BOOKS.

COOPER'S CRISIS TILE PUNJAUB--RAIIES'S REVOLT IN TILE NORTH-WEST PROVINCES.

THE two books before us differ from the other publications on the Indian mutiny, not only by the official position of their authors, but by the districts and the subjects to which they relate. Pre- vious works have narrated heroic action—the capture of Delhi, or heroic suffering dashed with anxiety—the siege of Lucknow, while newspaper narratives have generally run in the same di- rection. This was natural. The capture of one city, the relief of the other, were turning points of the campaign, both in a moral and military sense. The Punjaub under John Lawrence was in- deed equally important; for it was thence that the men and munitions of war came which enabled us to carry the capital of the great Mogul. But this succour, though not overlooked by the public, was not so striking in itself as the more obviously active proceeding's at Delhi and Lucknow. Agra was comparatively put aside. People might be confined or cooped up, suffer from close quarters, or it might be short commons, as well as rumours of wars ; but the place had not the strategical importance of Delhi, and did not apparently promise to regale the lovers of horrors with a repetition of Cavvnpore. The class of mind also in the volumes before us is of a different character to that which has hitherto been employed on current narratives in connexion with the mutiny. Both writers have been compelled by their position to become acquainted with native character, and observers of public events; both have been practically engaged in the affairs of which they treat ; Mr. Cooper as Deputy Commissioner of ilmritsur, a higher office than the title implies ; Mr. Raikes in various Offices, the mutiny finding him at Agra a Judge of the Sudder Court. Mr. Raikes is well known for his free and sound observations on Indian affairs and his lively descriptions of Indian life in his " Notes on the North-Western Provinces of India."t We do not know that Mr. Cooper has appeared before the world as an author ; but he has a freely-flowing vigorous style, which is often the accompaniment of a vigorous mind and promptitude in action ; and nowhere we think are these qualities so fully dis- played as in the civil and military servants of the East India Company.

A main object of Mr. Cooper's Crtzus in the Punjaub is to bring out the resolution, skill, and energy of Sir John Lawrence and his coadjutors in trampling down rebellion in their own dominion, while they supplied Upper India with the means of crushing Delhi, and subsequently relieving Agra and pushing the war in Oude. So far as Lawrence himself is concerned, this object is not very perfectly attained. The world already knew in a general way, the unshaken courage with which he received the disastrous news of the outbreak ; the prompt determination with which he prevented, or met and put down the attempts at Sepoy mutiny in his own district, mainly by means of the Sikh soldiery and the people who had been gained over to our rule. Neither was there any secret in the energetic daring with which he half-denuded. his own province of men and supplies, while the flames of the mutiny were yet smouldering around him, to enable Delhi to be successfully assaulted. All this, as we say, was known vaguely, but of the modus operandi—the conception, the preparation, and the execution, the public are ignorant, and this narrative will scarcely supply the detailed knowledge. Of Nicholson there is a fuller view. The reader sees the skill with which he selected a commanding position, the rapidity with which he sallied forth upon the mutinous enemy, and striking a deadly blow was ready to repeat his swoop in some other direction. But we lose sight of John Lawrence in action.

What the Crisis in the Punjaub thoroughly does is to give an account of the mutinous outbreaks at the different stations, and the manner in which they were met. This was mostly done with vigour and determination; sometimes in a resolute spirit, but with too much of the regulation-style thoroughly to destroy all danger and furnish an example ; more rarely with that procrasti- natinating formalism, which in other parts of India allowed the mutiny to make head, and the guilty to escape, at all events, from the immediate consequences of their crime. Some portions of this narrative are a repetition of Sepoy folly, hypocrisy, treach- ery, and cruelty as told in the public journals, by Mead in his Sepoy Revolt, and other writers. A considerable part of it is fresh and graphic, especially in the description of the military proceedings to effect the disarming, which are made as clear by typographical indications as by plans. The first great stroke of wisdom and decision—the disarming of the Sepoy regiments at the cantonment of Mean Meer, was heralded, like Waterloo, by a

ball.

