well-disciplined troops, officered by Europeans, to surrender without resistance to a British force,) a considerable degree of internal commotion prevailed in the vast empire of the Mahratta states. dominions fell successively into the hands of their more warlike neighbours. Stimulated by the example of the peishwa, the bukshi, or commander in chief of the forces to the rajah, made himself independent in Berar. His family name was Bhoonsla. Mular Rao Holkar, (a military chieftain of note, among the Mahrattas,) founded a dominion upon the same principles, in part of the fertile province of Malwa; while the remainder of that territory, and the whole of Candeish, became subject to Ranojee Scindiah,the most distinguished warrior of his age and country a similiar usurpation in the flourishing country of the Guzerat, established that province in the family of Guick war. Thus, among five chiefs, (whose representatives, at the present day, enjoy these territories as their birth-right) namely, the Peishwa, Bhoonsla, Holkar, Scindia, and Guckwar, was the then Mahratta dominion divid This people, originally uniting, as do the Tartar hordes, the pastoral occupation with a warlike and predatory spirit, had raised itself, in the course of one hundred and sixty years, to the first rank among the nations of Asia. Happily for the independence of the other powers of India, its vast strength and resources, both civil and military, are scarcely ever directed by a common principle of action, which is indeed at once forbidden by the nature of its government, and the individual and often opposite interests of its rulers. From a simple monarchy, founded by the extraordinary abilities of an adventurer, in the short period of five and twenty years, from the weakness of two succeeding princes, it became a federative body of indeed, the rajah of Sattarah being confinpendent chieftains, who yet, however, both as a common point of union, and from that unalterable principle in the east of veneration for the original strain of the royal blood, acknowledged an honorary fealty to the descendants of their first sovereign, the rajah of Sattarah. This revolution left the hereditary moBarch nothing but the name. His prime minister, (which office became also hereditary) under the designation of the peishwa, was universally allowed, by the whole Mahratta confederacy, as his representative and their supreme head: he established his court at Poonah, in the centre of a valuable territory, in part wrested from the imbecility of the rajah, and part the spoils of the neighbouring princes, whose ed within the walls of his capital, where his situation was that of actual imprisonment and subjection to the court of Poonah. At the commencement of the present century, however, a succession of able and warlike chieftains in the great Mahratta families, and the feebleness of the Mogul emperors, had extended their possessions to a vast extent. Their empire now comprehended all those western provinces of the Deccan, which lie between the rivers Nerbudda and Krisna; the province of Berar, in the interior; that of Cuttack, on the eastern shores of the peninsula, and the whole of western Hindostan, except the country of Moultan, the Punjaub, and Sirhind. This extensive dominion was, in length, from Delhi in the northern, to the river Tumbudra, their southern boundary, 970 British miles; and its extreme breadth, from east to west, across the peninsula, from the bay of Bengal to the gulph of Cambay, about 900 miles. It was bounded on the north, by the mountains of Scwalie, which separated it from Sirinigar and Cashmere; on the north-east, by Rohilcund and Oude; on the east, by the British provinces of Benares, Bahar, Bengal, part of Orissa, the bay of Bengal, and the northern Circars; on the south, by the dominions of the nizam in the Deccan, the rivers Krisna and the Tumbudra; on the west, by the Indian Ocean; and on the north-west, by the desérts of Moultan, the river Sursotee, and the province of Sirhind: the whole containing a population of nearly 40 millions, and enabling the different chiefs to keep on foot a military establishment, of about 210,000 infantry, and 100,000 cavalry*. It may easily be supposed, that various attempts have been made, by some or other of the sovereign chieftans, to gain the supreme direction of such an accumulation of strength and resource, as this great empire, collectively considered, presented to the individual ambition of each: accordingly, we find, that the comparatively short period of Mahratta history is, in a great measure, made up of their dissentions and intrigues of their princes to acquire absolute do minion over the whole. The most obvious mode to obtain this object, and the most agreeable to the constitution of the country, was by controlling the councils of the peishwa, and thus obtaining the sanction of his name and office for the meditated usurpation. The weakness of the government of Poonah, during the administration of several successive peishwas, gave ample scope to the execution of such a design; and the natural timidity, and weakness of mind of the present sovereign, left him and his authority at the mercy of the most enterprising or most powerful of the Mahratta chieftains. As it was the obvious interest of the British government in India to prevent such an accumulation of