"Maun Sing may be assured, that if he continues to give the governor-general effective proof of his least as good as it was before the British governfidelity and good-will, his position in Oude will be at ment assumed the administration of the country; while the proprietors in Oude, who have deserted the government, will lose their possessions. Maun Sing, or to others, by Sir Henry Lawrence, "Whatever promises may have been made to are confirmed, and shall be fully redeemed. None, however, have been reported to me." Sing, who had been relieved at Shahgunge, wrongs was indeed magnanimous; he had came into the camp. Of this individual, no sooner been released from captivity, than who occupied an important position through- he exerted himself to provide for the safety out the progress of the revolt, the following of English fugitives from Fyzabad, twentydetails may be considered interesting. A seven of whom he conveyed to his fortress few years previous, two brothers, Bucktawar at Shahgunge, and there protected them Sing and Dursun Sing, were in the military until the taint of rebellion infected his own service of the nawab, Saadut Ali Khan, of people; when he informed the officers under Oude the second-named holding a com- his roof, that the troops were clamorous for mand under the chuckledar of the Fyzabad their lives, and he could no longer protect district. He there married the daughter them, though he would answer for the safety of a Brahmin, Gunga Misar; and his first of the women and children.* Ultimately act was to eject his father-in-law, and seize the whole of the fugitives were put on upon his village, which thus became the board some boats secured by him for the foundation of the "Bainamah," or pur- purpose, and were conveyed down the river chased estate, as Maun Sing's dominions to Gopalpore, where they continued in are generally styled, in reference to the safety until they could be forwarded to supposed mode of acquisition, and as con- Allahabad. In September, the importance trasted with territory passing by adoption of his friendship appeared manifest to the or descent. From this small beginning, government; and, on the 12th of that Dursun advanced till he reached the dignity month, the governor-general in council, by of chuckledar; and, after adding one by a telegram to General Outram, referred to one to his villages, left at his death a vast the chief in the following terms:territorial property to his son, Maun Sing, who, at the period of the outbreak, was the recognised owner of 761 villages. An individual possessing the influence that so large a property naturally invested him with, was not one to be rashly irritated, and certainly not to be wantonly injured; and yet, in 1856, a year preceding the outbreak, this man was chased out of his estates by a regiment of the Company's cavalry, upon a plea of default in payment of a head-rent or assessment to government, which he objected to as enormous and unjust. This affront was in some way or other condoned, and he returned to one of his residences near Fyzabad, where he continued until symptoms of disaffection among the troops at that station became apparent. At that time he was upon the most amicable terms with the English authorities, and had offered to secure the safety of the women and children of the station, in the event of their being imperilled. Unfortunately this moment was chosen by the chief commissioner at Lucknow to renew the insult of the previous year, by placing him under arrest, as "a suspicious person, likely to be troublesome in the then state of the country." From this indignity, he was, after much difficulty, released, at the earnest solicitation, and upon the protest, of the superintendent commissioner at Fyzabad, who appreciated the value of his friendship at the crisis too evidently approaching. Maun Sing's revenge for the unprovoked Almost immediately after this communication, it seems that Maun Sing, instigated by a report no doubt purposely spread to entrap him into hostilities with the government, collected a large body of troops, and, placing himself at their head, was said to have joined the forces of the begum at Lucknow. There is no proof that he actually joined, or that he personally took an active part in, any operations of the rebel army, although it was rumoured that a portion of his followers manned a battery against the Baille guard, until its relief by General Outram on the 25th of September. This conduct of the rajah was afterwards explained, as appears by the following communication from Captain Bruce, for Majorgeneral Outram, to the governor-general:— 66 (Telegraphic.) "Cawnpore, October 21st, 1857. inclosure for General Outram. The purport of these Rajah Maun Sing has written to me, with is as follows:-Says he never intended to go to Lucknow at all, had not the ranee of the late * See vol. i., p. 393. now. Rajah Buktawar Sing, been seized there by the rebels. He went with Mr. Gubbins' (of Benares) sanction to rescue her; he could not get away until all the rebels opposed the British at Alumbagh; he seized this opportunity of rescuing her, making every arrangement to move back twenty coss from LuckHe swears on his oath, up to this time, he did not connect himself with the rebels. It was willed his name now should be connected with the rebels, and himself fall under displeasure of government thus. He suddenly heard the rebels were defeated, and the British, attacking the place, were about to disgrace his majesty's seraglio. He at once marched to protect it, for he had eaten the king's salt. If the general views with justice his actions, he will see that he did not join the rebels. He protected the British authorities in his district, and could not keep himself aloof from protecting the king's honour. Now he is ready to obey all government orders; and if his vakeel's life be spared, he will submit the whole facts: he hopes the general will let him know his design, that he may carry it out. "To this letter I sent the following reply:-I have received your letter and inclosure for General Outram. The British do no injury to helpless women and children, however humble their rank; and you ought to have known that those of the king would not have been dishonoured. I have written to-day to General Outram, who is now in the Lucknow residency; and in the meantime, if you are really friendly to the British government, you are desired at once to withdraw all your men from Lucknow, and communicate with the chief commissioner. I have sent to tell your vakeel, that if he likes to come in and see me, he will meet with no injury.'