Death of towards the north-west, sometimes appearing in Rajputana, sometimes making his appearance on the Nerbudda, frequently fighting and keeping the insurrection alive. At length, early in the year 1859, he gave up the struggle and went into hiding, and in April was surrendered by the most important of his adherents, Maun Singh. April 18, 1859. Results somewhat of the same kind had on the north of the rivers attended the fall of Lucknow. Eager to complete the suppression of the Mutiny, Lord Canning urged the Commander-in-Chief to advance immediately into Rohilcund. Sir Colin Campbell, not without misgivings, yielded to his arguments, and pushed forward at once, leaving Sir Hope Grant in Oude, and despatching Lugard to bring to order the west of Behar, where the skilful tactics of Kunwar Singh were creating a fresh danger. Since its rebellion Rohilcund had owned the rule of a chief, resident at Bareilly, called Khan Bahadur Khan. Upon this capital various columns were to concentrate. One from Roorkee in the extreme north-west, one from the south-west, while the Commander-in-Chief advanced from the south-east. It was hoped that thus the enemy would be driven to one point and finally defeated and destroyed. The expectation was not thoroughly fulfilled. The Moolvee, who had command at Shahjehanpore, on the road to Bareilly, managed to avoid an engagement, and to evacuate the town before the arrival of the English. He even returned to Shahjehanpore when Sir Colin Campbell advanced to Bareilly, and though again compelled to withdraw, afforded no opportunity for a decisive battle. But though thwarted in his attempt at dealing a final blow to the rebellion, Sir Colin Campbell and his lieutenants had by the end of May practically restored Rohilcund to the English rule, and confined the strength of the rebellion to Oude. Any hope of success the rebels may there have had was probably lost when, on the 5th of June, the Moolvee was shot in a quarrel with a native Rajah. Of the three important leaders, by the middle of 1858, Tantia Topi was thus a hunted fugitive, the Moolvee was dead, and the third, Kunwar Singh, alone was keeping up the Mutiny in Western Behar. But the reduction of Oude had yet to be completed, and Kunwar Singh and his followers to be suppressed-a work which was not concluded till the beginning of the following year. The success of Reduction of this chief had obliged Sir Colin Campbell, immediately Behar and Oude. after the capture of Lucknow, to despatch a brigade against him. He had been victorious over Milman at Assemghar, 1859] CLOSE OF THE MUTINY 327 and a small force under Lord Mark Kerr which the Governor-General had sent against him from Allahabad had only succeeded in partially checking him. The duty of reducing Behar was intrusted to Lugard, and proved difficult and wearisome. Kunwar Singh constantly evaded decisive battles, and crossing the Ganges found shelter in the vast jungles which surround Jagdespore, his own home. Invariably dispersed when encountered, the rebels immediately re-united, and the whole country swarmed with bands of marauders. It was only by driving roads through the jungle, and by organising a force of mounted riflemen at the suggestion of Sir Henry Havelock, that the country was at length cleared, and by November the rebels destroyed. In the course of the campaign Kunwar Singh had fallen. In the meantime, while Behar was thus being reduced, in October, when active measures again became possible, a number of columns were sent into Oude, and eventually Sir Hope Grant and Sir Colin Campbell succeeded in driving the main bodies of the rebels, and Nana Sahib among them, over the Nepal frontier. But they found no security there. The loyalty of Jung Bahadur allowed the English troops to continue their pursuit within the Nepal territory, where the rebel armies were finally broken up and dispersed. Danger in the Presidency, Although the Mutiny and its attendant revolt had been chiefly confined to the Bengal Presidency, it must not be supposed that the danger had been slight in the other parts of India. The same action which had proved so irritating to the chiefs Bombay in the North-West had been at work in the Southern Mahratta country in the Bombay Presidency. What is known as the Inam Commission had carried out the same strict inquiry into titles, as the Revenue Board had set on foot in the North-West Provinces. 35,000 estates, large and small, had been examined by this Commission, and in 21,000 cases sentences of confiscation had been pronounced. The discontent thus excited had shown itself in mutinies and in revolts, and it was only by the excellent government of Lord Elphinstone, and the skill of Mr. Seton Karr and Colonel Jacobson, that a great Mahratta movement which would naturally have centred round Nana Sahib was prevented. The danger was scarcely less in the great Mahomedan territory of the Nizam of Hyderabad. In June and July 1857, conspiracies had been discovered there, insurrection and at Hyderbroke out, and the Residency was assaulted. It was firmly met and suppressed by Major Davidson. But that it went no further is chiefly due to the consistent loyalty of Salar Jung, the Prime Minister. He was a remarkable man, believing strongly in the abad. possibility of native states being well ruled by natives, but acknowledging the necessity of some such paramount authority as that exercised by the English. It was with his determined support and assistance that Davidson was able to suppress disaffection, and even to employ the Hyderabad contingent to reinforce the army of Sir Hugh Rose, in whose splendid services it bore its full share. No portion of our history is more full of stirring incident than the Indian Mutiny. At no time did Englishmen exhibit more fully their characteristic tenacity and fertility of resource. At no time, it must be confessed, did they show in more cruel fashion their fixed belief in themselves and in the rightfulness of their cause, and their incapacity for understanding the rights or feelings of those opposed to them. In the grim struggle for life or death conscientious discrimination entirely disappeared. The contest seemed to lie between two savage races capable of no thought but that, regardless of all justice or mercy, their enemies should be exterminated. Deeds of cruelty on one side and the other were perpetrated, over which it is necessary to draw a veil, and a spirit of bloodthirsty recklessness was exhibited, which in calmer times fills the mind with horror. Such was the natural result of the position occupied by the English in India. The rightfulness of the position may well be questioned; but if it be once granted that it is justifiable, then the murderous treachery of