power, as an union of the different states of the Mahratta empire would throw into the hands of an individual, and which might eventually be fatal to the existence of the English name in Hindostan; so it was the policy of the different governors general to contract such alliances with the pieshwa, as might preserve him independent, and thus effectually counteract the projects of the more ambitions chieftains. It was, therefore, on this principle, that the marquis Cornwallis concluded the treaty of Poonah with that prince, as the acknowledged representative of the rajah of Sattarah, and supreme head of the Mahratta confederacy, without reference to any of the subordinate chiefs, at the commencement of the war with Tippo This immense tract of country comprehends the provinces of Delhi, Agra, Ajimere, Malwa, Guzerat, Candeishi, Baglana, Visiapour, the Koukan, Berar, Cuttack, and part of Doulatabad, of which a great proportion are highly fertile and populous, rich in grain, and abounding in villages and towns, which carry on a considerable internal commerce: of the inhabitants, nine tenths are Hindoos, the remainder Mahometans. 4 Tippo Sultaun, in the year 1789.Neither Scindia, nor Bhoonsla, (the rajah of Berar,) were parties to this alliance, which was, indeed. in opposition to their separate designs. The former, hardly then concealing his intentions of rendering the office of the peishwa subservient to his views upon the supreme authority, and the latter claiming that great office for himself, in right of his descent from the family of Sevagee, the ancestor of the rajah of Sattarah, and founder of the Mahratta pow cr. On the division, therefore, of Tippo Sultaun's dominions and treasure, which took effect after the treaty of Seringa patam, in 1797, the peishwa obtained a considerable accession of territory, and a large sum of money, without the consent or participation of any of the other chiefs of the Mahratta body; nor when, in the course of the following year, the marquis Cornwallis proposed a general alliance to the Mahratta power, did he make any proposition to the several chiefs, but addressed himself solely to the constitutional representative of the sovereign executive authority of the Mahratta empire. In the interval of time, between the peace of Seringapatam and the commencement of the marquis Wellesley's administration in India, the ambition and rapacity of Dowlut Rao Scindiah, (who had succeeded Madhagee Scindiah, in 1794,) had impaired the authority of the prishwa, to such a degree as to frustrate every benefit, which the treaty of Poonah was calculated to secure to the British interests :-At the latter period, he was not only in possession of the person, and possessed the nominal authority of the unfortunate Shah Aulum, the de posed Mogul emperor, but had for six years kept Bajee Rao, the reigning peishwa, in a state of the utmost degradation, and governed the councils of the court of Poonah, near which he had established himself with a powerful army, with almost absolute authority. By the perverse and overbearing influence of that chieftain, notwithstanding the apparent concurrence of the peishwa in the necessity and justice of the Mysorean war, in 1798, the Mahratta states not only afforded no assistance to the British government, in its prosecution, but actually maintained a secret and treacherous correspondence with Tippo Sultaun, until the fall of Seringapatam. And, even after that memorable event, the emissaries of their government, entirely subjected to the dominion of Scindia, attempted to excite the family and remaining officers of the deceased sultaun to resist the settlement of Mysore. Again, when, on the division of Tippo Sultaun's dominions, a cousiderable territory was offered to the peishwa, notwithstanding the total failure of the latter, in discharging those obligations, imposed by the terms of the alliance concluded between the marquis Cornwallis and the Mahratta power, he was induced to decline the proffered grant; as did Scindiah himself propositions of the most amicable nature, from the same quarter, and at the same period. In order to avert, as much as possible, the consequences of such an hostile spirit as was thus manifested, and to effect such an arrangement as should preclude the possibility of any union of the Mahratta states, states, under circumstances which might menace interruption to the tranquillity of the British possessions, and to which the great and increasing power of Scindiah manifestly led, the governor general concluded a subsidiary treaty with the Guick war, in 1802, the operation of which firmly attached that chief to the interests of the company, and secured to it a valuable and important territorial establishment in the maritime province of Guzerat. But the great object of marquis Wellesley's endeavours was, to establish between the peishwa and the British government such a connection as might secure the stability and efficiency of his authority, under the protection of the British power, without injury to the rights of the feudatory chieftains of the Mahratta empire. An arrangement which, if carried into effect, would be the best security for preserving a due balance between the several states constituting the confederacy of the Mahrattas, as well as for preventing any dangerous union or diversion of the vast