"On the 12th May, the shadow of coming. events had not cast its gloom over society : a ball and supper were to be given on that evening. While the ordinary preparations for this festivity were in process, extraordinary measures for a very different spectacle for the morning were being matured.

" The ball was permitted to proceed ; but it soon languished : strange rumours got about the room concerning the morning parade of all troops, which had been announced for daybreak.

• The Crisis in the Punjaub, from the 10th of May until the Fall of Delhi. By

Frederic Cooper, Esq. C.S., Deputy Commissioner of Umritsur. With a Map. Published by Smith, Elder, and Co.

Notes on the Revolt in the North-Western Provinces of India. By Charles Raikes, Judge of the Sadder Court at Agra: late Civil Commissioner with Sir Colin Campbell: Author of " Notes on the North-western Province) of India." Pub", lished by Longmans and Co.

+ 8palator for 1852, page 808. " Scarcely before the dancers departed, three Companies of H. M.'s 81st fell in and marched off to the fort at Lahore under Colonel Smith. Ten men per company had been also ordered to sleep in their barrack rooms with 'their clothes on.' At four o'clock in the morning, the remainder of the regiment fell in, and were ordered to loosen their ammunition ; a pro- ceeding which aroused the curiosity of the honest soldiers to the highest

pitch. Knowing looks began to be exchanged, and queries to the purport of What's in the wind' were freely passed, but not responded to, as none could divine."

After describing the effectively simple manoeuvre by which the native infantry and cavalry—in line at sunrise parade with the 81st, and the artillery, were brought directly face to face with the latter, Mr. Cooper proceeds.

" Hesitation was useless. The Sepoys confronted immediate death : in which, by the way, the officers would have been sacrificed. Some say their demeanour varied, and that the 16th Grenadiers made a clutch at their arms when they appreciated their utter discomfiture. Be this as it may, the regiments, shorn of their arms, marched back ; the bands playing and colours flying. A company of her Majesty's 81st fell out, in ordinary course ; and with the cool complacency of the European who summed up the whole crisis with the question to his commanding officer—' I suppose, Sir, it's them niggers again,' they, in an orderly and business-like way, packed the weapons of the dishonoured soldiery in carts, and escorted them to barracks.

" This refreshing spectacle thus concluded ; and it was the first of the sort. Simple as was the affair, common-place apparently as was the manoeuvre, the transaction of that morning hour was the turning-point in the destiny of the Punjaub. The Asiatic mind, ' unstable as water,' had been dealt with in the mode that has ever insured success. The initiative' had been taken, and the tables turned on him : trumps were led while he was finessing. Some 3500 men, with treachery and rebellion at their hearts, their plans concerted, but their aim uncertain, quietly laid down their arms in the presence of a dozen guns and three hundred rank and file of H. M.'s 81st Regiment. It was, in a military point of view, a simple, peaceful, and, politically speaking, a fateful piece of business. All honour to those who carried out the operation."

The promptitude shown at the outset in disarming was subse- quently displayed in the pursuit and often in the punishment of the mutineers. This was sometimes unsparing, occasionally ruthless. No doubt severity was necessary in dealing with trea- son so black, and too often with crime so cruel and atrocious. When the danger which surrounded men, women, and even children, is considered, as well as the political urgency of the case, and the bloody anarchy that would follow the overthrow of the English power, (if servants of the English people could contemplate such a thing,) to have yielded impunity to the guilty few, might only have led to the destruction of the innocent many. Prompt execu- tion was not merely the right political course, but mercy in the end. Yet to those who read the narratives of slaughter at a distance, after the event, and removed from the atmosphere of anger and from the necessity which surrounded the actors, one or two of the examples seem very terrible. Such is the case with the punishment of the 26th native infantry. This regiment was one of those bands disarmed at Mean Meer in May, as already described. Whether from folly, or weariness, or as Mr. Cooper seems inclined to believe, in consequence of a conspiracy among the disarmed men to desert by regiments, if the proceedings of the 26th succeeded, that regiment on the 30th July began by murdering their commanding-officer and the serjeant-major, and then made oft; after failing to kill Lieutenant White. They were immediately pursued by a military force, but in a wrong direction, a dust storm favouring their evasion. News, however, was brought to the Deputy Commissioner, of the course they had really taken, and he followed on the track with such native force as he could collect.

