While he reformed the civil service and established his authority over the army, he was equally successful in his foreign policy.  His landing on Indian ground was the signal for immediate peace.  The Nabob of Oude, with a large army, lay at that time on the frontier of Bahar.  He had been joined by many Afghans and Mahrattas, and there was no small reason to expect a general coalition of all the native powers against the English.  But the name of Clive quelled in an instant all opposition.  The enemy implored peace in the humblest language, and submitted to such terms as the new governor chose to dictate.

At the same time, the Government of Bengal was placed on a new footing.  The power of the English in that province had hitherto been altogether undefined.  It was unknown to the ancient constitution of the empire, and it had been ascertained by no compact.  It resembled the power which, in the last decrepitude of the Western Empire, was exercised over Italy by the great chiefs of foreign mercenaries, the Ricimers and the Odoacers, who put up and pulled down at their pleasure a succession of insignificant princes, dignified with the names of Caesar and Augustus.  But as in Italy, so in India, the warlike strangers at length found it expedient to give to a domination which had been established by arms the sanction of law and ancient prescription.  Theodoric thought it politic to obtain from the distant Court of Byzantium a commission appointing him ruler of Italy; and Clive, in the same manner, applied to the Court of Delhi for a formal grant of the powers of which he already possessed the reality.  The Mogul was absolutely helpless; and, though he murmured, had reason to be well pleased that the English were disposed to give solid rupees, which he never could have extorted from them, in exchange for a few Persian characters which cost him nothing.  A bargain was speedily struck; and the titular sovereign of Hindostan issued a warrant, empowering the Company to collect and administer the revenues of Bengal, Orissa, and Bahar.

There was still a Nabob, who stood to the British authorities in the same relation in which the last drivelling Chilperics and Childerics of the Merovingian line stood to their able and vigorous Mayors of the Palace, to Charles Martel, and to Pepin.  At one time Clive had almost made up his mind to discard this phantom altogether; but he afterwards thought that it might be convenient still to use the name of the Nabob, particularly in dealings with other European nations.  The French, the Dutch, and the Danes, would, he conceived, submit far more readily to the authority of the native Prince, whom they had always been accustomed to respect, than to that of a rival trading corporation.  This policy may, at that time, have been judicious.  But the pretence was soon found to be too flimsy to impose on anybody; and it was altogether laid aside.  The heir of Meer Jaffier still resides at Moorshedabad, the ancient