(Robert) lord, son of Richard Clive, Esq., of Styche near Drayton in Salop, was born in 1725. Toward the close of the war in 1741, he was sent as a writer in the East India service to Madras; but being fonder of the camp than the compting-house, he soon availed himself of an opportunity to exchange his pen for a pair of colours. He first distinguished himself at the siege of Pondicherry in 1748; acted under major Laurence at the taking of Devi Cotta in Tanjore, who wrote of his military talents in high terms; commanded a small party for the taking of Arcot, and afterward defended that place against the French; and performed many other exploits, which, considering the remoteness of the scene of action, would require a long detail to render sufficiently intelligible. He was, however, in brief, looked upon and acknowledged as the man who first roused his countrymen to spirited action, and raised their reputation in the East; so that when he came over to England in 1753, he was presented, by the court of directors, with a rich sword set with diamonds, as an acknowledgment of past, and an incitement to future, services. Captain Clive returned to India in 1755, as governor of fort St David, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the king's troops; when as commander of the company's troops, he, in conjunction with admiral Watson, reduced Angria the pirate, and became master of Geria, his capital, with all his accumulated treasure. On the loss of Calcutta and the well-known barbarity of the soubah Surajah Dowlas, they sailed to Bengal; where they took fort William, in January 1757; and colonel Clive defeating the soubah's army soon after, accelerated a peace. Surajah Dowlas's perjury, however, soon produced fresh hostilities, which ended in his ruin; he being totally defeated by colonel Clive at the famous battle of Plassey. The next day the conqueror entered Muxadabad in triumph; and placed Jaffier Ally Cawn, one of the principal generals, on the throne; the deposed soubah was soon afterwards taken, and privately put to death by Jaffier's son. Admiral Watson died at Calcutta; but colonel Clive commanded in Bengal the two succeeding years; he was honoured by the Mogul with the dignity of an Omrah of the empire; and was rewarded by the new soubah with a grant of lands, or a jaghire, producing 27,000l. a-year. In 1760, he returned to England, where he received the unanimous thanks of the company, was elected member of parliament for Shrewsbury, and was raised to an Irish peerage by the title of Lord Clive Baron of Plassey. In 1764, fresh disturbances taking place in Bengal, lord Clive was esteemed the only man qualified to settle them, and was accordingly again appointed to that presidency; after being honoured with the order of the Bath, and with the rank of major-general. When he arrived in India, he exceeded the most sanguine expectation, in restoring tranquillity to the province without striking a blow, and fixed the highest ideas of the British power in the minds of the natives. He returned home in 1767; and, in 1772, when a parliamentary inquiry into the conduct of the East India company was agitated, he entered into an able justification of himself in a masterly speech in the house of commons. He died suddenly towards the close of the year 1774.

CLOACÆ, in antiquity, the common sewers of Rome, to carry off the dirt and filth of the city into the Tiber; justly reckoned among the grand works of the Romans. The first common sewer, called Cloaca Maxima, was built by Tarquinius, some say Priscus, others Superbus, of huge blocks of stone joined together without any cement, in the manner of the edifices of those early times; consisting of three rows of arches one above another, which at length conjoin and unite together; measuring in the clear 18 palms in height, and as many in width. Under these arches they rowed in boats; which made Pliny say that the city was suspended in air, and that they sailed beneath the houses. Under these arches also were ways through which carts loaded with hay could pass with ease. It began in the Forum Romanum; measured 300 paces in length; and emptied itself between the temple of Veila and the Pons Senatorius. There were as many principal sewers as there were hills. Pliny concludes their firmness and strength from their standing for so many ages the shocks of earthquakes, the fall of houses, and the vast loads and weights moved over them.