The opposition which the officers offered to the reduction of their allowances, was in some measure countenanced by the local Government, which had evaded the execution of the orders issued by the Directors for the abolition of double batta. Nor is it very surprising, that the officers should have heedlessly rushed on the extreme measure of resigning their commissions, when we advert to the encouragement which their combination had received from an officer of the rank and reputation of Sir Robert Fletcher; and to the sympathy and support which had been expressed and afforded by the civilians, among whom were some who held confidential situations under the Government, and others who were believed to have great influence in England: these persons were, as well as the military, discontented with the revisions and reductions which Lord Clive had adopted. Under these circumstances, and under the impression that their services could not be dispensed with, at a time when the country was not only unsettled, but threatened with invasion by a large Mahratta army, the officers felt confident that the Governor must have yielded to their demands. But in thus judging, they appear to have little understood the character of him with whom they had to contend; and when they were met, not only with an unyielding spirit, but treated at once as criminals, and every measure adopted for their punishment, they fell without a struggle. They had prepared no means to go beyond their first act; and this, though it was by some brought forward as a proof of want of forethought and weakness, was, in fact, a proof of their innocence of any deliberate intention to injure the interests of their country: though, but for the overruling genius of Clive, the most fatal injury would assuredly have been the consequence of the success of their guilty combination; for, had they succeeded, the civil Government would have lost all respect, and the usurpation of the public authority, by a combination of officers, would have given an example to their men which, if followed, would have been alike destructive of all discipline, and have terminated in the subversion of the English government in Bengal. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 1: This account is an abstract of a narrative of the mutiny, written by the late Sir Henry Strachey, and which forms Appendix 1st to the 9th Report of the Committee of Secresy of the House of Commons, A.D. 1773.] [Footnote 2: Vide Ibid. Appendix, No. 1. a. fo. 699.] [Footnote 3: The Court's orders for this reduction, dated the 11th of June, 1764, are very positive and peremptory.] [Footnote 4: The order was expected some time before it was issued.] [Footnote 5: Vide 9th Rep. of Com. of Secresy, App. No. 1. fo. 699. This remonstrance sets forth the high rates of supplies at a distance from the coast, objections of servants to act except in one capacity, and various expenses and hardships entailed by their situation, and aggravated by the reduction of allowances.]