Page:Final French Struggles in India and on the Indian Seas.djvu/27

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INTRODUCTION.
xix

Asiatic Annual Register, and on the newspaper files above alluded to.

To the work as it stands I have added an Appendix, giving a plain didactic account of the expedition from India to Egypt in 1801. It is true that the events recorded in this Appendix have only an indirect connection with the main subject of the book. But the French occupation of Egypt may fairly be considered an integral part of the efforts made by France to disturb the supremacy of England in India. When, moreover, it is remembered that we live in a time when the Eastern question is the burning question of the day, I shall be excused for thinking that a plain statement of an expedition from India to Egypt organised by a Wellesley, carried into execution by a Baird, and approved of by a Wellington, may not be altogether out of place or out of season. My authorities for the account of this expedition are the Life of Sir David Baird, the memoirs of the Comte de Noé, the British despatches, and the Asiatic Annual Register.

G. B. MALLESON.

27, West Cromwell Road,

1st February, 1878.