capital of his house, still bears the title of Nabob, is still accosted by the English as “Your Highness,” and is still suffered to retain a portion of the regal state which surrounded his ancestors.  A pension of a hundred and sixty thousand pounds a year is annually paid to him by the government.  His carriage is surrounded by guards, and preceded by attendants with silver maces.  His person and his dwelling are exempted from the ordinary authority of the ministers of justice.  But he has not the smallest share of political power, and is, in fact, only a noble and wealthy subject of the Company.

It would have been easy for Clive, during his second administration in Bengal, to accumulate riches such as no subject in Europe possessed.  He might indeed, without subjecting the rich inhabitants of the province to any pressure beyond that to which their mildest rulers had accustomed them, have received presents to the amount of three hundred thousand pounds a year.  The neighbouring princes would gladly have paid any price for his favour.  But he appears to have strictly adhered to the rules which he had laid down for the guidance of others.  The Rajah of Benares offered him diamonds of great value.  The Nabob of Oude pressed him to accept a large sum of money and a casket of costly jewels.  Clive courteously, but peremptorily refused; and it should be observed that he made no merit of his refusal, and that the facts did not come to light till after his death.  He kept an exact account of his salary, of his share of the profits accruing from the trade in salt, and of those presents which, according to the fashion of the East, it would be churlish to refuse.  Out of the sum arising from these resources, he defrayed the expenses of his situation.  The surplus he divided among a few attached friends who had accompanied him to India.  He always boasted, and as far as we can judge, he boasted with truth, that this last administration diminished instead of increasing his fortune.

One large sum indeed he accepted.  Meer Jaffier had left him by will above sixty thousand pounds sterling in specie and jewels:  and the rules which had been recently laid down extended only to presents from the living, and did not affect legacies from the dead.  Clive took the money, but not for himself.  He made the whole over to the Company, in trust for officers and soldiers invalided in their service.  The fund which still bears his name owes its origin to this princely donation.

After a stay of eighteen months, the state of his health made it necessary for him to return to Europe.  At the close of January 1767, he quitted for the last time the country, on whose destinies he had exercised so mighty an influence.