money whatsoever from their hands. But vehement passion is ingenious in
resources. The Company's servants were not only stimulated, but better
instructed by the prohibition. They soon fell upon a contrivance which
answered their purposes far better than the methods which were
forbidden: though in this also they violated an ancient, but they
thought, an abrogated order. They reversed their proceedings. Instead of
receiving presents, they made loans. Instead of carrying on wars in
their own name, they contrived an authority, at once irresistible and
irresponsible, in whose name they might ravage at pleasure; and being
thus freed from all restraint, they indulged themselves in the most
extravagant speculations of plunder. The cabal of creditors who have
been the object of the late bountiful grant from his Majesty's
ministers, in order to possess themselves, under the name of creditors
and assignees, of every country in India, as fast as it should be
conquered, inspired into the mind of the Nabob of Arcot (then a
dependant on the Company of the humblest order) a scheme of the most
wild and desperate ambition that I believe ever was admitted into the
thoughts of a man so situated.[32] First, they persuaded him to
consider himself as a principal member in the political system of
Europe. In the next place, they held out to him, and he readily imbibed,
the idea of the general empire of Hindostan. As a preliminary to this
undertaking, they prevailed on him to propose a tripartite division of
that vast country: one part to the Company; another to the Mahrattas;
and the third to himself. To himself he reserved all the southern part
of the great peninsula, comprehended under the general name of the
Deccan.

On this scheme of their servants, the Company was to appear in the
Carnatic in no other light than as a contractor for the provision of
armies, and the hire of mercenaries for his use and under his direction.