As his men trained, Arthur studied the campaigns of Cornwallis, in particular the failed attempt to reduce Seringapatam and end the threat from Tipoo Sahib. Cornwallis had been defeated by the monsoon season, and the failure to secure a steady supply of food for his army. He had been forced to spike his guns, abandon the siege and retreat, occasioning a serious decline of faith in the iqbal of the English. The difficulties of campaigning in India were immense: the terrible heat of the dry seasons and the torrential rains of the monsoons that turned tracks into glutinous mud and could transform dry river beds into raging torrents in a matter of hours. Then there was the lack of any roads worth the name, just a series of tracks that linked the fortified villages that dotted the landscape. Any modern army desiring to cross the subcontinent was further handicapped by the sheer distance it would be obliged to maintain its lines of communication. It was difficult to find horses strong enough to pull the guns and wagons of a baggage train. The mounts favoured by the Mahratta and other warrior nations were small and nimble and of little use as beasts of burden.

These were matters he took up with Harry Ball when the two officers were attending one of the numerous dinner parties that were held in the houses of Calcutta’s tiny European population. When the meal was over, officers and Company officials retired to the veranda outside the house to drink in the light draught of the punkahs swaying overhead. Arthur sat himself down on the chair next to Ball with a brief exchange of pleasantries.

‘So how are you finding life in Calcutta, sir?’

‘It’s pleasant enough provided one doesn’t get too hot.’ Arthur smiled. ‘Not that there’s any chance of avoiding the heat.’

‘You think this is bad?’ Ball looked amused. ‘Just wait until you encounter the climate further inland. Sometimes it gets so hot that a man will lie under his camp bed covered with a wet sheet just to stop his brains from boiling and sending him insane. It’s not good country for proper soldiers like yourself, sir.’

‘Nevertheless, we are required to fight here. Especially if we are to protect our interests from the French. So we are obliged to find some means of waging war effectively in India. From what I’ve read so far, we’ve not had much success.’

‘It is a problem,’ Ball agreed. ‘That is why our interests in India are confined to the lands immediately surrounding the three presidencies. That is the limit of our operations. Most attempts to campaign further afield have failed to achieve anything worthwhile, or ended in disaster.’