's army, the only formidable native force drilled by
European methods.

Such was the position of affairs when General Decaen undertook the
enterprise of revivifying French influences in India.

The secret instructions which he received from the First Consul, dated
January 15th, 1803, were the following:

"To communicate with the peoples or princes who are most impatient
under the yoke of the English Company.... To send home a report six
months after his arrival in India, concerning all information that
he shall have collected, on the strength, the position, and the
feeling of the different peoples of India, as well as on the
strength and position of the different English establishments; ...
his views, and hopes that he might have of finding support, in case
of war, so as to be able to maintain himself in the Peninsula....
Finally, as one must reason on the hypothesis that we should not be
masters of the sea and could hope for slight succour,"

Decaen is to seek among the French possessions or elsewhere a place
serving as a _point d'appui_, where in the last resort he could
capitulate and thus gain the means of being transported to France with
arms and baggage. Of this _point d'appui_ he will

"strive to take possession after the first months ... whatever be
the nation to which it belongs, Portuguese, Dutch, or English....
If war should break out between England and France before the 1st
of Vendemiaire, Year XIII. (September 22nd, 1804), and the captain
general is warned of it before receiving the orders of the
Government, he has _carte blanche_ to fall back on the Ile de
France and the Cape, or to remain in India.... It is now considered
impossible that we should have war with England without dragging in
Holland. One of the first cares of the captain-general will be to
gain control over the Dutch, Portuguese, and Spanish
establishments, and of their resources. The captain-general's
mission is at first one of observation, on political and military
topics, with the small forces that he takes out, and an occupation
of _comptoirs_ for our commerce: but the First Consul, if well
informed by him, will perhaps be able some day to put him in a
position to acquire that great glory which hands down the memory of
men beyond the lapse of centuries."[208]

Had these instructions been known to E