It will now be convenient to state the rules for finding which of the

agnates take as residuaries of the deceased. These are, in ordinary

circumstances, the male agnates only, and the rule in question depends

upon a classification of the male agnates which is common in other parts

of the world. Every family consisting of several generations of male

agnates may be broken up into groups, each of which has a separate

common ancestor of its own. Thus, suppose A to be the person from whom

the descent is to be traced. A belongs to a large group of persons, all

of whom are males descended from a common ancestor D. But A and his or

her own male descendants form a smaller group, which we may call the

group A. This is the first class of male agnates of A. Then suppose A to

be the son or daughter of B, excluding those who are descendants of A,

and as such included in the first class, the remaining male descendants

of B will form the second class of male agnates of A. In like manner we

get a third class of male agnates of A who are descendants of C,

excluding those who are descendants of A or B; and a fourth class of

male agnates of A who are descendants of D, excluding those who are

descendants of A, B, or C. This classification can obviously be carried

through as many generations as we please. Mahommedan lawyers adopt this

classification with only one difference. Between the first and second

classes they interpose a class consisting entirely of the direct male

ancestors, which they call the "root," so that the male descendants of A

(the person whose heirs are in question) would be the first class of

residuaries. B, C, D, &c., would be the second class of residuaries; the

male descendants of B, other than the descendants of A, would be the

third class of residuaries; the male descendants of C, other than the

descendants of B and A, would be the fourth class of residuaries, and so

on. In order to find the residuaries who are to succeed, we have only to

take the classes in their order, and of the highest class which is

represented to select the nearest to the deceased. If there are several

who are equidistant, they will take equally _per caput_.

The sharers are, of course, those to whom a share is assigned by the

Koran. They are (1) the father, (2) lineal male ancestors, whom

Mahommedans call the "true grandfathers," (3) uterine half-brothers,

i.e. the half-brothers by the mother, (4) daughters, (5) daughters of a

son, or other direct male descendant, whom we call daughters of a son

how low and soever, (6) the mother, (7) true grandmothers, i.e. female

ancestors into whose line no male except a lineal male ancestor enters,

(8) full sisters, (9) consanguine half-sisters, i.e. half-sisters by the

father, (10) uterine half-sisters, (11) the husband, (12) the wives. The

right to a share and the amount of it depends upon the state of the

family. Under Mahommedan law not only, as elsewhere, the nearer relative

excludes the more remote, but there are special rules of total or

partial exclusion arising out of the equitable considerations upon which

all rules of distribution are based.

