AFFAIRS OF INDIA.
During this year the power of Tippoo Sultaun was destroyed. Recently he had been encouraged in his hostility by the French, who eagerly sought to strike a blow at the commercial prosperity of Great Britain. It was for this purpose that the Egyptian expedition had been undertaken, and for this purpose likewise alliances were formed with the native powers of India. In Tippoo Sultaun the French found an implacable foe to the English—a foe which was ever ready to unsheathe his sword to destroy them. In order to crush their power and to regain what he had lost in the late war, Tippoo Sultaun had sent an embassy to Cabul, to bring the Affghan tribes down into India; he had negociated with the Nizam of the Deccan and with other native princes; and in 1797 he had sent two ambassadors to the Isle of France to propose an alliance with the French republic, and to request a supply of troops sufficient to enable him to expel the English from every part of Hindustan. The governor of the Isle of France had no troops to spare; but he forwarded Tippoo’s letters to France, and allowed his ambassadors to enrol some Frenchmen for his aid. Some sixty or seventy of these volunteers proceeded to Tippoo’s capital, where they first set up a tree of liberty, and next proceeded to organize a Jacobin club. These proceedings soon became known to the government at Calcutta; and the Earl of Mornington, then Governor-general of India, determined to anticipate Tippoo. Troops were sent under Generals Harris and Stuart; and the sultan was defeated in the route, and compelled to take refuge in his fortified capital. Seringapatam was besieged, and on the 4th of May was stormed and captured. Two of his sons were taken alive; but Tippoo fell near one of the gates, and was found buried under a heap of dead bodies. His territories were divided among his enemies; the English kept Seringapatam with the island on which it is situated, the whole of his territories on the Malabar coast, the district of Coimbatoor, and all the country that intervened between the company’s possessions on the western and those on the eastern coast; the Nizam of the Deccan obtained a more inland country; and another great tract of country was conferred upon a descendant of the ancient Hindoo rajahs, who had been dispossessed by Hyder Ali. Thus ended a dynasty which was founded by a daring adventurer on the ruins of the Hindoo house of Mysor. It began and ended its career in spoliation and the shedding of blood.