the natives, the acute character of the danger to which the English were exposed, the necessity for asserting our supremacy at all hazards, give a satisfactory excuse for all that was done. This was the view which England took. Any cruelty caused by excess of zeal was condoned. No praise was too great to lavish on the splendid work of those who had saved the Empire. Yet the mutineers who were shot from the guns, the hundreds of unarmed Sepoys who were cut to pieces in pursuit, or hanged in cold blood after capture, were brave men fighting after the nature of their kind for a national liberty which they loved, or for a religion in which they devoutly believed. The Mutiny was still unrepressed when Parliament assembled in February 1858. But the popular feeling that the Indian revolt with all its horrors was traceable to misgovernment was too strong to be Palmerston's Feb. 12, 1858. restrained. The worst of the crisis appearing to be over, the Ministry felt it necessary to introduce a Bill upon the subject. There was a widespread feeling that one of the chief evils in Indian administration was the double system of government, and it appeared to many a monstrous thing that the rule of so vast a portion of our Empire should be in the hands of a mercantile 1858] PALMERSTON'S INDIA BILL 329 company, even though its powers were largely restrained by the concurrent jurisdiction of a department of the Government. The general voice demanded that the divided authority of Crown and Company should cease, and that the government should be consolidated in the hands of the Crown alone. The Directors of the Company drew up an able petition against the abolition of the Company, pointing out the advantages which had accrued from their government, and claiming credit for their worthy management of India. This view was upheld by those who represented the Indian interest in Parliament. They pointed out that every instance of aggressive policy was due to the coercive influence of Parliament, and not to the will of the Directors; while not a few statesmen of high rank, and among them John Stuart Mill, believed that the withdrawal of the check exercised by the Directors, and the transference of all power and patronage to the Government, would be injurious to the best interests of India, by bringing it at once into the sphere of party politics: "and thus converting the administration of that country into a thing to be scrambled for by the second and third class of English Parliamentary politicians." But in spite of ably supported arguments in this direction, the general sense of the glaring anomalies of the double system, and of the want both of rapid action and direct responsibility which it entailed, was too strong to be resisted. The prevalent feeling found expression in the speech of Sir George Lewis, Chancellor of the Exchequer. All the good deeds of which the Company boasted were, he declared, subsequent to 1784, subsequent, that is, to the time when the Company was subjected to Parliamentary control. The double government begun by Mr. Pitt in that year, perfected by Mr. Dundas in 1793, reduced the Company to complete political subordination. In 1813 their monopoly of trade with India was removed; in 1833 their monopoly of trade with China. Originally a trading company, having accidentally acquired governing powers, the establishment of the Board of Control had reduced them to the condition of subordinate governors retaining their original capacity for trade. On the renewal of their charter in 1833 their powers had been still further diminished, and one-third of the Court of Directors consisted of nominees of the Crown. Thus stripped of its original commercial monopoly, and closely restricted in its powers of government, the Company remained only as a piece of effete and cumbrous machinery serving no end except to hamper the administration. Lord Palmerston thought it necessary therefore to introduce a Bill for transferring the whole government to the Crown. But he was not destined to carry out the measure: an unexpected defeat drove him from office. On the 14th of January an attempt had been made to assassinate the Emperor of the French. While he was Orsini attempts driving with the Empress to the Opera-House, three to assassinate Napoleon. Jan. 14, 1858. bombs were thrown under his carriage with such terrible effect that, though he himself escaped unhurt, ten innocent persons were killed, and no less than 156 more or less wounded. The chief of the conspirators was Orsini, an Italian refugee. Naturally the greatest indignation was felt at this cruel and reckless assault, and when it appeared that the plot had been concocted and the bombs made in England, the anger of the French was turned upon their allies, who had allowed such a crime to be hatched undisturbed under the cover of hospitality. On the 20th of January, Count Walewski, the French Foreign Minister, wrote a despatch to the English Ministers, in which in strong words he called attention to what had happened, and while refraining from indicating any particular measure, demanded that "her Majesty's Government should assist in averting a repetition of such guilty enterprises, by affording a guarantee of security, which no state could refuse to a neighbouring state, and which the French were authorised to expect from an ally." In introducing this demand the despatch had asserted that this fresh attempt, like those which preceded it, had been devised in England, and went on to say of the attitude of the demagogues established in England, "it is assassination elevated to a doctrine, preached openly, turned against practised in repeated attempts, the most recent of which has just struck Europe with amazement. Ought then the right of asylum to protect such a state of things? Is hospitality due to assassins? Ought the English legislation to contribute to their designs and their plans? and can it continue to shelter persons who, by their flagrant acts, place themselves beyond the pale of common rights, and under the ban of humanity?" The despatch remained without a written reply. At the same time addresses of congratulation on his escape poured in upon the Emperor, and among others several from the French army. They were couched in most exaggerated and injudicious language. One demanded "an account of the land which contains the haunts of the monsters who are sheltered by its laws. Give us the order, Sire, and we will pursue them even to their strongholds." Another said, "Let the miserable assassins, the subordinate agents of such crimes, receive the chastisement due to their abominable attempts, but let also the infamous haunt in which machinations so infernal are planned (presumably London) be French anger England. |