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Before we went to bed that night, Haidar Aboul, the second interpreter, came and swore on the Koran that the Relation had promised the camel-men two rupees each; still we lay down happy in the assurance that we should be at Sheher in seven days, but after a night much disturbed by guns for a wedding, the first news that greeted us was that those camel-men wished to leave us.
The cotton is plastered with indigo, even beyond the dye, and when calendered, as the clothes are when new, gleam purple and red. The richer you are the bluer you are, and Sultan Haidar was very blue indeed. The curious thing about these blue people is that, as the prominent parts of the face and body are the darkest, there is an odd inside-out effect.
We were very thankful for a large pot of coffee and ginger, sent by a sultan, and a fat lamb. The princes ventured to leave us in charge of Abdullah-bin-Abdurrahman, and abode in the tower. Sultan Haidar went home from here. The tableland of Mis'hal is approached by three akabas: Sauda, to 2,000 feet; Beva, to 2,500 feet; Hadda, to 2,750 feet.
Both again combined with a new power whose rise had been as rapid as it was alarming, the Mohammedan power of Haidar in Mysore. When Warren Hastings arrived in India the second time Haidar was in his sixty-seventh year. He was born in 1702 as the son of a Mogul officer in the Punjaub. At his death Haidar held a rank somewhat similar to that of a captain in the service of the Emperor of Delhi.
Fortunately, however, the Governor was able to issue the following notification for the reassurance of the public: 'A sufficient number of guns have been mounted on the Black Town wall, and 'nothing has been omitted that I can think of for the security of the Black Town. Haidar was not sufficiently venturesome to attack the fortified town; but the terror of the inhabitants was by no means at an end; for a little later came the disastrous news that a British force sent out to meet the invader had been cut to pieces at Conjeevaram.
Under this compact Central India was pacified, and the Carnatic protected from the encroachments of the notorious Haidar Ali Khan, and his son, the equally famous Tippu Sahib. It is important here to observe that the Calcutta Gazettes of the day contain several notices of the progress of the Sikhs, and the feeble opposition offered to them by the courtiers.
It was not until Haidar had marched with fire and sword into the Carnatic, and that the smoke of the villages he destroyed in his progress could be seen from Madras, that they learned that Haidar was in earnest and not merely making a menace in the hope of frightening the English into an advantageous treaty.
Our party was now increased by another 'prince, Sultan Haidar, son of the sultan of Naab, a person delightful to contemplate. He was got up in Bedou style; his hair, fluffy and long, was tied back by a fillet and stuck out in a bush behind. He had a curious countenance and very weak eyes. He was wrapped in a couple of large blue cotton cloths with very long fringes, half a yard at least.
It was thus that San Thomé became a British possession; and, although it was afterwards ravaged successively by the French under Count Lally and by Haidar Ali of Mysore, it has remained a British possession ever since. We have said enough to show the manner in which the different parts of the modern city of Madras came into the hands of the English.
In the same year a German was appointed as expert for silkworm breeding and for the cultivation of beet. Practically all the railways in Asia Minor are pure German concerns by right of purchase. They have secured also the Haidar Pasha Harbour concession, thereby controlling and handling all merchandise arriving at railhead from the interior of Asia Minor.
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