While the British power was thus growing, that of the Marathas had increased likewise; and they had organised themselves into a confederacy of five co-equal parts under five principal chiefs. In 1758 their success ran so high that they laid hold upon Delhi itself; but this was too much for the Mohammedan Afghans. They came down in their wrath; and in 1761 a great battle was fought at Panipat in which the Marathas were utterly defeated. Had the Afghans followed up their success, the Marathas would have taken long to recover from the blow; but the victors were obliged to look to their own western frontier which was threatened by the Persians; and the only result of the fight was to exhaust two of the possible masters of northern India and leave the country in greater confusion than ever. Most unfortunately, too, Clive, the representative of the third possible master, went home on leave at this time; and the supreme power in Bengal passed into the hands of the Company's clerks. Having no high standard before their eyes and being miserably paid, these clerks saw the chance of enriching themselves by selling the use of the Company's troops to any potentate or adventurer who might offer to buy; and, by setting up and throwing down the Nawabs of Bengal as best suited their pockets, they involved the Company in most perilous and soon disastrous wars. From the worst of their difficulties they were extricated by the military genius of Major Thomas Adams, who though deficient alike in men, arms and supplies, contrived by three victories at Katwa, Suti and Undwa Nala in July, August and September, 1763, to maintain the terror of the British arms. But the titular Emperor of Delhi of the Mogul dynasty also entered the fray, and strove with the help of the Nawab of Oudh to re-establish his former sovereignty over Bengal; and to make matters worse at this critical moment there was a mutiny among the Sepoys of the Bengal Presidency. The mutiny, however, was sternly repressed by Major Hector Munro, who then led his army against the Emperor and utterly defeated him at Buxar on the 23rd of February, 1764. This victory opened the way to Oudh, and the British captured in succession the great cities of Allahabad and Lucknow; when at this moment Clive returned and stopped further annexation. He had no wish to have for neighbours the adventurers who had sprung up at Delhi, Agra, Bhurtpore and in Rohilkhand. He therefore restored Oudh to its Nawab, so as to keep it a buffer-state between Bengal and the rest of Hindostan.