CHAPTER VI. DELHI; STATE OF THE CITY AND ENVIRONS AFTER THE RECAPTURE; MEASURES FOR THE RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF ORDER; TREATMENT OF THE NATIVE INHABITANTS; CHARGES OF INJUDICIOUS CLEMENCY; COLONEL HOGG AND THE PRINCE JUMMA BUKHT; VISITS TO THE ROYAL PRISONERS; THE QUESTION OF PRIZE-MONEY; TRIAL OF THE EX-KING; EVIDENCE OF A HALF-CASTE WOMAN, AND OF THE KING'S SECRETARY; PROCLAMATION OF KHAN BAHADOOR KHAN; FACTS ESTABLISHED BY THE TRIAL; THE ANDAMAN ISLANDS; INTRIGUES OF THE COURT; ADMINISTRATION OF SIR JOHN LAWRENCE; COMPENSATION EXACTED; PARTIAL IMPROVEMENT OF THE CITY; THE FUTURE OF DELHI; REPORTED ATTEMPT TO RESCUE THE KING; FIDELITY REWARDED; THE KING'S SOOTHSAYER HUNG; CUSTOMS' REVENUE FOR JULY, 1858; ESTIMATED AMOUNT OF PRIZE-MONEY. Or the successful assault and capture of the city of Delhi, the imprisonment of the king, and the merited death of several of the princes of his family, copious details have been given in previous pages of this work.* It is now for us to turn aside from the continuous progress of events connected with the rebellion in other parts of India, that the incidents subsequent to the reconquest of, and connected with, the Mogul capital, may be succinctly traced. As soon as the storm of war had subsided, and the British flag once more floated triumphantly over the shattered bastions and towers of the imperial city, it of course became necessary to take measures for its internal regulation, and for the effective control of the native population that yet continued to lurk amidst its ruined palaces and mosques. To this end, Colonel Burn, an officer of many years' experience in the Company's service (who then held a command in Brigadier Nicholson's movable column), was appointed military governor of the city; Colonel Innes, at the same time, exercising the functions of commandant of the palace; and Mr. Saunders succeeding Mr. Greathed as civil commissioner. These appointments had scarcely been notified in garrison orders, when, as before related, General Wilson, worn out by his anxieties and incessant exertions during the siege, surrendered his important command, and retired to the hill country for the benefit of his health. In consequence of this occurrence, General Penny was provisionally appointed to the chief command of the army at Delhi. At the time this change took place, the city was still, as it were, trembling from the effects of the shock that had resulted in its utter prostration, as the capital and stronghold of a rebel power. Its streets were, for the most part, desolate; and silence reigned Vol. i., pp. 505–530. through its once most busy quarters. Nearly all the native inhabitants, both Hindoos and Moslems, had fled from it in well-grounded terror, lest the English soldiers should retaliate upon them the barbarities perpetrated by the mutinous troops upon the defenceless Europeans found in the place at the commencement of the outbreak, and during the months of usurped dominion by the phantom king. To a certain extent, this wholesale evacuation by the inhabitants was of advantage to the authorities entrusted with the resettlement of the city, since it better afforded facilities for them to ascertain to what extent the traders and general population had taken part in the rebellion, and the excesses that followed its outburst. Nor did the inhabitants, on their part, show any great anxiety to return; as, although a few days after the occupation, a proclamation was issued by General Wilson, promising protection and encouragement to all not actually concerned in the foul murders and outrages of the 11th of May, very few availed themselves of the offer. From the period of complete reoccupation in September, the city gradually assumed a state of reorganisation and order scarcely, under the circumstances, to have been expected; but, for many weeks after the crisis, its forlorn and desolate condition, as well as that of the environs, was pitiable in the extreme. Without the walls, the devastation was widely spread; but ruin had concentrated its force upon the ill-fated city. From the Lahore gate to the village of Subzee Mundee, on the road to Kurnaul, there was an almost continuous line of carcasses of camels, horses, and bullocks, with their skins dried into parchment over the sapless bones. Here and there were remains of intrenchments, where battles had been fought on the road. From Badulee Serai, a short distance from the Lahore gate, on the west side, opposite to the principal entrance to the palace; and the Calcutta gate, on the east, communicating with the bridge of boats over the Jumna, and the road to Meerut-the other four entrances to the city having been blocked