पान:आंग्ल प्रभा.djvu/14

I2 guns were mounted on the battlements of the forts in some places. In the Carnatic, Gardis were employed on similar duties as a check on the Canarese garrisons. The old system was departed from in the employment of these mercenaries, and even the old garrisons were shifted from one place to another for supposed reasons of State. Under the later Peishwas, these forts appear chiefly to have served the double purpose of state granaries and State prisons. State prisoners were sent to the forts for custody, and the condemned criminials of both sexes were sent there for penal servitude. In the latter half of the century, the forts are chiefly mentioned in this connection. Against the more improved means of warfare, represented by the artillery, these Hill-forts ceased to be valuable for purposes of defence, and in many places they were neglected and allowed to go into dis-repair. In the wars with the English, the forts offered little or no protection, and submitted without firing a shot. The Army, the Navy and the Forts were thus, by the course of events and the neglect of the State, rendered incapable, for different reasons, of doing any service in the latter half of the last century. While in these higher spheres of statesmanship and the art of Government, the lines of departure pursued by the later Peish was and their ministers indicated visible signs of decay, it must in justice to them be admitted that in the matter of the revenue and judicial management, the Government at Poona showed gteat powers of application, careful elaboration of detail, and an honest desire to administer well the charge entrusted to them. The financial condition of the State was decidedly more prosperous than the hand-to mouth system which characterised the first half of the last century. It is well known that all the great Maratha leaders, including Bajirao I, always found it difficult to raise the monies required for their great expeditions into Hindustan, and the information given in the Diaries of the debts, contracted by Balaji Bajirao between 1740 and 1760, shows a total of a crore and a half of public debt. The strain rapresented by this amount will be better understood when it is mentioned that the Peish wa’s Government had to pay from 12 to 18 per cent. interest. On these loans. Owing to the great collapse at Panipat, things did not much improve in the elder Madhaorao Peishwa's time. That Prince had a heavy load of debt, amounting to some 24,00,000 Rs. which had to be satisfied by the assurance given at his death-bed by the ministers about him that his bonds would be discharged there and then. Under Nana Fadinaviş's careful management, the finances appear to have greatly improved, and the accounts do not show that the debts contracted by him Public debt.