" It was reported at mid-day, on the 31st of July, that they [the escaped mutineers] were trying to skirt the left bank of the Ravee ; but had met with unexpected and determined opposition from the Tehseeldar, with a posse of police, aided by a swarm of sturdy villagers at a ghat twenty-six miles from the station. A rapid pursuit was at once organized. "At four o'clock, when the district officer arrived with some eighty or ninety horsemen, he found a great struggle had taken place : the gore, the marks of the trampling of hundreds of feet, and the broken banks of the river, which, augmented with the late rains, was sweeping in a vast volume, all testified to it. Some 150 had been shot, mobbed backwards into the river, and drowned inevitably ; too weakened and famished as they must have been after their forty miles flight to battle with the flood. The main body had fled upwards and swum over on pieces of wood, or floated on to an island about a mile off from the shore, where they might be descried crouching like a brood of wild fowl. It remained to capture this body, and having done so, to execute condign pudishment at once. "Everything natural, artificial, and accidental, favoured the attempt and combined to secure the fate of the mutineers. So cool was the day that no horses were knocked ur though the riding was very heavy, and the distance they had made twenty-six miles) from Umritsur was great. The sun was waxing low, and the dispirited mutineers probably would magnify the numbers of the reinforcing party ; and, moreover, probably would think that the Tehseeldar, with all the villagers who had attacked them so warmly in the first instance, was still on the bank flushed with recent triumph, and eager with accession of strength ; whereas, in fact, many had gone in pursuit of stragglers some ten miles off. These were the calculations of the district officer, and they turned out not amiss."

By pluck, audacity, artifice, and luck, the whole body were eventually captured, marched back to the police-station, and safely lodged there before midnight.

" A drizzling rain coming on prevented the commencement of the execu- tion ; so a rest until daybreak was announced. Before dawn another batch of sixty-six was brought in and as the police-station was then nearly full they were ushered into a large round tower or bastion. * * *

" As fortune would have it, again favouring audacity, a deep dry well was discovered within one hundred yards of the police station, and its pre- sence furnished a convenient solution as to the one remaining difficulty, which was of sanitary consideration—the disposal of the corpses of the dis-

honoured soldiers. * *

" When the morrow dawned, sentries were placed round the town, to prevent the egress of sight-seers. The officials were called ; and they were made aware of the character of the spectacle they were about to witness. " Ten by ten the sepoys were called forth. Their names having been i taken down in succession, they were. inioned, linked together, and marched to execution ; a firing-party being in readiness. Everyphase of deport_ meat was manifested by the doomed men, after the sullenp firing of volleys of distant musketry forced the conviction of inevitable death : astonish- ment, rage, frantic despair, the most stoic calmness. One detachment, al they passed, yelled to the solitary Anglo-Saxon magistrate, as he sat under the shade of the police-station performing his solemn duty, with his native officials around him, that he, the Christian, would meet the same fate ; then as they passed the reserve of young Sikh soldiery, who were to relieve the executioners after a certain period, they danced, though pinioned, insulted the Sikh religion, and called on Gungajee to aid them ; but they only in one instance provoked a reply, which was instantaneously checked. Others again petitioned to be allowed to make one last salaam ' to the Sahib. "About 150 having been thus executed, one of the executioners swooned away, (he was the oldest of the firing-party,) and a little respite was al- lowed. Then proceeding, the number had arrived at two hundred and thirty-seven ; when the district-officer was informed that the remainder re- fused to come out of the bastion, where they had been imprisoned tem- porarily a few hours before. Expecting a rush and resistance, preparations were made against escape; but little expectation was entertained of the real and awful fate which had fallen on the remainder of the mutineers; they had anticipated, by a few short hours, their doom. The doors were opened" and, behold ! they were nearly all dead ! Unconsciously, the tragedy of- llolwelPs Black Hole had been reenacted. No cries had been heard during the night, in consequence of the hubbub, tumult, and shouting of the crowds of horsemen, police, tehseel guards, and excited villagers.. Forty- five bodies, dead from fright, exhaustion, fatigue, heat, and partial suffoca- tion, were dragged into light, and consigned, in common with all the other bodies, into one common pit, by the hands of the village sweepers.