—The vakeel has since come, and having expressed his master's willingness to comply with the terms of my letter, departed for Lucknow." That Maun Sing was truthful in his avowal of motives, and non-participation in the objects of the rebels, may be fairly inferred from the following passage in a telegram from the lieutenant-governor of the Central Provinces, to the governor-general, dated on the 13th of the month :-"Nana Sahib has returned from Lucknow to Futtehpore Chowrassie, opposite Bithoor, having had a turn-up with Maun Sing before he left." At any rate, it cannot be denied that there was, throughout the entire conduct of this chief, a glow of chivalric disinterestedness and recklessness of personal safety that eminently distinguished him from others of his influential countrymen. He had rendered to the Company's government benefits for insults offered and unatoned for: he had protected its fugitive subjects; and he had now advanced in arms towards Lucknow, to rescue a female relative from the hands of the rebels, and had then withThe lady referred to was a widow of the uncle of Maun Sing. See preceding page. drawn; but learning that the honour of his sovereign (for such the king of Oude still was, until his allegiance had been formally transferred to the English government) was likely to be imperilled by the wild license of a conquering army, he again came forward to protect the inviolability of the zenana. In none of these acts can we trace any fair indication of hostility to the British. According to the testimony of Mr. Rees,† Maun Sing stood in the first rank among the most distinguished of the "insurgent" (?) rajahs, and the most powerful landed barons of the kingdom of Oude; and the testimony of that author, which is certainly not marked by any strong bias in favour of the chief, exonerates him from the charge of active co-operation in the rebellion. He says-" During the whole of the siege, I believe his troops (10,000 in number) never aided the other insurgents in their operations against us; but preserved a sort of armed neutrality." Mr. Rees further states, that, "shortly after Sir James Outram's assumption of the command of the Oude field force, Maun Sing sent a messenger to him, offering to mediate with the rebel government for the safety of the prisoners in its hands, and stipulating for a guarantee, as the price of his doing so, and fighting on the side of the British, that his own life would be spared, and all his estates be restored. He was told to withdraw his troops and return to his estate. Government was generous, and would no doubt act well towards him; but he must trust to that generosity alone. After this," observes Mr. Rees, "Maun Sing had the insolence to offer to escort our women, children, and wounded to Cawnpore, with his 10,000 men! This would have been like entrusting the safety of a flock to a wolf. We had learned to distrust natives now." So much for opinion on the spot. To a distant observer it might appear possible, that whatever seemed doubtful or unfriendly on the part of this powerful chief, could have fairly been attributed to the distrust of him unworthily manifested at the early stage of the revolt, and never entirely concealed even in the face of his most generous and disinterested services. By the middle of September, the general aspect of affairs in Oude was considered satisfactory; and with the exception of the military operations then progressing in the † Personal Narrative of the Siege of Lucknow, p. 265. neighbourhood of Sultanpore, matters looked hopeful. The districts then in the hands of the British were represented as lying in an ellipse, of which Lucknow and Durriabad were foci-the ends of one diameter being Cawnpore and Fyzabad, which cities were situated almost due east and west of each other. The civil jurisdiction of the government extended, on an average, to about twenty-five miles round Lucknow, and nearly the same distance round Durriabad; and the line of communication was uninterrupted from Cawnpore to Fyzabad, bordering upon the Goruckpore district in the North-West Province. To the south of this region, the rebels, under different leaders, and in various districts, numbered in the aggregate about 45,000 men and 30 guns; and to the north were the forces of the begum and her partisans, the sum of whose power was represented by about 60,000 men and 50 guns. These numbers were exclusive of about 6,000 men under Balla Rao, at Bareitch, and such gathering as might still adhere to the Nana Sahib, who had esconced himself in the fort of Churda, in the north-east of Oude. It was therefore evident that some heavy work was still before the British troops, when the arrival of cold weather should enable them to resume operations of magnitude in the open field. Among the villagers and townspeople matters were quietly settling down, and many of the chief zemindars appeared desirous to send in offers of submission and allegiance; but were prevented doing so with safety by the numerous bands of rebels that were scattered over the country. The great event, however, to which all eyes were now directed, was the approaching campaign in Oude. It was naturally assumed, that the plan of that campaign had been formed by the commander-in-chief upon principles that would lead