INVASION BY THE MAHRATTAS. 49 



dignity, shut and barricaded the doors of the house in which 

 he was confined, set fire to it, and before the flames could 

 be extinguished, he had perished. Several of his attend- 

 ants are said to have thrown themselves into the burning 

 mansion, and suffered the same fate. A conquest achieved 

 by such deeds of violence soon excited a fierce rebellion, 

 which was suppressed only by severe executions, and by 

 the transportation of a great number of the people to a re- 

 mote quarter of the Mysorean dominions. 



These rapid successes, and the additional resources de- 

 rived from them, alarmed the great powers of Southern 

 India. Nizam AH, Subahdar of the Deccan, and Madoo 

 Rao, the Mahratta commander, united in a confederacy to 

 crush the assailant ; and the English agreed to place an 

 auxiliary force at the disposal of the former, with the vague 

 commission " to settle the affairs of his government in every 

 thing that is right and proper." It was distinctly under- 

 stood that, they were to co-operate in the invasion of My- 

 sore ; and Colonel Smith proceeded to Hydrabad to arrange 

 measures for that purpose. This seems to have been a very 

 doubtful policy, when the Mahrattas alone were fully equal 

 to contend with Hyder ; so that the two parties might have 

 been advantageously left to weaken each other by mutual 

 warfare ; whereas the aggrandizement of one by the down- 

 fall of the other tended directly to overthrow the balance 

 of power. 



The three allied armies began to move early in 1767, but 

 in a straggling and ill-combined manner. A month before 

 the two others Madoo Rao had covered with clouds of cav- 

 alry the high plains of Mysore. His force alone was more 

 than Hyder dared to encounter in the field. The latter en- 

 deavoured to pursue a desultory mode of defence, causing 

 the grain to be buried, the wells to be poisoned, the forage 

 to be consumed, and the cattle to be driven away. Every 

 expedient proved unavailing to stop the progress of these 

 rapid and skilful marauders ; their horses fed on the roots 

 of grass; by thrusting iron rods into the earth they discov 

 ered from the sound, the resistance, and even from the smell, 

 the places where grain was deposited ; while the cattle, to 

 whatever spot they could be removed, were traced out and 

 seized. The Mysorean leader, finding them already in the 

 heart of his dominions, where he had no means of arresting 



Vol. II.— E 



