It was not Clive’s way, however, to lose his head. He fell back quickly and steadily, making a rear-guard fight of it for six hours, all the time keeping the enemy off and dealing great slaughter among their pursuing columns by the continuous cannonade from his 6-pounders, until at noon he regained the camp. In the fighting two of the guns had to be abandoned owing to their carriages breaking down. The loss on the English side was: a lieutenant of the _Salisbury_ mortally wounded, twelve seamen and twenty-nine soldiers and Sepoys killed, including two captains of the Company’s troops, fifteen seamen and between forty and fifty soldiers and Sepoys wounded. Suraj-u-daulah’s loss was reported by a spy as being upwards of thirteen hundred, including some of his best officers. At any rate, it staggered the Nawab. Startled at the audacity of Clive’s attempt on his camp and its near approach to success, when the names of his fallen captains were told him he lost what little nerve he possessed, and in a state of abject fright sent a flag of truce to Calcutta declaring his readiness to treat for peace. To prove his good faith, as he said, he at the same time ordered his troops to break camp and withdraw up-country. The Calcutta Council, for their part, were quite ready to come to terms. Their demands included the restoration of their trading rights and of the _status quo_ generally, together with the payment by the Nawab of a lump sum as compensation for property seized at Calcutta in the previous June. The terms were acceded to by Suraj-u-daulah, and articles of peace were ratified on the 9th of February.
The Council had agreed with their adversary quickly. They had reason to do so. A yet more threatening cloud was lowering on the horizon. The settlement with the Nawab came almost as a God-send to the Company’s politicians at Calcutta, for the long-expected war between England and France had broken out.
Official intimation of the declaration of war had been received at Fort William five weeks before, but for very urgent reasons it had been deemed advisable to keep the news secret if possible. The authorities at Calcutta understood that the French garrison at Chandernagore—barely twenty-five miles off up the Hooghly river—numbered some five hundred Europeans and a thousand Sepoys, and the French also had another garrison at Cossimbazaar (Kasim Bazar), within touch of Chandernagore. What if the French should make common cause with Suraj-u-daulah, then on his march down country, and reinforce his horde of armed men with their drilled troops, officered by men who had seen service. The bare idea was a nightmare to the Council of Calcutta.