to the most successful results; but it was also remembered that the tactics of the enemy were to avoid any grand operations, and to harass and wear out the European troops by an incessant repetition of forced marches and tedious and desultory engagements in a country difficult of passage; a plan which would necessarily render the forthcoming campaign one of extreme embarrassment. The great problem to be solved was, not how to defeat the enemy, but how to reach them, spread as they were over a vast extent of country, interspersed with wide and interminable jungles and intricate passes, and studded with fortresses in every direc tion-under circumstances, also, that rendered it next to impossible to bring the rebels to bay, and at the same time to preserve the European soldiers from the decimating effects of exposure to the sun. Wisdom and energy were, however, paramount both in the council-chamber and the camp; and the hearts of the loyal in India and in Europe, were calmed by the assurance that the direction of affairs was in the hands of men whose past achievements indisputably entitled them to all confidence as to the future. CHAPTER XIV. CALCUTTA; UNPOPULARITY OF LORD CANNING; PETITION FOR HIS RECALL; POLICY OF HIS GOVERNMENT; TRIBUTE TO SIR HENRY LAWRENCE; ARRIVAL OF TROOPS FROM ENGLAND; FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES OF THE INDIAN GOVERNMENT; THE PUBLIC DEBT; GROWING DEFICIENCIES; PROPOSED REDEMPTION OF THE LAND-TAX; POSITION OF THE EX-KING OF OUDE; THE ARMS ACT; PRESENTATION OF COLOURS TO THE CALCUTTA VOLUNTEER GUARDS; CORRESPONDENCE; THE BRANDING ACT; GRAND REVIEW OF BRITISH TROOPS BY.THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL; LORD CANNING'S EXPLANATION OF HIS POLICY; MR. GRANT AT CAWNPORE; RECEPTION OF THE LUCKNOW FUGITIVES; DEATH OF THE BISHOP OF CALCUTTA; THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL AT ALLAHABAD; A PANIC AT CALCUTTA; PROCEEDINGS OF THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL. To preserve the continuity of our narrative, it will be necessary to take advantage of the opportunity afforded by a cessation of important military operations in the revolted districts, to revert to the state of public affairs at the seat of the Anglo-Indian government. The extreme unpopularity of Viscount Canning at an early stage of the insurrec- | of action or of judgment might have been tionary movement, has already been noticed; committed; and the pertinacious incredulity and the feeling adverse to his general policy with which the early rumours of the gatherwas greatly extended by the measures intro- ing storm were received at Calcutta, and duced by him for restricting the press, as thence officially transmitted to the home well as by the tone of discouragement with government, certainly did not tend to enwhich all suggestions for the maintenance courage confidence on the part of the Euroof tranquillity in the home presidency were pean community of Bengal in the wisdom of met by his lordship in council. One con- the government. Possibly, much of the sequence of the feeling thus engendered was irritation that existed in the popular mind shown in a petition to the queen from the during the early stages of the revolt, might inhabitants of Calcutta, which prayed for have been accounted for by the want of tact the immediate recall of the governor-gen- on the part of those to whom the governeral;* and in another petition to the parliament had delegated responsible duties at a ment of the United Kingdom, in which the perilous crisis, and some of whom had shown British inhabitants of Calcutta prayed that themselves utterly incompetent to deal measures might be adopted for substituting with the circumstances around them; while the direct government of the crown in place the odium of their inefficiency fell with of that of the East India Company,† in redoubled weight upon the individual by reference to whose mismanagement the fol- whom they had been entrusted with aulowing strong allegations were submitted:-thority. "Your petitioners can look for no redress to the powers to whom the government of this great country is delegated, they having shown themselves unequal to the task. The government of the East India Company have neither men, money, nor credit; what credit they had was destroyed by their conduct in the last financial operations. The army has dissolved itself; the treasuries have either been plundered by the rebels, or exhausted by the public service, and a loan even at six per cent. would scarcely find subscribers." The petitioners further said—"The system under which the country has been hitherto governed-utterly antagonistic as it has ever been to the encouragement of British settlement and enterprise in India, has entirely failed to preserve the power of the queen, to win the affections of the natives, or to secure the confidence of the British in India." These weighty charges had certainly, to a great extent, been warranted by the effects of the policy adopted by Lord Canning and his immediate predecessors; and, as we have already observed, "there were truths enunciated in the petitions that it was impossible to deny, and that it had now become hazardous to neglect the serious consideration of." Even among the most cautious observers of Lord Canning's administrative policy, who at the moment thought it but just to abstain from avowed censure, there were many who did not deny that, in the midst of the unprecedented difficulties with which the governor-general had to contend, errors • See vol. i., p. 592. † Ibid., p. 597. At the first outbreak of the revolt, it is quite obvious that the Indian government could not have used any language, or adopted any general line of action, that would, at the same time, have satisfied the European and the native populations. While every Englishman was filled with alarm and with just indignation, professions of impartiality and of confidence in the good-will