et in equipoise. At
Surat both Companies had places of business; on the coast of Malabar the
English had Bombay, and the French Mahe; on the coast of Coromandel the
former held Madras and Fort St. George, the latter Pondicherry and
Karikal. The principal factories, as well as the numerous little
establishments which were dependencies of them, were defended by a
certain number of European soldiers, and by Sepoys, native soldiers in
the pay of the Companies.

These small armies were costly, and diminished to a considerable extent
the profits of trade. Dupleix espied the possibility of a new
organization which should secure to the French in India the
preponderance, and ere long the empire even, in the two peninsulas. He
purposed to found manufactures, utilize native hand-labor, and develop
the coasting trade, or Ind to Ind trade, as the expression then was; but
he set his pretensions still higher, and carried his views still further.
He purposed to acquire for the Company, and, under its name, for France,
territories and subjects furnishing revenues, and amply sufficing for the
expenses of the commercial establishments. The moment was propitious;
the ancient empire of the Great Mogul, tottering to its base, was
distracted by revolutions, all the chops and changes whereof were
attentively followed by Madame Dupleix; two contested successions opened
up at once--those of the Viceroy or Soudhabar of the Deccan and of his
vassal, the Nabob of the Carnatic. The Great Mogul, nominal sovereign of
all the states of India, confined himself to selling to all the
pretenders decrees of investiture, without taking any other part in the
contest. Dupleix, on the contrary, engaged in it ardently. He took
sides in the Deccan for Murzapha Jung, and in the Carnatic for Tchunda
Sahib against their rivals supported by the English. Versed in all the
resources of Hindoo policy, he had negotiated an alliance between his two
proteges; both marched against the Nabob of the Carnatic. He, though a
hundred and seven years old, was at the head of his army, mounted on a
magnificent elephant. He espied in the melley his enemy Tchunda Sahib,
and would have darted upon him; but, whilst his slaves were urging on the
huge beast, the little French battalion sent by Dupleix to the aid of his
allies marched upon the nabob, a ball struck him to the heart, and he
fell. The same evening, Murzapha Jung was proclaimed Soudhabar of the
Deccan, and he grant