" One Sepoy only was too much wounded in the conflict to suffer the agony of being taken to the scene of execution. He was accordingly re. prieved for Queen's evidence, and forwarded to Lahore, with some forty- one subsequent captures, from IJmiitsur. There, in full parade before the other mutinously-disposed regiments at Meean Meer, they all suffered death by being blown away from the cannon's-mouth. The execution at Ujnalla commenced at day-break, and the stern spectacle was over in a few hours. Thus, within forty-eight hours from the date of the crime, there fell by the law nearly 500 men."

The principal actor in this terrible drama appears to have been the author himself, and this is his commentary.

" The above account, written by the principal actor in the scene himself, might read strangely at home ; a single Anglo-Saxon, supported by a sec- tion of Asiatics, undertaking so tremendous a responsibility, and coldly pre- siding over so memorable an execution, without the excitement of battle, or a sense of individual injury, to imbue the proceedings with the faintest hue of vindictiveness. The Governors of the Punjaub are of the true Eng- lish stamp and mould, and knew that England expected every man to do his duty, and that duty done, thanks them warmly for doing it. The crime was mutiny, and had there even been no murders to darken the me- mory of these men, the law was exact. The punishment was death. " .Political reasons also governed the occasion, and led to the decision is to immediate execution."

The Notes on the _Revolt in the North-Western Provinces, by Mr. Charles Raikes, is a combination of personal observations with generalized criticisms and suggestions. The observations relate to what he heard, saw, and did, during the long four months of apprehension and suspense when he, in common with the other European residents of all ranks, was shut up at Agra, till the capture of Delhi enabled Greathed to march to its relief. They also contain a very interesting narrative of a subsequent visit to Delhi, and of the author's personal intercourse with Sir Colin Campbell, whom he was to have accompanied as chief com- missioner, had Sir Colin's original plan as to Rohilound been fol- lowed out. The generalized remarks embrace some criticisms on the past, and various suggestions for the future, in reference to the reconstitution of the police and native army, our policy in reference to religion, education, and hospital management, the treatment or rather punishment of the Bengal Sepoy, the circum- stances of the late revolt, and our future relations to the people and princes of India. The general part is the most important in a political point of view. Acquainted from actual experience with the working of the new system in the Punjaub, and the older system in the North-West Provinces, Mr. Raikes is able to estimate both ; and prefers the fresh and free to the formal. The terrible lessons going on around him for so many months have been read to some purpose, sharpening his observation, and modifying foregone con- clusions. His suggestions may not always be new, and bang drawn from facts as open to others as to himself, novelty would not always be a recommendation; but they are useful as confirm- ing the opinions of others. All are worth consideration, from the principles that should govern the reconstruction of our native army and the policy which should manage it, down to the remo- val of all natives from all medical control, as they are morally unfit. The personal observations containing extracts from the journal, and vivid reminiscences their reperusal has called up, are more interesting than the general suggestions. They furnish a picture of the anxiety and privation of every-day life, felt by all in the disturbed districts ; they let the reader behind the scenes, show- ing the many varying and distracting demands that come upon the most strong-willed chief, and overwhelm the weaker minded ; they indicate many blots in our system, which but for the mutiny would have continued spreading, and which let us hope we shaY not allow to remain, by lapsing into supineness when the war is over. Neither must it be supposed that the observations are un- important because they have more individual life than the syste- matic essays. Occasionally a particular instance more forcibly brings out the general conclusion. Such is this conclusion from a visit to an independent chief.