resources of that empire. To these wise and masterly measures, the comprehensive mind of the marquis Wellesley was stimulated by another powerful motive. It had ever been a principle of the British government to prevent the sovereign power of the Mahratta state, or any great branch of its empire, from passing into the hands of France. Such an event was not only possible, but even much to be dreaded, from the situation in which the dissentions of the different Mahratta chieftains had placed their country, at the commencement of the year 1802, and which afforded but too favourable an opportunity to the government of France to establish a dominion within the peninsula, by the introduction of a military force, for the purpose of aiding one of the contending parties. In this object, the views of France would have been materially favoured by the strength and efficiency of the force under M. Perron, a Frenchman in the service and pay of Scindia, in whose confidence he possessed the first place, and over whose councils he possessed unlimited influence.— This formidable military establishment, consisted of 38,000 regular infantry, 8000 cavalry, and about 300 Europeans, (of whom not more than 30 were British subjects,) furnished with a train of 120 pieces of iron, and upwards of 150 pieces of brass ordnance. This force was formed into brigades, officered by European adventurers, chiefly Frenchmen, and disciplined on the European system. It was farther established with a great territorial dominion, extending towards the left bank of the Indus through the Punjaub, and comprehending Agra, Delhi, and a large portion of the Douab of the Ganges, on the most vulnerable part of the British north western frontier' in Hindostan; and to which also was committed the custody of the deposed Mogul emperor, Shah Aulum. Under these circumstances it was, that the governor general determined to renew his negotiations, in the month of June 1802, for the conclusion of an improved system of alliance with the court of Poonah. The increased distractions of the Mahratta state, and the successes of Jeswunt Rao Holkar against the forces of Scindiah, appeared to constitute a crisis favourable to the establishment of the British power in the Mahratta empire, without the hazard of involving it in any contest whatever. The war which had for a considerable period desolated the Mahratta states, originated in the rapacity and thirst of acquisition in Scindiah. On the death of Tuckogee Holkar, in 1797, a dispute arose between his sons, with respect to the succession, in which Scindiah interfered, and actually, in a sudden and unexpected attack on the younger, Mulhar Rao, slew him and many of his adherents. But the present chieftain Jeswunt Rao Holkar, an illegitimate son of Tuckogee, having escaped, and being possessed of considerable abilities and resource, levied forces in the name and behalf of the infant son of Mulhar Rao, (then in the custody of Scindiah,) and carried on, with various success, a severe contest with Scindiah until the middle of the year 1802, when he sudden ly determined upon the measure of marching to Poonah. The weakness of the peishwa's government, and the entire annihilation of his authority by Scindiah, had left the former no means of opposing Holkar; and that chief naturally and wisely concluded that the most severe blow he could strike against the power of his antagonist, was to destroy his ascendency at the court of Poonah, and to convert the authority of the peishwa's name to his own projects of aggrandizement. With these views, he proceeded with a large force to that city, whence Scindiah had been compelled to depart, nearly a year and a half before, to defend his dominions in Malwa; and who was at Qugein, when Holkar commenced his march towards the metropolis of the peishwa. During this period, the discussions between the British government and that of the peishwa went on but slowly. Although Scindia was absent in northern Hindostan, his opinions and views still continu. ed to govern at Poonaḥ, and the peishwa declined the proffered protection and alliance of the company until Holkar actually reached the vicinity of the capital. Scindiah in the mean time detached a force, under the command of one of his generals, named Suddashee Bhow, which effected a junétion with the army of the peishwa, and both united, gave battle on the 25th day of October, 1804, to the force of Holkar, which terminated in the total defeat of the former, with considerable loss. After the action the peishwa retired with a small body of cavalry, to a fortress in the vicinity of Poonah, whence he prosecuted his farther retreat to Mhar, a fort in the province of Koukan. On the day on which the action took place, the peishwa sent his minister to the British resident at his court, with a written instrument, containing the terms of a subsidiary treaty, which he carnestly requested might be immediately executed, and the minister at the same time assured the resident, that a general defensive alliance should be concluded, at the first practicable moment, between his highness and the company, on the principle of that existing with the nizam. The terms of that now demanded, were the establishment of a force of six battalions of sepoys, for the service of the peishwa, with the usual complement of artillery, and conveying |