Kitabı oku: «India Under British Rule», sayfa 5

Bombay and the Peishwas.

Meanwhile, the British at Bombay had come into contact with the Mahrattas at Poona. For years the East India Company had been anxious to hold two important positions close to Bombay harbour, namely, the little island of Salsette and the little peninsula of Bassein. But the Mahrattas had wrested Salsette and Bassein from the Portuguese, and would not part with them on any terms. A civil war, however, had broken out in the Mahratta country. A Peishwa had been murdered. An uncle ascended the throne, but was banished on suspicion of being the murderer. He applied for help to the British at Bombay, and offered to cede the coveted positions if the British at Bombay would restore him to the Mahratta capital. The Governor and Council at Bombay closed with the offer, and the war began.

Disastrous retreat.

After some successes, the British at Bombay met with disaster. Mahadaji Sindia appeared at Poona with a large army to act against the banished Peishwa. A British force advanced from Bombay towards Poona, but took alarm at the report of Sindia's army, and suddenly halted, and beat a retreat. During the return march, the British force was environed by the Mahrattas, and finally surrendered to Sindia under what is known as the "Convention of Wurgaum."

Success of Warren Hastings.

Warren Hastings condemned the war from the outset; as, however, the Company was committed to a war, he exerted himself, in the teeth of Francis, to maintain British prestige in India. He sent an expedition, under Colonel Goddard, from Bengal to the Mahratta country, and detached another force under Captain Popham to capture Sindia's fortress at Gwalior. The success of these exploits electrified half India. The war was brought to a triumphant close, but all conquered territories, excepting Salsette and Bassein, were restored to the Mahrattas. Indeed, Warren Hastings was not a conqueror like Clive; he acquired no territory during his régime, excepting that of Benares, which was ceded to the Company by the Nawab Vizier of Oudh.

Three Asiatic powers in India.

§12. During the Mahratta war secret negotiations were carried on between the Indian powers for a confederation against the British. The two great powers of the Deccan—the Mahrattas on the west representing the Hindus, and the Nizam on the east representing the Mohammedans—had hated one another for the greater part of a century. A third power, that of a Mohammedan adventurer named Hyder Ali, was becoming formidable further south on the western tableland of the peninsula. Hyder Ali is said to have once served as a sepoy in the French army. Later on, he entered the service of the Hindu Raja of Mysore, and eventually ousted the Raja, usurped the sovereign authority, and conquered the countries round about.

Hyder Ali of Mysore.

For many years Hyder Ali was the Ishmael of the Deccan and peninsula. His hand was against every man, and every man's hand was against him. He invaded alike the territories of the Mahrattas and the Nizam in the Deccan, and those of the Nawab of the Carnatic up to the suburbs of Madras and Fort St. George. At the same time, he more than once exasperated the British by his secret dealings with the French at Pondicherry.

Invasion of the Carnatic, 1780: breaking up of the confederation.

About 1779 Warren Hastings was warned that the three powers—the Mahrattas, the Nizam, and Hyder Ali—were preparing for simultaneous attacks on Bengal, Bombay, and Madras, and that a large Mahratta army was already on the move from Berar territory for the invasion of the Bengal provinces. In 1780 Hyder Ali desolated the Carnatic with an army of a hundred thousand men, but he was the only one of the three allies that kept to his engagement, and was eventually driven back by Sir Eyre Coote, one of the half-forgotten warriors of the eighteenth century. The Nizam did nothing; he probably waited to see what the others would do. The Mahrattas of Berar encamped in great force in the hills and jungles of Orissa, but only appear to have wanted a money present; and after wasting several months they were induced by Warren Hastings to return to Berar. No movement of any kind was undertaken against Bombay; and thus the strange confederation of Mohammedans and Mahrattas melted away.

Parliament interferes.

§13. The quarrels, the wars, and the irregularities of Warren Hastings induced the British Parliament to attempt radical changes. The antagonism between Philip Francis and Warren Hastings had led to a duel, in which Francis was wounded; and he returned to England to pour his bitter prejudices against Warren Hastings into the ears of Burke and Fox. The result was that a bitter animosity was excited, not only against Warren Hastings, but against the East India Company; and Parliament was called upon to decide whether the control of the administration of British India ought not to be transferred from the Court of Directors to the British Crown. The main question was one of patronage. The patronage of Indian appointments would render the Crown too powerful, as the elder Pitt had foreseen in the days of Clive; and George III. was already straining his royal prerogative over Parliament and Ministers to an extent which was exciting alarm.