" Pending a reply to my letters to Agra and the head-quarters camp, I paid a visit to the reply of Putialee. This powerful chief had ren- dered such important services to the British Government during the con-

against the mutineers at Delhi, that I was anxious, on behalf of the

lgra Government, to express my acknowledgments. After a visit of some da,-,3 to Putialee, I can more than ever enter into the feelings of aversion with which our ablest officers regard any further annexation of native gates. I can conceive no greater crime, nor anymore extravagant political blunder, than it would be to annex such a principality as this of Putialee. To say ?bat the subjects of this state are as contented and happy as those in our own conterminous districts is not enough. They get, I believe, cheaper and speedier justice than their near neighbours at Paniput did under the late Agra regime. They

are, if anything, better fed, clothed, and housed than our own subjects ; and, is no small matter, they are, so long as

we leave them alone, on our side. In order to cement the existing good feeling between us and native independent or protected states, we might well assure them, for the future, that even in the event of a failure of direct heirs we have no wish to assume charge of new territories. Our true strength is in the support and confidence of our native allies, not in any further increase of territory."

The same Prince warned Mr. Raikes against an error into which we are very likely to fall, a mere transfer of confidence from the Sepoy to the Sikh. And this warning chimed in with others he had heard at Delhi.

" Leading me aside, he [the Maharajah] gave earnest warning of the dangers of too large aSikh army. '" Wait, sir,' said he, until this excitement of victory, this surfeit of plunder, be over ; wait till you mass large bodies of Sikhs in your canton- ments, and then remember that I warned you of the danger.' This conver- sation made the greater impression on me as confirming the views of Bri- gadier Chamberlain, who a few days before had said to me, The Sepoys have waited a hundred years to mutiny ; the Sikhs, if subject to like temptations, will not wait ten.' He also had received from the Rajah of Jheend a similar warning. Making full allowance for the hereditary pre- udice which these Rajahs, as Malwa Sikhs, have against the Manjha Sikhs, yet consider that we must be careful how we handle our Sikh levies ; but I shall return to this subject in a future chapter."

It should be said in defence of the seventies exercised in the Punjaub, that Mr. Raikes, though far from indiscriminate in his censure of the natives, conceives that no mutineer should escape unpunished.

" If any native of India, who, having once eaten of our salt, has lifted his hand against us, be permitted under the shade of his village groves to boast of his exploits against the ruling power, there is so far an end to our prestige. Either mutiny must be connected in the mind of our subjects with death, whether social or physical, or we shall have more mutinies. Severity is the truest mercy in this case, and the only safety."

And Hodson was for still more extreme measures, grounded on the necessities of the future.

" In the afternoon General Grant and Hodson called. The latter re- marked to me that his Sikhs are anxiously watching our treatment of mu- tineers. They say, ' Just now you are very angry with the Sepoys, but six months hence the Lord Sahib (Governor-General) will pardon them all.' Hodson is clearly of opinion, that unless the mutineers are fairly hunted down and sentenced either to death or transportation for life, that we may expect before long a Sikh mutiny. They are watching to see whether mu- tiny is not condoned by the British Government ; and if it is condoned the Sikhs will have their turn, for they will argue, If we get the best of it we gain everything, and if we lose we shall be as well off as we were before.' These are the natural speculations of semi-barbarous men."

Turn we from the larger politics of India to more personal mat- ters. This was the appearance of the heroes of Delhi as they marched into Agra.

"The column came in by long forced marches, owing to an express sent out by Colonel Fraser. From the bastion we went down to the Delhi Gate. The Queen's 8th passed within three yards of us. 'Those dreadful-looking men must be Afghans,' said a lady to me, as they slowly and wearily marched by. I did not discover they were Englishmen until I saw a short clay pipe in the mouth of nearly the last man. My heart bled to see these

Sjaded miserable objects, and to think of all they must have suffered since ay last, to reduce fine Englishmen to such worn, sun-dried skeletons. Sure, your honour,' said an Irish serjeant, and it's the air has been too strong for 'ern ; they was well enough in Delhi amongst the stink, but coming out into the fresh country air has been too much for 'cm.' I did not argue the point, but thought that the damp nights and hot days, with long marches and constant fights, had probably done more harm to the poor fel- lows than the fresh country air.'