up with solid masonry during the siege. The city of the Moguls was now, indeed, but little better than a vast and hideous ruin-its houses and streets deserted; its defences unmanned; and the sentence of utter demolition suspended over its shattered gates and once defiant towers: the carcasses of some thousands of its defenders, who had fallen in their insane struggle to establish a throne based upon treason and cruelty, had been necessarily gathered by the sweepers and camp-followers into deep pits, and were so hidden from mortal sight: and now, within the vast area of that imperial city, not one hand remained uplifted in defiance of its conquerors. gate, every tree was either levelled with the ground, or the branches were lopped off by round shot. The garden-houses of the wealthy citizens were, in almost every instance, masses of ruins, with the remains of men and beasts bleaching around them. Here and there might be seen the perfectly white skeleton of one who had shared in the terrible conflicts of the siege, and had fallen unnoticed and unremembered by his fellows; while, on all sides, lay scattered fragments of clothing, cartouch-boxes, round shot, and fragments of exploded shells. Around the Subzee Mundee all foliage was destroyed. The gaily ornamented residences in the vicinity of the Serai, were now mere masses of blackened ruins, with broken sand-bags and shattered loopholed walls, that declared the fiery ordeal through which the combatants on both sides had passed. With the exception of the Moree bastion and the Cashmere gate (both on the north side of the city), the line of defence did not exhibit much trace of injury; but within the walls, the appearance of the city was fearfully desolate. Entering by the Cashmere gate, the Mainguard was seen wholly destroyed. St. James's church next appeared, battered with shot even up to the ball and cross that surmounted the edifice. Most of the houses from this point to near the palace, were mere ruins; many of them blackened by fire. A spacious structure, occupied as the Delhi bank, formerly the residence of the Begum Sumroo, had nothing but the outer walls and a portion of the verandah remaining. In a narrow street, leading thence to the Chandnee Chouk, every house bore visible proof of the showers of musket-balls that must have been poured upon the defenders of the city, as they retreated, street by street, and from house The re-establishment of order within the to house, towards the palace. In many of walls of the capital, as we have shown, the avenues, were still to be seen the débris occupied the attention, and called for the of arches which had been built up by the active vigilance, of the civil and military rebels, but were broken into by the advanc-authorities during the first few weeks of the ing troops. The road-ways had been cut up into furrows by the action of shot and shell, that ploughed up their surface. House-doors and huge gates lay about in all directions, some of which had been well backed up by massive stone-work and heavy beams of wood; while the remains of sand-bag defences were passed at every corner. But three of the seven gates of the city were as yet permitted to be open-namely, the Cashmere gate at the north-east angle, towards the old cantonments; the Lahore The terrible but just work of retribution was, however, carried on in a spirit of humanity that sometimes was mistaken for weakness. The women and children found in Delhi met with no harsh treatment, and were even sheltered from personal indignity by men fierce with the excitement of war, and thirsting to avenge the murders and outrages perpetrated upon their countrymen; nor were the inhabitants molested who had remained passive during the struggle, and had not aided the rebellion by their resources or their sympathy. All such were allowed to depart from the city upon application for the purpose; and even those who were suspected of treason had the advantage afforded them of an impartial trial; and when punishment was inflicted, it was because guilt was incontestably proved. reoccupation. The king, and the female members of his family, with his youngest son, a youth of some eighteen years of age, still remained in strict confinement in a small building within the palace enclosure, but separate from the palace itself; and the apparently unnecessary delay in putting the dethroned traitor upon his trial, gave occasion for the expression of much dissatisfaction, and the dissemination of unfounded rumour and undeserved obloquy. At this time, however, the feelings of the whole phant, with two British officers behind him to do him honour. The statement appears so incredible, that it may be set aside