Note 414 — BOOK X[399]

Joseph François Marquis Dupleix (1697-1764) was Governor of the French East Indies from 1742 to 1754. In the war which ensued on his breach of faith (vide supra), he displayed a courage and capacity that went far to atone for the wrong he had undoubtedly committed. For forty-two days, he defended Pondicherry against a formidable English fleet and an army on land, and he added a great tract of country to the French dominions. Puffed out by his successes, he ended by struggling against the French East India Company itself, whose agent he was, when it tried to oppose his enterprises. Ruined at last by all these wars, he strove for a time to conceal the real state of things: the truth became known, and he was recalled (1754). He spent the rest of his life in bringing actions against the Company for sundry millions of francs advanced to them and died in poverty and humiliation, in Paris, in 1764.—T.