Fox's India Bill, 1783.

In 1783, when the coalition ministry of Charles James Fox and Lord North was in power, Fox brought forward a bill for abolishing the Court of Directors, and transferring their authority and patronage to seven Commissioners nominated by Ministers. The bill was passed by the Commons, but George III. opposed it, and it was rejected by the Lords.

Pitt creates a board of control, 1784.

In 1784 William Pitt the younger brought in another bill, which left the Directors in full possession of their power and patronage, but brought them under the strict supervision of a Board of Control, consisting of six privy councillors nominated by the Crown. Henceforth the President of the Board of Control, who was always a member of the Cabinet, was the centre of all authority, and was strictly responsible to Parliament for the conduct of Indian affairs.

Trial of Warren Hastings.

§14. Warren Hastings returned to England in 1785 to find that the minds of Burke, Fox, and other leading statesmen had been poisoned against him by Philip Francis. Eventually he was impeached by the Commons and tried by the Lords in Westminster Hall. Hastings was certainly responsible for the Rohilla war, and also responsible for the execution of Nundcomar; but the crowning charge against him was that he had connived at the torture of the servants of the Oudh Begums by the Nawab Vizier of Oudh. The charge was painted in terrible colours by Sheridan, and it may be as well to sum up the actual facts.

Case of the Oudh Begums.

A Nawab Vizier of Oudh died in 1775, leaving treasure to the value of some two or three millions sterling in the public treasury at Lucknow. The son and successor of the deceased ruler naturally assumed possession on the ground that the money was state property; but his mother and grandmother, known as the two Begums, claimed it as private property, which the late Nawab Vizier had made over to them as a gift. Warren Hastings declined to interfere. Philip Francis, however, insisted that the British Government ought to interfere; and eventually the money was made over to the Begums on the condition that they paid some quarter of a million towards the State debt due to the East India Company.

Did Hastings connive at torture?

During the Mahratta war money was urgently required. The Nawab Vizier owed large arrears to the Company, but could not pay up unless he recovered possession of the State treasures. Philip Francis had returned to England. Accordingly Warren Hastings abandoned the Begums to the tender mercies of the Nawab Vizier, and connived at the imprisonment of their servants. It subsequently appeared that the Nawab Vizier tortured the servants until the money was surrendered, but there is no evidence to show that Warren Hastings connived at the torture.

Services of Hastings.

Warren Hastings was undoubtedly a man of great abilities and marvellous energy. His services to the East India Company, and to British interests in India, are beyond all calculation. But he was exposed to great temptation in times when public virtue was less exalted than it has been in the present generation, and he was hedged around with enemies who were spiteful and unscrupulous enough to misrepresent any and every transaction. His errors were those of his time, but his genius is stamped for ever on the history of British India. His misdeeds cannot be entirely overlooked, but he paid a bitter penalty. For many months he was threatened by the proceedings which culminated in his trial at Westminster Hall. Eventually he was acquitted of all charges, but his trial was protracted over seven long years and ruined his private fortunes and public career.

Merits as an administrator.

After the lapse of a hundred years, the flaws in the character of Warren Hastings may be condoned in consideration of his merits as an administrator. He found the Bengal provinces in chaos, and introduced light and order. He converted British traders into revenue collectors, magistrates, and judges, but he established Courts of Appeal to supervise their proceedings; and if his magistrates and judges had no legal training, they were at any rate Britons with a national sense of justice, and their decisions were infinitely better than those of Bengal zemindars, without law, or justice, or control. Warren Hastings kept a watchful eye on British interests as well as on the welfare of the people under his charge. He sent a mission to Tibet, which shows his anxiety for the extension of trade. He recorded a touching tribute to the memory of Augustus Cleveland, a young Bengal civilian who had done much to humanise and elevate the rude Sonthals of the Rajmahal hills, which sufficiently proves his sympathy with the well-being of the masses. Altogether, if Warren Hastings is not so free from blame as he is represented by his friends, he certainly was not so black as he has been painted by his enemies.

Lord Cornwallis, 1786-93.

§15. In 1786 Lord Cornwallis, an independent peer, was appointed Governor-General. This event marks a change in British rule. Lord Cornwallis was the first British peer, and the first Englishman not in the service of the East India Company, who was appointed to the post of Governor-General. He carried out two measures which have left their mark in history, namely, the perpetual settlement with the Bengal zemindars, and the reform of the judicial system.

