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the field, are in a constant state of exertion and hostility with 

 their convenience. This is a point of view in which the military 

 character of this nation merits a particular comparison with the 

 indulgence and luxury of European armies in India. 



The safety of the Mahratta camp is to be attributed to the 

 number of their cavalry, hovering round in every direction, rather 

 than to any of the precautionary measures of trenches, posts, and 

 guards, systematically used in European armies; they have in- 

 deed at night patrols of horse, called shabeena, sent out in dif- 

 ferent directions, but their ample equipment, at least of the 

 host with which I marched, and of which I now write, en- 

 abled them always to keep a large army, under the denomina- 

 tion of harole, or van-guard, in advance; and when they ap- 

 proached the enemy, to divide that again by an advance named 

 toage jereede, which signifies the unincumbered army; and it is 

 literally so, having seldom a tent belonging to it, every thing, ex- 

 cept the immediate apparatus for service, being left at a conve- 

 nient distance, and under a very slender guard, on what they call 

 beheer, or boonga, the baggage-camp; so that, at the time of battle 

 with the Nizam, the Mahratta army consisted of three camps, the 

 peshwa's, or head-quarters, being upwards of twenty miles in the 

 rear of the toage jereede, whose beheer was between both. 



It will be readily understood, that while this division of force, 

 both in marching and encamping, opens a field of great ad- 

 vantage to an active enemy, provided with cavalry, an army of in- 

 fantry, or one much inferior in cavalry, can avail themselves of it 

 very little ; as their camp must be, in a manner, constantly block- 

 aded by the numerous troops of the enemy, so as to prevent the 