The same day the mutineers attacked Greathed and were tho- roughly routed by the worn and wearied soldiers ; many of whom were borne back wounded to be nursed by the English ladies of Agra.

"Ere long the spacious corridors were filled with sick and wounded men. Dr. Farquhar requested Mrs. Raikes to preside over the hospital arrange- ments. Of her labours, and of those of many ladies who, with her soothed and tended the sufferers, I will say not another word. But, I must describe the conduct of the British soldier in the day of sickness and pain. For weeks that the ladies watched over their charge, never was a word said by a sol- dier which could shock the gentlest ear. When all was over, and when such of the sick and wounded as recovered were declared convalescent, the soldiers, in order, as they expressed it, to show their gratitude for the kind- ness of the ladies, modestly asked permission to invite their nurses and all the gentry and society of Agra to an entertainment in the beautiful gardens of the Taj. There, under the walls of the marble mausoleum, amidst Bowers and music, these rough veterans, all scarred and mutilated as they were, stood up to thank their countrywomen who had clothed, fed, and visited them, when they were sick. Every lady in Agra was ready to.join in this good work, and not one of them but will bear testimony to the deli- cacy of feeling and conduct, as well as the hearty gratitude, of these brave men."

The official position of Mr. Raikes brought him into close rela-

tions with Mr. Colvin the Lieutenant-Governor of Agra, Sir Cohn Campbell, and other authorities. Of the kind of matter this experience furnished, we take a few specimens.

lir. Colvin in Council.—"' Wednesday, 13th May.—Summoned to Govern- ment House to take part in a council of war.' "Here I pause to look back to that scene. Mr. Colvin had received re- ports from which he was led to suppose, that the mutineers from Meerut, after sacking Delhi and committing atrocities there, were marching on Agra. I found the Lieutenant-Governer already exposed to that rush of alarm,ld: suggestion, expostulation and thieat, which went on increasing for nearly two months until he was driven broken-hearted into the fort. The critic may ask, why did Mr. Colvin allow any man to advise, threaten, or expostulate ? My answer is, that his position from the first was one of ex- treme difficulty ; he did his duty to the best of his ability, and his devotion to the public good ended only with his life. To say that he made some mis- takes is to say that he was a man. "One officer rushed in to suggest that we should all retire to the fort, another to ask what was to be done at the jail, a third to speak about provi- sions, a fourth about the Sepoy regiments in cantonments. Every man was anxious to do his best, but to do it in his own way."

Foresight of the Indian Authorities.—" Mr. Thornhill, Secretary to Go- vernment, came with his family to our house to sleep, or rather to pass the night, for too many reports and notes came in to allow him much rest. He observed to me, that the Sepoys held our forts, treasuries, and arsenals all over the country, and that if they rose at once upon us there was no Euro- pean force to put them down."

Origin of the " difference" between _Lord Canning and his Commander- in-chief.—" Sir Colin gave me the following account of the reported mis- understanding' between him and the Governor-General, which once caused serious public uneasiness, and resulted in explanations in Parliament. " One sultry evening, not long after Sir Colin's arrival in Calcutta, where he was the guest of Lord and Lady Canning, Sir David Baird re- minded him that dinner was just coming on the table. Sir Colin had been writing despatches all day, was too tired to make a regular dinner toilette, and, taking Sir David by the arm, strolled across to a neighbouring hotel, where they took a quiet chop and bottle of claret.'

" The next day it was all over Calcutta that Sir Colin had so serious a misunderstanding with Lord Canning that he had actually left Government House."

The Mahometan population did not come so fully before Mr. Cooper as before Mr. Raikes : but the last seems to think that it is with them that the great mischief was and is, Both assume the fact of a general conspiracy as too true to need any proof, caste and cartridges merely furnishing an excuse or a means of stimulating the Hindoos. Of their folly—their total want of head and judgment—both writers speak strongly. In fact, Mr. Cooper, with the Chaplain of the Delhi forces, traces their blindness to the

immediate finger of Providence.