of the natives, jarred against the prevalent desire for vengeance, and the irritated pride of race. On the other hand, the loyal feeling of every yet faithful Hindoo and Mussulman might have been destroyed, if official proclamations had echoed the language adopted by the press and in private society. Lord Canning might perhaps have been more careful to soothe the susceptibilities of his alarmed and enraged countrymen ; but it was his most pressing duty to take care that a mere military mutiny, which at the outset it appeared to be, was not goaded on, by injudicious treatment, to a great national revolt. With this object before him, the governor-general, in the case of the doubtful regiments, affected to hope even against hope; and, in some degree, it was afterwards found that, by this appearance of confidence, he succeeded in giving the Company's government a fresh hold on the loyalty of a large portion of the people of India. There was a purpose in the public and almost ostentatious display of his determination that, in the midst of the anarchy which raged over the country, all subjects of the Company's government should be equal before the law. If by this he offended 385 at Calcutta; while the unbroken tranquillity of the province under his immediate care, and the good feeling manifested by many of the native princes, might fairly be attributed to the calm and thoughtful policy which, with a generous disregard of his own personal feelings, he consistently pursued through the hurricane of opinions that raged around his path. the English residents of the capital, the alike reflected a portion of the honour acconsequences were likely to fall on himself quired by each on the administrative head personally; while the advantages derivable from the gratitude and confidence of the native community, would be secured by his act to the government and the country. It has been truly observed, "that politicians trained under a free constitution, seldom desire that their rulers should be found in advance of a popular movement; public feeling supplies the force which is required for great achievements; and it is the busi- At length, the more influential portions ness of high functionaries, by regulating of the community-the gentry, landowners, the impulse, to take care that it is not and capitalists of Bengal and the neigh wasted in a wrong direction." In the pre-bouring provinces-showed they had not sent instance, the nation was unanimous in the determination, at whatever cost, to effect the restoration of its supremacy, and the punishment of the guilty; but its best efforts might have been thrown away, if the supreme government had, from deference to wild clamour and reckless indignation, given occasion for general disaffection among the millions of its Indian subjects. The Calcutta malcontents were, however, able to console themselves by the reflection, that the neglect of compliance with their wishes for the establishment of martial law, implied, in a certain sense, absolute confidence in their own loyalty. It was probably anticipated by the governor-general, that the disappointed would become agitators; but he had no fear that any contingency would convert them into rebels. At the worst, even if the results of his policy had confirmed their gloomiest predictions, he knew that he could have commanded their wealth, and even their lives, to ward off the dangers they had denounced, and to the suppression of which they had pledged themselves; and, in the meanwhile, he felt that he would be justified in disarming a more possible enemy by generous forbearance and undisguised confidence, than by confining himself to merely strengthening the attachment of natural and tried friends, from among whom no possible chance of danger could been insensible to the prudent impartiality of Lord Canning's language and conduct. In two energetic and well-written addresses, they thanked him for his resistance to the clamour against the native populations, and congratulated him on the success of the British arms at Delhi. More than 2,000 memorialists reminded the government of the fact, that "natives of Bengal-men, women, and children-have, in every part of the scene of the mutinies, been exposed to the same rancour, and treated with the same cruelty, which the mutineers and their misguided countrymen have displayed to the British within their reach." The memorialists recognised as equal merits, the determination to crush the disaffected and rebellious, and the resolution to protect and reassure the loyal and obedient. Every civil and military official, every soldier, and almost every European upon the soil of India, might have claimed to share the credit of the vigour that had been displayed; but the honour of steadily discriminating between the rebels and the peaceful community, was assigned, by the common voice of enemies and friends, principally to the governor-general. A second memorial, bearing 5,000 signatures, more directly referred to the demands put forth in the Calcutta petition to which we have already referred.* "It has become notorious," said the memorialists, "throughout As time progressed, the fact became this land, that your lordship's administradaily more apparent, that the governor- tion has been assailed by faction, and asgeneral had deserved well of his country, sailed because your lordship in council has and was entitled to its most generous inter- refused compliance with capricious depretation of his conduct. He had prose- mands, and to treat the loyal portion of the cuted the war with vigour to the utmost Indian population as rebels; because your limit of his means, and had also preserved lordship has directed that punishment for the loyalty of the great bulk of the native offences against the state should be dealt populations. The capture of Delhi, the out with discrimination; because your relief of Lucknow, the victory at Cawnpore, arise. prose-mands, *See vol. i., p. 592. |