as a mere newspaper report; but we entreat the government to believe that it is one which we would not publish without such information as produces absolute certainty. The king also, it is said (but for this we have only the authority of the Lahore Chronicle), has a retinue to attend him, and coolly insults the British officers who visit him. It is things such as these the honours paid to our murderers-which exasperate Europeans to frenzy." European community, distant, as well as in Hindostan, were painfully excited by the terrible calamity that had torn from it many of its most loved and valued members, under circumstances which afforded no room for doubt that the bereavement had been attended with brutalism which struck a sickening terror to the hearts of all connected with the victims: it was not strange, therefore, that the delay in bringing to trial the head and chief of the rebellious confederation should be viewed with impatience, and that the motives of the authorities, so long as they were left unexplained, should be misconstrued and censured; and such, in fact, was the case. Prudent delay was imputed to weakness and indecision; and every act of mitigated punishment, where a native was concerned, was, irrespective of the merits of the case, cried down as an exhibition of mistaken and mischievous leniency. The position of the authorities upon the spot, and of the governor-general at Calcutta, had thus become one of exceeding difficulty upon this subject alone. On the one hand was the impulsive and all but national cry for unmitigated vengeance; on the other, the calm and prudent dictates of high policy and humanity: and by adopting the latter, whatever Lord Canning lost in the eyes of the impetuous and unthinking as a conqueror, he more than gained, in the esteem of the civilised world, as a statesman and the representative of the sovereign of a great and magnanimous nation. The derisive sobriquet of "Clemency Canning," which was applied to him at this time, lost all its point when the propriety of the course he had pursued towards the natives of the vast country he governed became manifest. Among other charges against the governor-general, which had their origin in Delhi, but found a too liberal echo in Calcutta, were some connected with the indul-none, I consented to call for him; and, acgent treatment of the captive king and his family; which, it was alleged, was owing to the interference of Lord Canning with the authorities at Delhi. One of these reports obtained circulation through the Friend of India, a paper of some influence at the time; and was as follows:- "We would call the attention of the government of India to the state of things existing in the city of Delhi, which demand instant and stern reform. The youngest son of the king, eighteen years of age, has been declared innocent on account of his youth, and rides through Delhi on an ele With regard to the allegation respecting the son of the king and the English officers, a prompt denial of the calumny was at once forwarded to the Lahore Chronicle by Colonel Hogg, one of the officers implicated. This gentleman says-"As you have given my name in one of the editorials of your paper of the 4th of November, as one of the officers who had been seen riding with one of the sons of the king on an elephant through the streets of Delhi, I send you for publication the following statement of facts:-Having been asked to accompany the commissioner on a visit to the king, I went, along with several officers (one of them holding high official rank in the army), to the house where he was confined. Before leaving, Jumma Bukht, a son of the king, apparently a lad of fifteen or sixteen years of age, asked the commissioner if he might be permitted to go out occasionally for an airing along with any gentleman who would take him; and as I was in the habit of going out every evening on an elephant, the commissioner asked if I would mind occasionally calling for him. I replied, that if there were no other (?) objections I would do so;' and as both the commissioner and the officer before alluded to, appeared to think there could be cordingly, on two occasions I took Jumma Bukht out: the first time, having nothing but a pad on the elephant, and being rather afraid that he might try to escape, I put him in front to prevent him slipping off; the second time, having a 'charjamah,' I sat in front, though, I must say, I considered it a matter of very little moment which seat I occupied. As to parading through the streets of the city, the first time I went out through the Cashmere gate to Ludlow Castle; and home, when it was quite dusk, through the Lahore gate and Chandnee Chouk. The second |