Perpetual settlement.

The settlement with the Bengal zemindars was still awaiting a decision. Lord Cornwallis was anxious to arrange the land revenue of the Bengal provinces on English lines. He abandoned the yearly leases, and concluded leases for ten years, with the view of eventually declaring the settlement to be perpetual. Mr. John Shore, a Bengal civilian, pressed for a preliminary inquiry into the rights of the ryots, for the purpose of fixing the rents. But Lord Cornwallis was opposed to any further delay. In 1793 he proclaimed that the ten years settlement would be perpetual; that the tenant-rights of ryots would be left to future inquiry; and that henceforth the Bengal zemindars would be invested with the proprietary rights enjoyed by English landlords, so long as they paid the fixed yearly revenue to Government and respected all existing rights of ryots and cultivators.

Judicial reforms.

The judicial system introduced by Warren Hastings was modified by Lord Cornwallis. The British collector, as already seen, was also magistrate and civil judge. Lord Cornwallis decided that a collector ought to have no judicial duties under which he might be called on to adjudicate in revenue questions. Accordingly a regulation was passed under which the duties of revenue collector were separated from those of magistrate and judge, and the magistrate and judge was to be the head of the district, whilst the revenue collector was his subordinate. It is difficult to understand the merits of this measure. Since then the two offices have been sometimes united and sometimes separated. Eventually the two offices of magistrate and collector were united in the same person.

Non-intervention.

Four provincial Courts of Circuit and Appeal were created by Lord Cornwallis, and remained without alteration for a period of forty years. One Court was at Calcutta, a second at Dacca, a third at Murshedabad, and a fourth at Patna. Each Court consisted of three civilian judges and three Asiatic expounders of the law, namely, a Mohammedan cazi and mufti, and a Hindu pundit. The judges sat in their respective cities to hear appeals in civil cases; and they went twice a year on circuit to try the prisoners who had been committed by the district magistrates within their respective jurisdictions.

Munsifs and darogahs.

Lord Cornwallis also created a class of Hindu civil judges named munsifs, and a new body of Asiatic police under the name of darogahs. These changes are best dealt with in connection with modern reforms which will be brought under review in a future chapter.

First war against Tippu.

Lord Cornwallis was engaged in two campaigns against Tippu of Mysore, the son and successor of Hyder Ali. The war is a thing of the past. Tippu had invaded the territory of the Hindu Raja of Travancore, who was under British protection; and a triple alliance was formed against him as a common enemy by the British Government, the Peishwa of the Mahrattas, and the Nizam of Hyderabad. In the end Tippu was reduced to submission and compelled to cede half his territories, which were distributed amongst the three allies. The confederation, which only lasted to the end of the war, is memorable for suggesting the idea of maintaining the peace of India by a balance of power, which for a brief interval dazzled the imaginations of Anglo-Indian statesmen.¹⁵

Shore, 1793-98; abolition of "dharna."

In 1793 Lord Cornwallis was succeeded by Sir John Shore, the Bengal civilian who pressed Lord Cornwallis to settle the rights and rents of the ryots before proclaiming the perpetual settlement with the zemindars. He is better known by his later title of Lord Teignmouth. He was the first British ruler who suppressed a Hindu institution. He put a stop to "sitting in dharna," a Hindu usage which was subversive of all justice and all law. It was based on the superstitious belief that the life of a Brahman was as sacred as that of a sovereign, and that killing a Brahman, or being in any way implicated in his death, was the most hideous crime that could be committed by mortal man. Any Brahman might ruin a Hindu, either for private revenge or to avenge another, by sitting at his door and refusing to take food. The victim was as helpless as a bird under the fascination of a serpent. He dared not eat so long as the Brahman fasted. He dared not move lest the Brahman should injure himself or kill himself—a catastrophe which would doom the victim to excommunication in this life and perdition in the next. The terrors of this superstition were removed by a British regulation passed in 1797; and although "sitting in dharna" is still a crime under the Penal Code, the memory of the usage is passing away.¹⁶

Sir John Shore strictly adhered to the old policy of non-intervention, which amounted to political isolation. Meanwhile the Mahratta powers united to demand enormous arrears of chout from the Nizam; and the Nizam was utterly defeated, prostrated and paralysed. All hope of a balance of power for the maintenance of the peace of India was thus cast to the winds. Finally, as if to show beyond all question the absurdity of the idea, the Mahratta powers were at war with each other for the mastery at Poona. Such was the state of affairs in 1798 when Lord Mornington, better known by his later title of Marquis of Wellesley, succeeded Sir John Shore as Governor-General, boasting, as he left Europe, that he was going to govern India from a throne with the sceptre of a statesman, and not from behind a counter with the yard measure of a trader.