These rules are best shown by taking the case of each member of the

family in turn, and at the same time it will be useful to explain the

general position of each member. First, the sons. They take no share,

but they are first in the first class of residuaries, and their position

is a very strong one; they exclude entirely sisters and daughters from a

share, and they reduce considerably the shares of the husband, the

widows, and the mother. The position of the other male descendants is

very similar to that of the sons. They are not sharers; they are

residuaries of the first class, and will take as such if the

intermediate persons are dead. They reduce the shares of some of the

sharers, but not to the same extent as the sons. The father is a

residuary of the second class, and the first in that class. But he is

also a sharer, and as such is entitled to a share of one-sixth. He can

take in both capacities. The father's father is also a residuary of the

second class, and he is a sharer, entitled to a share of one-sixth, but

of course he cannot take either as sharer or residuary if the father is

alive. The position of any true grandfather is analogous. An only

daughter takes as sharer one-half of the property, two or more daughters

take one-third between them. But sons exclude daughters from a share,

and they would get nothing. Naturally this was considered unjust, and a

remedy has been found by making the daughters what are called

"residuaries in right of their brothers," each daughter taking half of

what a son takes. The mother gets a share of one-sixth when there is a

child of the deceased, or a child of any son how low and soever; also

when there are two or more brothers or sisters. In any other case her

share is one-third. If, however, the wife, or the husband (as the case

may be), and the father are alive, the share of the mother is only

one-third of what remains after deducting the share of the husband or

the wife. The brother is never a sharer. He is a residuary of the third

class, and he excludes some sharers. The daughters of a son how low and

soever get a share of two-thirds between them if there are several; if

there is only one she gets one-half. But the daughters of a son are

excluded by any direct male descendant who is nearer to the deceased

than themselves, or at the same distance from him. If, however, they are

excluded by a person who is at the same distance from the deceased as

themselves, Mahommedan lawyers again say that they come in as

residuaries in right of that person, each female as usual taking half as

much as each male. Of course the daughters of a son may also be excluded

by the daughters having exhausted the two-thirds allotted to females. A

single sister takes a share of one-half; several sisters take two-thirds

between them. Sisters are excluded from a share by any residuary of the

first class, and their own brothers also exclude them, but in the latter

case they take as residuaries in right of their brothers, each sister

taking half what a brother takes. So, again, the sisters may be excluded

from a share by the daughters or daughters of sons having exhausted the

two-thirds allotted to females, and the residue would go to the nearest

male agnate--that is, the uncle or the nephew of the deceased, or some

more distant relative. To prevent this Mahommedan lawyers say that in

this case the sisters are residuaries, basing their assertion upon a

somewhat vague tradition. The share of the husband in the property of

the wife is one-fourth if there are surviving children, one-half if

there are none. The share of the widow in the property of her deceased

husband is one-eighth if there are surviving children, one-fourth if

there are not. The nearest true grandmother takes a share of one-sixth.

If there are several equidistant, they take one-sixth between them. The

uterine half-brothers take a share of one-third when there is only one,

but they are excluded by any direct descendant and by any direct male

ascendant. Uterine half-sisters are in the same position as uterine

half-brothers. Consanguine half-brothers are residuaries of the same

class as brothers, but only take in default of full brothers.

Consanguine half-sisters take a share of two-thirds, or if there is only

one she takes a share of one-half. But if there is a full sister also,

the full sister takes one-half, and the consanguine sisters one-sixth

between them. The consanguine half-sisters, like the full sisters, are

excluded from a share by the children and the father of the deceased,

and also by full brothers and consanguine brothers; but in the last case

they come in again as residuaries, taking half what a brother takes.

The sharers must of course, unless excluded, be all satisfied before

anything is taken by the residuaries. But the sharers may not only

exhaust the property; there may not be enough to satisfy all the

claimants. Thus, if a man died leaving a wife, a mother and two

daughters, the shares are one-fourth, one-sixth and two-thirds, and the

sum of the shares being greater than unity, they cannot all be

satisfied. The difficulty is met by decreasing the shares rateably, in

other words, by increasing the common denominator of the fractions so as

to produce unity; hence the process is called the "increase." The

converse case arises when the shares of the sharers do not exhaust the

property, but there are no residuaries to take what remains. It has been

doubted whether the residue does not fall to the government as _bona

vacantia_. But it is now settled that the surplus is to be divided

rateably amongst the sharers in proportion to their shares. The process

is called the "return." The husband and the wife are excluded from the

benefit of the return. If there are no sharers, the whole estate will go

to the residuaries. If there are neither sharers nor residuaries, it

will go to the (so-called) distant kindred. Their claim is strong on

equitable grounds, as some of them are very near relations; such, for

example, as a daughter's children or a sister's children. Nevertheless

their claim has been doubted, and it must be admitted that there is no

very clear ground upon which It can be based. They are not mentioned as

sharers in the Koran, and it is not very clear how, as cognates, they

could have been recognized by any ancient Arabian custom. However, their

claim is now well established, and, in default of both sharers and

residuaries, they succeed on a plan somewhat resembling that on which

male agnates are classified as residuaries. If all the claimants fail

the property goes to the government, but there is one peculiar case.

