"You are mistaken," said Mr. Merriman, in the course of a conversation one day. "The natives are a terrible thorn in our side. At best we are in Bengal on sufferance; we are a very small community--only a hundred or two Europeans in Calcutta: and since the Marathas overran the country some years ago we have felt as though sitting on the brink of a volcano. Alivirdi wants to keep us down; he has forbidden us to fight the French even if war does break out between us at home; and though the Mogul has granted us charters--they call them firmans here--Alivirdi doesn’t care a rap for things of that sort, and won’t be satisfied until he has us under his heel. Only his trading profits and his fear of the Mogul have kept him civil." "But you said he was dying." "So he is, and that makes matters worse, for his grandson, Siraj-uddaula, who’ll probably succeed him, is no better than a tiger. He lives at Murshidabad, about 100 miles up the river. He’s a vain, peacocky, empty-headed youth, and as soon as the breath is out of his grandad’s body he’ll want to try his wings and take a peck or two at us. He may do it slyly, or go so far as to attack us openly." "But if he did that, sure Calcutta is defended; and, as Mr. Clive said to me in Gheria, British soldiers behind walls might hold out for ever." "Clive doesn’t know Calcutta then! That’s the mischief! At the Maratha invasion the Bengalis on our territory took fright, and at their own expense began a great ditch round Calcutta--we call it the Maratha ditch; but the Nawab bought the Marathas off, the work was stopped, the walls of the fort are now crumbling to ruins, and the cannon lie about unmounted and useless. Worst of all, our governor, Mr. Drake, is a quiet soul, an excellent worthy man, who wouldn’t hurt a fly. We call him the Quaker. Quakers are all very well at home, where they can ’thee’ and ’thou’ and get rich and pocket affronts without any harm; but they won’t do in India. Might is right with the natives; they don’t understand anything else; and as sure as they see any sign of weakness in us they’ll take advantage of it and send us all to kingdom come. And I’m thinking of the women folk: India’s no place for them at the best; and I did all I could to persuade my wife and daughter to remain at home. But they would come out with me when I returned last year; and glad as I am to have them with me I sometimes get very anxious; I can’t bear them out of my sight, and that’s a fact."