CHAPTER III.—THIRD PERIOD: IMPERIAL GOVERNMENT.—1798-1836

§1 Lord Mornington (Marquis of Wellesley), 1798-1805: last war against Tippu, 1799. §2. Carnatic confiscated and annexed to Madras Presidency. §3. Wellesley's scheme of a paramount power. §4. Second Mahratta war: successes of Arthur Wellesley and Lake. §5. Disastrous war with Holkar. §6. Return to non-intervention. §7. Sepoy mutiny in Madras army. §8. Lord Minto, 1807-13: wars and alliances against France. §9. Evils of non-intervention in Rajputana: troubles in Nipal. §10. Lord Moira (Marquis of Hastings), 1813-23: war with Nipal, 1814-15. §11. Revival of the paramount power: Pindhari and Mahratta wars, 1817-18. §12. Lord Amherst, 1823-28: wars with Burma and Bhurtpore. §13. Lord William Bentinck, 1828-35; abolition of Suttee. §14. Suppression of Thugs. §15. Administrative reforms. §16. North-West Provinces: Joint Village Proprietors. §17. Madras and Bombay Presidencies: Ryotwari Settlements. §18. Changes under the Charter of 1833. §18. Sir Charles Metcalfe, 1835-36.

French menaces, 1798.

In 1798 British India was confronted on all sides by France or Frenchmen. An army of sepoys, drilled and commanded by French officers, was maintained by the Nizam in the Deccan. Another French officered army was maintained by Sindia in Western Hindustan, between the Jumna and the Ganges. Napoleon Buonaparte was invading Egypt, and threatening to conquer the world.

Asiatic aspirations of Napoleon.

The successes and crimes of the French Revolution had filled Europe with indignation and despair. Napoleon Buonaparte had risen, like another Chenghiz Khan or Timour, to take the world by storm. He had driven the British from Toulon, conquered Italy, wrested the Netherlands from Austria, threatened to invade the British Isles, and then had landed in Egypt, won the battle of the Pyramids, and proclaimed himself to be a follower of the Prophet. Not a man in Europe or Asia could penetrate the designs of the young Corsican. Alexander of Macedon had invaded Egypt as a prelude to the conquest of Persia and India. Napoleon might follow in his footsteps after the lapse of twenty-two centuries. He might restore the Caliphat of Bagdad on the banks of the Tigris, or resuscitate the sovereignty of the Great Mogul over Northern India, from the banks of the Indus to the mouths of the Ganges.

Tippu's alliance with France.

§1. The first duty of Lord Mornington was to get rid of the French sepoy battalions in the Deccan and Hindustan, and to provide for the defence of India against France and Napoleon. Within three weeks of his landing at Calcutta the note of alarm was sounded in Southern India. Tippu, Sultan of Mysore, had formed a hostile alliance with France against Great Britain. It appeared that Tippu had been groaning under his humiliation by Lord Cornwallis, and burning to be revenged on the British government. He hesitated to ally himself with the Mahrattas or the Nizam, and coveted an alliance with a European power. Accordingly he secretly sent emissaries to the French governor of Mauritius, to conclude a treaty with France and Napoleon against Great Britain. The idea fired the imagination of the French at Mauritius, and the fact of the treaty was published in the Mauritius Gazette, and republished in the Calcutta newspapers for the edification of the new Governor-General.

Explanations demanded.

Lord Mornington naturally concluded that Tippu was in collusion with Napoleon, and that a French fleet might soon be sailing from Egypt down the Red Sea to help Tippu in the invasion of the Carnatic, or to help Sindia to restore the supremacy of the Great Mogul over Oudh and Bengal. In the first instance he called upon Tippu for an explanation, and proposed to send an envoy to Seringapatam to arrange for a better understanding between the two governments.

Tippu dumbfoundered.

