now renewed in effect with yet worse additions; for they bound themselves to fight for a twice perjured ally against the fierce, wily, resourceful Sultán of Mysore. The Company, in fact, were committed to a long and costly struggle with the stoutest, ablest, and most determined foe whom our arms had ever encountered in Southern India.
The Court of Directors cried aloud against the meddling policy of their servants at Madras. Once more they declared it none of their business to act as 'umpires of Indostan.' It was not for their interest that either the Nizám or Haidar should be crushed altogether, while the Maráthás, whom they dreaded more than Haidar, remained free to overrun India. All they cared for was to hold aloof from the quarrels of the 'country powers'; and very strong was the language in which they condemned the bargain just made with the Nizám for the possession of provinces still owned by the ruler of Mysore. And in the opulent fortunes lately amassed by their own servants they saw only fresh grounds for the popular belief that 'this rage for negotiations, treaties, and alliances, has private advantage for its object, more than the public good.'
Meanwhile the war against Haidar Naik, as his opponents scornfully styled him, raged for some months with varying fortune. His strong places on the Malabar coast were captured at one moment by a force sent from Bombay, only to be retaken at the next by Haidar's unstaying energy. On his eastern frontier Smith pressed him so hard that, before the