Supposing a man dies leaving a widow, or a woman dies leaving a husband,

and no other relative. There is then a residue and no one whatever to

take it, as the husband and wife are excluded from the return. Strictly

speaking, it would fall to the government as _bona vacantia_, but the

claim is never made, and would now be considered as obsolete, the

husband or wife being allowed to take the property.

Under Mahommedan law there are certain grounds upon which a person who

would otherwise succeed as heir to a deceased person would be

disqualified. These grounds are--(1) that the claimant slew the deceased

by an act which, under Mahommedan law, would entail expiation or

retaliation, and this would include homicide by misadventure; (2) that

the claimant is a slave; (3) that he is an infidel, i.e. not of the

Mahommedan faith. The second impediment cannot now have any application

in India; the third has been removed by Act 21 of 1850. There is a rule

of Mahommedan law that if two persons die in circumstances which render

it impossible to determine which died first, as, for example, if both

went down in the same ship, for the purposes of succession it is to be

assumed that both died simultaneously.

Testamentary succession.

Mahommedan lawyers appear always to have recognized the validity of

wills, and they are said to be recognized by a passage in the Koran. But

the power of testamentary disposition is restricted within very narrow

limits. It only extends to one-third of the property after the payment

of debts and funeral expenses. There is no hint of this restriction in

the Koran, and it rests upon tradition. If the one-third has been

exceeded the legacies must be reduced rateably. The heirs, however, by

assenting to the legacies, may render them valid even though they exceed

the prescribed amount. There is no restriction as to the form of making

a will; it may be either oral or written. A legacy cannot be given to an

heir. Mahommedan law contains some very simple and wise provisions for

preventing the reckless and often unjust dispositions of property which

persons are apt to make upon the approach of death. A man who is "sick,"

that is, who is suffering from illness which ends in death, can only

give away one-third of his property; and if he has also made a will

containing legacies, the gifts and the legacies must be added together

in the computation of the disposable one-third. So long as slaves had a

money value, the value of the slaves liberated by a man on his deathbed

was also included, which reminds us of the _Lex Furia Caninia_ of the

Roman law. Another transaction by which the restriction on the

testamentary power might be eluded is that called _mohabat_. By this is

meant a transaction in the form of a sale, but which, from the

inadequacy of the price named, is obviously intended as a gift. If such

a transaction is entered into during "sickness," the loss to the estate

would have to be reckoned in computing the disposable one-third. But the

_mohabat_ transaction takes precedence of legacies. Another obvious mode

of eluding the restriction on the testamentary power is the

acknowledgment by a man on his deathbed of a fictitious debt; and it

would seem that such acknowledgments ought to have been put under

restriction. But Mahommedans, like other Orientals, have a useful,

though possibly a superstitious, dread of leaving the debts of a

deceased person unpaid, and it is this, no doubt, which has prevented

their questioning the deathbed acknowledgment of a debt, even though

there is every reason to believe it to be fictitious. All that has been

done is to prescribe that debts of health should be paid before debts of

sickness, and that debts cannot be acknowledged by a sick man in favour

of an heir.

Administration.

When a Mahommedan dies, the funeral expenses and the creditors must

first be paid; then the legatees, then the claims of the sharers, and,

lastly, those of the residuaries; or, if there are neither sharers nor

residuaries, those of the (so-called) distant kindred. The

administration of the estate need present no difficulties if there are

no disputes, and if there is some one empowered to take possession of

the property, to get in the debts, to satisfy the creditors, and

distribute the assets amongst the various claimants; and such a person

may be appointed by a Mahommedan in his will, who will perform these

duties. He is called a _wasi_, and he is in a position very similar to

an executor under English law. But if there is no _wasi_, even if there

are no disputes, there may be a good deal of trouble. It would have been

in accordance with the spirit of Mahommedan law, and with general

principles of equity, if an officer of the courts established under

British rule had been regularly empowered to take possession of the

property, and to take such measures as were necessary to ensure all the

claimants being satisfied in their proper order. But this view of their

powers has not been taken by the courts in India; recently, however,

they have been enabled by legislation to grant the power of

administering the estate to a single person.