Meanwhile Tippu was amazed and bewildered. To have his secret designs suddenly published in successive newspapers, and then to be called upon for an explanation, seems to have stupefied him. He replied that the French were liars, and refused to receive an envoy from Lord Mornington. To have overlooked the offence would have been sheer madness. Accordingly Lord Mornington determined to revive the old alliance with the Nizam and the Mahrattas against Tippu; and meanwhile to get rid of the French sepoy battalions.

French battalions disbanded at Hyderabad.

The Nizam welcomed a British alliance as offering a means of escape from the crushing demands of the Mahrattas. He was glad enough for the British to disband his French sepoy battalions, which drained his resources, and were threatening to mutiny for arrears of pay. A British force was moved to Hyderabad, the disbandment was proclaimed, and a battle was expected. Suddenly, the French sepoys raised an uproar, and the French officers rushed into the British lines for protection. It was the old Asiatic story of mutiny for want of pay, and when the British advanced the money, the sepoys went away rejoicing, and the French officers were thankful for their deliverance.

Mahrattas evade a British alliance.

Lord Mornington next began his negotiations with the Mahrattas, but they raised up a host of difficulties. The Peishwa at Poona was a young Brahman, sharp and suspicious. He was jealous of the British alliance with the Nizam, which boded no good as regarded future payments of chout, but he was anxious to keep on good terms with the British. Accordingly he promised to send a contingent to join the British in the war against Tippu, but at heart he had no intention of doing anything of the kind. With him an alliance with the Christian or the Mohammedan was a mere question of money. He was anxious to sell his alliance to the highest bidder. Accordingly he entertained Tippu's envoys at Poona in the hope that the Sultan might eventually offer higher terms than the British for the services of a Mahratta army.

Destruction of Tippu, 1799.

In 1799 Lord Mornington began the war against Mysore. A British army from Madras, under the command of General Harris, invaded it from the east, whilst another force from Bombay invaded it from the west. The two armies soon closed round Tippu. He saw that he was environed by his enemies, and that resistance was hopeless. He sued for terms, but was told to cede the half of his remaining dominions and pay up two millions sterling. He refused to surrender on such crushing conditions, and retired to his fortress at Seringapatam, resolved to die sword in hand rather than become a servant or a pensioner. In May, 1799, Seringapatam was taken by storm, and the dead body of Tippu was found in the gateway.

Cruelty of Tippu.

The fate of Tippu might have been regretted but for his cruel treatment of British prisoners in former wars. At Bangalore, British captives were chained together, starved, threatened, and tormented until some were driven to become Mohammedans. The consequence was, that during the advance on Seringapatam British soldiers were burning for revenge, and Sir David Baird, one of the greatest sufferers, begged for the command of the storming party as a relief to his outraged feelings. When the war was over, the death and downfall of the tyrant was celebrated in songs which were reverberated from India to the British Isles, and the old strains are still lingering in the memories of some who are yet living.¹⁷

Hindu Raj restored.

Lord Mornington annexed part of Mysore territory to the Madras Presidency, and gave another share to the Nizam; and he proposed, as will be seen hereafter, to give a third share to the Mahrattas; but he converted the remainder into a Hindu kingdom. Accordingly an infant scion of the Hindu Raja, who had been deposed by Hyder Ali some forty years previously, was placed on the throne of Mysore in charge of a British Resident and a Brahman Minister until he should attain his majority. The subsequent career of the Raja will be brought under review hereafter.

Annexation of the Carnatic.

§2. Soon after the capture of Seringapatam a clandestine correspondence was discovered in the palace between the Nawab of the Carnatic and the deceased Tippu. The treachery was undeniable. At the same time the discovery enabled the British to get rid of a dynasty that had oppressed the people and intrigued with the enemies of the East India Company for half a century. Nawab Mohammed Ali, whom the British had placed on the throne of the Carnatic in opposition to the French, had died in 1795. His son and successor had followed in the steps of his father, but no complaints reached him, for he was smitten with mortal disease. Lord Mornington, now Marquis of Wellesley, waited for his death, and then told the family that their rule was over. The title of Nawab was preserved, and pensions were liberally provided, but the Carnatic was incorporated with the Madras Presidency, and brought under British administration like the Bengal provinces.

Scandals of Nawab rule.

