lonel Maxzvell, about eleven at night. In an inftant the whole
B lue L ights, environs were illuminated by the blue lights fufpended from
the ramparts, as cuftomary with the Indians. The material
ttfed by them is no other than the antient Naptha, remarkable
for its extreme inflammability. The antients had two forts, the
white and the black*, both liquid, and were ufed in lamps.
Every fortified place in Hindoajlan. has its walls befet with
branched irons ready to receive the pendent lights, which give
an uncommon degree of fplendor. They might ferve to illuminate
the infernal council-chamber, or to facilitate a midnight
flaughter. How completely does the effeit anfwer to the fine
defcription given by Milton o f the illumination of the Pandemonium,
to which the horrors of the night o f afiault might, by
the caufe, give to the fimile greater aptnefs.
From the high walls.
Pendent by fubtile magic, many a row
Of ftarry lamps and blazing creflets, fed
With Naptha and AJphaltus, yielding light
As from a iky !
T he thunder o f the artillery, the noile of the mufquetry,
the fanguinary ihouts of the aflailants, and the groans and
Ihrieks of the dying, added horrors to the terrible fcene. The
garrifon fled from the mercilefs foldiery, and part choaking up
the paflage o f the oppofite gate, left multitudes like a herd o f
timorous goats or flocks expofed to refiftlefs carnage. The
• Strabo, lib, xvi. p. 1078. Alfo Plin. Nat, Hill. lib. ii. c. 105.
veteran
veteran governor alone flood by his colors when transfixed by
a thoufand bayonets, he fell as glorioufly as an old Roman, or
the immortalized Velafquez, wrapped in the ftandard he died to
defend. The Marquis Cornwallis fent to Tippoo the offer o f the
honored remains to be interred, Tippoo nobly replied, that to
an old foldier no place could be found fo fit as that on which
he breathed his laft. The interment was accordingly performed
by the Muffelmen after their own rites.
Both Pettah and fort Were taken in the face o f a powerful
army, commanded by ‘Tippoo in perfon. He made fome fruitlefs
attempts to relieve them. The importance to us was of the firft
rate : it became the depot of ffores and provifions, a hofpital for
the lick or wounded, and the place through which our reinforcements
of every kind from the Carnatic were to arrive ; and as
it happened unforefeen, became the head quarters during the
monfoon, after our inevitable retreat from Seringapatam. The
fuccefs at Bangalore infpirited our friends, and deprefled the
mind o f the enemy; and, according to perhaps the cuftom o f
even European nations, occafioned great defection from the
neighboring chieftains, who, in India particularly, feldom adhere
long to the declining fide. The Polygars efpecially, who,
having no more to fear from the tyrant, poured in fupplies
to our army from every part *.
Bangalore lies, the neareft way, only eighty miles from Seringapatam,
Tippoo's capital; the fall of which was to terminate
all our labors : but the march towards it was inevitably delayed
Mr. Home.
for