The Court of Directors, however, must be excepted, for in their warrant (17th June, 1748) they direct that “no Indian, black, or person of a mixed breed, nor any Roman Catholic, of what nation soever, shall, on any pretence, be admitted to set foot in the laboratory, or any of the military magazines, either out of curiosity, or to be employed in them, or to come near them, so as to see what is doing or contained therein.” And to such an extent did this fear then carry them, that another paragraph runs: “And if any person belonging to the company of artillery marry a Roman Catholic, or his wife become a Roman Catholic after marriage, such person shall immediately be dismissed from the company of artillery, and be obliged to serve the remainder of his time in one of the other companies, or be removed to another of the Company’s settlements, to serve it out there, if the Council think fit,” &c. And again, in their military letter to Bombay (6th April, 1770), they say: “As it is very essential that the natives should be kept as ignorant as possible, both of the theory and practice of the artillery branch of the art of war, we esteem it a very pernicious practice to employ the people of the country in working the guns; and, if such practice is in use with you, we direct that in future you attach European artillerymen to the service of the guns which may belong to sipahi corps, and that no native be trusted with any part of this important service, unless absolute necessity should require it.” With these views it is not to be wondered at that the Home Government should have directed the golundaz to be reduced; but Indian experience might even then have taught that no more dangerous ally can be found for a native army than a large and imperfectly-equipped artillery. A native power will hardly bear the heavy _continued_ expense required to keep it efficient; or, if the state should supply the means, the want of integrity in its agents will divert them from their proper course; and consequently, in the hour of emergency, the army is forced to fight a pitched battle to protect the unwieldy train of cannon, which becomes an incumbrance instead of a support: so it had been at Plassey and Buxar, and so it has been in every general action since. Assye, Argaum, Laswaree, Mahidpoor, would have been avoided, had there been no artillery in the native armies; unencumbered, they could have evaded the British; but the necessity of protecting their trains, and, perhaps, the confidence which their presence inspired, induced them to try the result of a battle. Instead of discouraging native powers from organizing large parks of artillery, our policy should have been the reverse, resting confident that native parsimony and dishonesty would insure inefficiency in that branch.