signments on the
same districts for nineteen lakhs: then the cession of the lands
south of Calcutta, so long deferred, was actually made--the annual
rental being the sum of 222,958 rupees. These arrangements having
been completed, Clive accompanied the Subahdar to the capital of
Bihar, the famous city of Patna. There they both remained, the
Subahdar awaiting the receipt of the imperial patents confirming him
in his office; Clive resolved, whatever were the personal
inconvenience to himself, not to quit Patna so long as the Subahdar
should remain there. They stayed there three months, a period which
Clive utilized to the best advantage, as it seemed to him at the
moment, of his countrymen. The province of Bihar was the seat of the
saltpetre manufacture. It was a monopoly[9] farmed to agents, who
re-sold the saltpetre on terms bringing very large profits. Clive
proposed to the {118}Subahdar that the East India Company should
become the farmers, and offered a higher sum than any at which the
monopoly had been previously rated. Mir Jafar was too shrewd a man
not to recognize the enormous advantages which must accrue to his
foreign protectors by his acquiescence in a scheme which would place
in their hands the most important trade in the country. But he felt
the impossibility of resistance. He was a bird in the hands of the
fowler, and he agreed.

[Footnote 9: The possession of this monopoly became the cause of the
troubles which followed the departure of Clive, and led to the
life-and-death struggle with Mir Kasim.]

At length (April 14) the looked-for patents arrived. Accompanying
that which gave to the usurpation of Mir Jafar the imperial sanction
was a patent for Clive, creating him a noble of the Mughal empire,
with the rank and title of a Mansabdar[10] of 6000 horse. The
investiture took place the day following. Then, after marching to
Barh, the two armies separated, the Subahdar proceeding to
Murshidabad; Clive, after a short stay at that place, to Calcutta.

[Footnote 10: For the nature of Mansab, and the functions of the
holder of a Mansab (or Mansabdar) the reader is referred to
Blochmann's _Ain-i-Akbari_. By the original regulations of Akbar, who
founded the order, the Mansabdars ranked from the Dahbashi, often
Commander-in-Chief, to the Doh Hazari, Commander of 10,000 horse, to
the Mansabdars of 6000 downwards. Vide _Ain-i-Akbari_ (Blochmann's),
p. 237 and onwards.]

Clive had returned to Calcutta, May 24,