Note 10 — Chapter XVII · IN WHICH GREEK JOINS GREEK.

Our patriotic anxieties have been happily relieved, madam, by the arrival of Mr Scrafton, of the Company’s Service, on his way to Dacca, bringing news of the glorious triumph of our arms in the capture of Chandernagore, which surrendered eight days ago to Admiral Watson. Our success was not without alloy, being attended with a very heavy loss of life and great damage to the ships, while a parcel of French took advantage of the respite allowed for considering the terms of surrender to slip out and make their way to Sydabad, their factory near Cossimbuzar, where Mr Laws[10] has ’em concealed. So stubborn, indeed, was the enemy that we would scarce have been able to subdue them before Colonel Clive had drawn lines of investment about them on the land side, had it not been for the assistance rendered by a deserter named Mr Terrano,[11] who upon some affront received from the Directeur, Mr Renault, came over to us, and pointed out to the Admiral the only channel for the ships to pass up the river, which the French had blocked by sinking six vessels there, besides mooring two great booms across the stream with chains. In spite of this advantage the passage was so dangerous that the Kent, which suffered most, has been condemned, being an old vessel, and is fallen down to Calcutta to be broke up, while only one officer on board of her escaped unwounded, poor Billy Speke, among others, sustaining an injury that is like to be mortal by the same shot that wounded his father, the Captain.[12] My own ship, the Tyger, came off somewhat more lightly, although among the wounded was Admiral Pococke, who, arriving at Culpee in the Cumberland from Madrass, and finding the action imminent, was so resolute to take a share in it that he came up the river in his long-boat, and hoisted his flag on the Tyger, to the excessive mortification of Captain Latham, who saw himself cruelly deprived of the honour of fighting his ship. As for the army which the Nabob sent by Roydoolub to the assistance of the French, it was detained at Houghley by the address of our friend Nuncomar, who persuaded the commander that Chandernagore would be fallen before he could reach it. The letters sent to forbid the attack, arriving after that which permitted it, were treated by the Admiral and Colonel Clive with unconcern, a treatment accorded also, as we hear from Mr Scrafton, to Mr Drake, whose speech at the council held before starting on the expedition was so hesitating and contradictory that no one could make anything of it, and on the Colonel’s suggestion it was unanimously voted that the President’s opinion was no opinion at all.