176 PINDAREE WAR. 



The Patan and other Mohammedan troops, who, m the 

 wreck of all the thrones occupied by their countrymen, had 

 no longer a sovereign in whose service to fight, afforded 

 another source whence predatory squadrons were formed 

 and recruited. Most of them rallied round Ameer Khan, a 

 bold and enterprising chief, who in the last war had fought 

 under the banner of Holkar. He still retained his allegiance 

 to that house, and attempted to direct its councils ; but his 

 chief object was, with his chosen band of about 12,000 horse 

 and 200 pieces of artillery, to overawe and extort contributions 

 from the Rajpoot and other petty states in this part of India. 

 Though equally destitute of fixed possessions, and as much 

 devoted to plunder as the Pindarees, he acted more sys- 

 tematically, and aimed at the attainment of political influ- 

 ence ; yet, in Sir John Malcolm's opinion, the Mohammed- 

 ans, from their tendency to sink into indolence and luxury, 

 are less to be dreaded than the Hindoos, who, though they 

 yield for the moment, pursue their object, on the whole, with 

 unwearied perseverance. 



Though Ameer Khan formed a power distinct from the 

 Pindarees, he easily attracted large bodies of them to any 

 enterprise which promised to gratify their appetite for plun- 

 der. Such was the expedition which, in 1809, he under- 

 took against Berar, then governed by an effeminate and un- 

 warlike sovereign. He would have succeeded in subverting 

 that monarchy, had not Lord Minto wisely departed from 

 his strictly defensive system. A strong detachment under 

 Colonel Close was despatched into the territory of Nagpore, 

 which, it was notified to Ameer Khan, was under British 

 protection. That chief made a blustering and indignant 

 reply, but was soon, by different circumstances, compelled 

 to retreat into Malwa ; and the governor-general, on further 

 consideration, gave up the design which he had once enter- 

 tained, of crushing this turbulent and ambitious marauder. 

 The arrangements with the peishwa, meantime, pro- 

 ceeded also in a very unsatisfactory manner. That prince 

 began, indeed, by courting the English, and even soliciting 

 the continuance of their subsidiary force in his territories ; 

 but his object was to regain the control, which he had almost 

 entirely lost, over his dominions. Besides the provinces 

 possessed by Sindia and other independent princes, nume- 

 rous districts, especially in the south, had been parcelled out 



