It is perhaps justice to the guilty and unhappy Middlemas to suppose,
that if the agency of a British officer had been employed, he might have
been induced to throw himself on his mercy, might have explained the
whole of his nefarious bargain with Tippoo, and, renouncing his guilty
projects of ambition, might have turned his whole thoughts upon saving
Menie Gray, ere she was transported beyond the reach of British
protection. But the thin dusky form which stood before him, wrapped in
robes of muslin embroidered with gold, was that of Paupiah, known as a
master-counsellor of dark projects, an Oriental Machiavel, whose
premature wrinkles were the result of many an intrigue, in which the
existence of the poor, the happiness of the rich, the honour of men, and
the chastity of women, had been sacrificed without scruple, to attain
some private or political advantage. He did not even enquire by what
means the renegade Briton proposed to acquire that influence with Tippoo
which might enable him to betray him--he only desired to be assured that
the fact was real.
"You speak at the risk of your head, if you deceive Paupiah, or make
Paupiah the means of deceiving his master. I know, so does all Madras,
that the Nawaub has placed his young son, Tippoo, as Vice-Regent of his
newly-conquered territory of Bangalore, which Hyder hath lately added to
his dominions. But that Tippoo should bestow the government of that
important place on an apostate Feringi, seems more doubtful.
Pages:
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229