It has pulled them every one from their thrones, or has left them there the contemptible puppets of a power that works its arbitrary will through them. But friendship or enmity, the result has been eventually the same to them. If they resisted alliance with the encroaching English, they were soon charged with evil intentions, fallen upon, and conquered; if they acquiesced in the proffered alliance, they soon became ensnared in those webs of diplomacy from which they never escaped, without the loss of all honour and hereditary dominion—of every thing, indeed, but the lot of prisoners where they had been kings. The first step in the English friendship with the native princes, has generally been to assist them against their neighbours with troops, or to locate troops with them to protect them from aggression. For these services such enormous recompense was stipulated for, that the unwary princes, entrapped by their fears of their native foes rather than of their pretended friends, soon found that they were utterly unable to discharge them. Dreadful exactions were made on their subjects, but in vain. Whole provinces, or the revenues of them, were soon obliged to be made over to their grasping _friends_; but they did not suffice for their demands. In order to pay them their debts or their interest, the princes were obliged to borrow large sums at an extravagant rate. These sums were eagerly advanced by the English in their private and individual capacities, and securities again taken on lands or revenues. At every step the unhappy princes became more and more embarrassed, and as the embarrassment increased, the claims of the Company became proportionably pressing. In the technical phraseology of money-lenders, “the screw was then turned,” till there was no longer any enduring it. The unfortunate princes felt themselves, instead of being relieved by their artful friends, actually introduced by them into Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace And rest can never dwell; hope never comes That comes to all; but torture without end Still urges. To escape it, there became no alternative but to throw themselves entirely upon the mercy of their inexorable creditors, or to break out into armed resistance. In the one case they found themselves speedily stripped of every vestige of their power—their revenues and management of their territories given over to these creditors, which still never were enough to liquidate their monstrous and growing demands; so that the next proposition was that they should entirely cede their territories, and become pensioners on their usurpers. In the other case, they were at once declared perfidious and swindling,—no faith was to be kept with them,—they were assaulted by the irresistible arms of their oppressors, and inevitably destroyed or deposed.