Dupleix was shabbily treated by France. He received but little support
from the mother country; the vast sums he had expended from his
private resources in prosecuting the war were never refunded to him;
he was consistently maligned by the jealous and treacherous La
Bourdonnais, and after his recall to France in 1754 his services to
his country were never recognised, and he died in poverty.
G. B. Malleson's _Dupleix_ is a most impartial and interesting account
of this remarkable man's life: it has been translated into French and
is accepted by the French as an accurate text-book.
The whole reign of Louis XV. was a supremely disastrous period for
French Colonial aspirations. Not only did the dream of a great French
empire in the East crumble away just as it seemed on the very point of
realisation, but after Wolfe's victory on the Heights of Abraham at
Quebec, Canada was formally ceded by France to Britain in 1763, by the
Treaty of Paris.
This ill fortune pursued France into the succeeding reign of Louis
XVI., for in April, 1782, Rodney's great victory over Count de Grasse
off Dominica transferred the Lesser Antilles from French to British
suzerainty.
The same sort of blight seemed to hang over France during Louis XV.
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