The annexation of the Carnatic delivered Madras from a host of scandals which had been accumulating for some forty years. The old Nawab had removed from Arcot to Madras, and carried on costly intrigues with the Company's servants in India, and with influential persons in the British Isles, in the hope of getting the revenues into his own hands, and leaving the East India Company to defend his territories out of their own resources. He loaded himself with debt by bribing his supporters with pretended loans, which existed only on paper, bore exorbitant interest, and were eventually charged on the public revenue. All this while, he and his officials were obstructing British operations in the field by withholding supplies, or treacherously informing the enemy of the movements of the British army. Since the annexation of the Carnatic in 1801 all these evils have passed into oblivion, and the public peace has remained undisturbed.

Wellesley's political system.

§3. The war with Tippu taught Lord Wellesley that it was impossible to trust the Mahrattas. They would not join the British government against a common enemy unless paid to do so; and they were always ready to go over to the enemy on the same terms. Accordingly Lord Wellesley proposed to maintain the peace of India, not by a balance of power, but by becoming the sovereign head of a league for the prevention of all future wars.

Subsidiary alliances.

With these views Lord Wellesley proposed that neither the Nizam nor the Mahrattas should take any French officers into their pay for the future; that neither should engage in any war or negotiation without the consent of the British government; and that each should maintain a subsidiary force of sepoys, drilled and commanded by British officers, which should be at the disposal of the British government for the maintenance of the peace of India.

Nizam accepts.

The Nizam accepted the subsidiary alliance. He provided for the maintenance of a Hyderabad Subsidiary Force by ceding to the British government all the territories which he had received on account of the Mysore wars. By this arrangement all money transactions were avoided, and the subsidiary force was paid out of the revenues of the ceded districts.

Mahrattas refuse.

The Mahratta rulers utterly refused to accept subsidiary alliances in any shape or form. They did not want British protection, and they would not permit any interference by mediation or otherwise with their claims for chout against the Nizam. The Peishwa would not maintain a subsidiary force, but he was willing to take British battalions of sepoys into his pay, provided he might employ them against Sindia or any other refractory feudatory. He would not pledge himself to abstain from all wars or negotiations without the consent of the British government. He was willing to help the British in a war with France, but he would not dismiss the Frenchmen in his service.

Sindia refuses British alliance against Afghans.

Sindia was still more obstinate and contemptuous. Mahadaji Sindia was dead. His successor, Daulat Rao Sindia, was a young man of nineteen, but already the irresponsible ruler of a large dominion in Western Hindustan. He was all-powerful at Delhi, and was bent upon being equally all-powerful at Poona. He collected chout from the princes of Rajputana, and, with the help of his French-officered battalions of sepoys, he had established a supremacy over the valleys of the Jumna and Ganges from the banks of the Sutlej to the frontier of Oudh at Cawnpore. Lord Wellesley would not venture to offer a subsidiary alliance to a prince so puffed up with pride as young Sindia. The Afghans, however, were threatening to invade India, and Lord Wellesley invited Sindia to join in an alliance against the Afghans. But Sindia would not hamper himself with a British alliance. He was not afraid of the Afghans. At any rate he waited for the Afghans to appear before taking any steps to prevent their coming.

British fears of France and Russia.

Lord Wellesley was not afraid of Afghans alone, but of French or Russians, who might make their way through Persia, join the Afghans, resuscitate the Great Mogul, and establish a European empire in his name as the rightful representative of Aurangzeb. Accordingly Lord Wellesley sent the once famous Sir John Malcolm on a mission to Persia to persuade the Shah to bar out the French and prevent the Afghans from invading India. Meanwhile, he anxiously waited some turn in Mahratta affairs which would bring their rulers into a more compliant mood towards the British government.

Provinces taken from Oudh.

Lord Wellesley, however, determined that the Nawab Vizier of Oudh should contribute something further towards the defence of India against invasion. The Nawab Vizier maintained a rabble army that was costly and useless, and he depended entirely on British troops for his defence against Afghans and Mahrattas. He was urged to disband his rabble army and replace it by battalions of sepoys trained and commanded by British officers; but he was impracticable, and Lord Wellesley got over the difficulty by taking half his territory for the maintenance of the required battalions. This was an arbitrary proceeding, but it was justified on the score of state necessity and self-preservation. It pushed the British frontier westward to Cawnpore on the Ganges, where it was close to Sindia and his French sepoy battalions, and would be face to face with any foreign invasion from the north-west. The new territories were called "ceded provinces," and eventually were incorporated with what are now known as the North-West Provinces.¹⁸