"Marryat," he said, "I must send you back, with two hundred men, to Madras. The governor there has been writing to me, by every ship which has come up the coast, begging me to move down with the bulk of the force, as soon as affairs are a little settled here. That is out of the question. There are innumerable matters to be arranged. Meer Jaffier must be sustained. The French under Law must be driven entirely out of Bengal. The Dutch must be dealt with. Altogether, I have need of every moment of my time, and of every man under my orders, for at least two years. "However, I shall at once raise a Bengal native army, and so release the Sepoys of Madras. If there be any special and sore need, I must, of course, denude myself here of troops, to succour Madras; but I hope it will not come to that. In the meantime, I propose that you shall take back two hundred of the Madras Europeans. Lawrence will be glad to have you, and your chances of fighting are greater there than they will be here. Bengal is overawed, and so long as I maintain the force I now have, it is unlikely in the extreme to rise; whereas battles and sieges, great and small, are the normal condition of Madras." The next day Charlie, with two hundred European troops, marched down towards Calcutta. Clive had told him to select any officer he pleased to accompany him, as second in command; and he chose Peters, who, seeing that there were likely to be far more exciting times in Madras than in Bengal at present, was very glad to accompany him. Three days after reaching Calcutta, Charlie and his party embarked on board a ship, which conveyed them without adventure to Madras. The authorities were glad, indeed, of the reinforcement; for the country was disturbed from end to end. Since the departure of every available man for Calcutta, the Company had been able to afford but little aid to Muhammud Ali, and the authority of the latter had dwindled to a mere shadow, in the Carnatic. The Mahrattas made incursions in all directions. The minor chiefs revolted and refused to pay tribute, and many of them entered into alliance with the French. Disorder everywhere reigned in the Carnatic, and Trichinopoli was, again, the one place which Muhammud Ali held. The evening after landing, Charlie Marryat had a long chat with Colonel Lawrence; who, after explaining to him exactly the condition of affairs in the country, asked him to tell him, frankly, what command he would like to receive.