And perhaps it lay against Mahomed Reza Khan as well as him.

But it was a source of apprehension to the Nabob, and contributed to make him wish to keep all Mahomedan influence at a distance.

For he was a Syed, that is to say, a descendant of Mahomet, and as such, though of the only acknowledged nobility among Mussulmen, would be by that circumstance excluded, by the known laws of the Mogul empire, from being Subahdar in any of the Mogul provinces, in case the revival of the constitution of that empire should ever again take place.
An auction was now opened before the English Council at Calcutta.
Mahomed Reza Khan bid largely; Nundcomar bid largely.

The circumstances of these two rivals at the Nabob court were equally favorable to the pretensions of each.

But the preponderating merits of Mahomed Reza Khan, arising from the subjection in which he was likely to keep the Nabob, and make him fitter for the purpose of continued exactions, induced the Council to take his money, which amounted to about 220,000_l._ Be the sum paid what it may, it was certainly a large one; in consequence of which the Council attempted to invest Mahomed Reza Khan with the office of Naib Subah, or Deputy Viceroy.