced British India at this crisis.-Probability of a French Invasion.-French Expedition to Bantry Bay.-Lord Mornington resolves to prepare for Hostilities.-Final orders to General Harris.

THE first public act of the Earl of Mornington after his assumption of the powers of the supreme government at Calcutta was directed to the settlement of the