Buckingham returned to Egypt and occupied himself with making a chart of the Red Sea. But the Anglo-Egyptian merchants, not relishing their defeat by the East India Company, entered into a compact with Mahomet Ali to send Buckingham to India as his envoy and representative; and as such the Company could not refuse to allow him to reside there. Accordingly, habited as a Mussulman, turbaned and long-robed, with his speaking eye, jovial face, and dark, flowing beard, he looked every inch of him a true-born Oriental, and his extraordinary knowledge of various languages stood him in good stead as he made his way overland to India, by Palestine and Bagdad. Proceeding still on his course, he entered Persia, crossed the chain of the Zagros, and embarked at Bushir in a man-of-war of the East India Company that was bound on an expedition against some Wahabee pirates in the Persian Gulf, and going ashore at Ras el Khyma, acted as interpreter to Captain Brydges, Commander of the Squadron, assisted in bombarding the town, and then proceeded to Bombay, which he reached after a journey of twelve months. But his mission was again unsuccessful; either the Bombay merchants had no confidence in the Egyptian Government, or they were jealous of any interference with their own line of trade. Now, however, the Company's licence reached him, authorizing him to remain in their territories, and he regained the appointment to the vessel _Humayoon Shah_, in the service of the Imaum of Muscat, and he remained navigating the Eastern waters till Midsummer, 1818, when, having received commands from the Imaum to proceed to the coast of Zanzibar, on a slaving expedition, he threw up his engagement, worth £4000 per annum, rather than be implicated in such a nefarious trade. Buckingham next became proprietor and editor of the _Calcutta Mirror_, a Liberal paper, that instantly obtained an extensive sale, and brought in to its founder a net profit of £8000 a year. But his resolute advocacy of Free Trade, free settlement, and free Press, and an exposure of the misdoings of the East India Company, brought down on him the heavy hand of Mr. John Adams, the temporary Governor-General. His paper was suppressed, and he was ordered to quit Calcutta. His little fortune was sacrificed in a vain attempt to fight the Governor and the Company, and he was thrown back on the world, almost as poor, save in experience, as when a youth he trudged from Corunna to Lisbon. He left his magnificent library at Calcutta, in the hopes of being able to return, after having obtained redress at home. But the redress he hoped for never came. Too many interests were involved to accord it to him, and his library, like his fortune and his hopes, was wrecked.