Fictitious relationships.

There is scarcely any part of Europe or Asia where the creation of

fictitious relationships is altogether unknown. In many cases the object

of the creation is simply to obtain an heir. This is the object of

adoption amongst modern Hindus, and it is this, no doubt, which has led

some persons to speak of Hindu adoption as a rudimentary will. But

adoption, as such, has never obtained a footing in Mahommedan law. The

fictitious relationships which that law recognizes are based upon a

different idea. There was in early times a widespread notion that every

man must belong to some family either as a freeman or a slave. The

family to which a slave belongs is always that of his owner, and that of

a freeman is generally indicated by his birth. But a liberated slave has

no family, at least no recognized family; and as he cannot stand alone,

it was necessary to attach him to some family. Now, just as in Roman law

the freedman became a member of his master's family under the

relationship of _patronus_ and _cliens_, so in Mahommedan law a

liberated slave becomes a member of the master's family under the

relationship called _mawalat_. The object, of course, was to make the

master's family liable for the consequences of the wrongful acts of the

freed slave. As a compensation for the liability undertaken by the

master's family, in default of residuaries of the slave's own blood (who

can only be his own direct descendants), the master's family are

entitled to succeed as what are called "residuaries for special cause."

Of course the relationship of master and slave cannot now be created,

and it is scarcely probable that any case of inheritance could arise in

which it came into question. The relationship of _mawalat_ may, under

Mahommedan law, also be created in a case where a freeman is converted

to Islam. From a Mahommedan point of view he then stands alone, and

would be required to attach himself to some Mahommedan family. The form

of the transaction exactly indicates the nature of it. The party wishing

to attach himself says to the person ready to receive him, "Thou art my

kinsman, and shalt be my successor after my death, paying for me any

fine or ransom to which I may be liable." In this case also the family

of the person who receives the convert is entitled, in default of other

residuaries, to succeed to him as "residuaries for special cause." But

this transaction can have no meaning under English law, which does not

recognize the joint responsibility of the family, and it is therefore

also obsolete. In the case of _mawalat_ the rights of the persons

concerned are not reciprocal. The person received gains no right of

inheritance in the family into which he enters, and incurs no

responsibility for their acts. An important part may still be played in

Mahommedan law by the creation of relationships by acknowledgment. Any

such relationship may be created, provided that the parentage of the

person acknowledged is unknown; a person of known parentage cannot be

acknowledged. The age, sex and condition of the person acknowledged must

also be such that the relationship is not an impossible one; for, as was

said in the Roman law, _fictio naturam imitatur_. The relationship thus

constituted is, in the ease of a father, mother, child, or wife,

complete, and must be treated for all purposes as having a real

existence. But in any other case the acknowledgment, although good as

between the parties thereto, has no effect upon the rights of other

parties. The acknowledgment which we have just been considering

contemplates the possibility at any rate, and in most cases the

certainty, that the relationship is entirely fictitious, and has no

connexion with any rule of evidence in whatever sense the term is

understood. But there is a rule of Mahommedan law that, in cases where

the paternity of a child is in dispute, the acknowledgment of the child

by the father is conclusive. Whether this would now be maintained in

face of the Evidence Act 1870, which deals with cases of conclusive

evidence, and expressly repeals all previously existing rules of

evidence, may be doubtful.

Marriage.

Marriage is a transaction based upon consent between a man and a woman,

or between persons entitled to represent them. The result of the

transaction is that certain family relationships involving legal rights

and duties are created by the law, and these are not wholly under the

control of the parties. But as to some of them, to some extent they may

be regulated by agreement, and it is customary amongst Mahommedans at

the time of a marriage to come to such an agreement. The only condition

necessary to the constituting of a valid marriage between persons of

full age is the consent of the parties. It is, however, the practice to

conclude the transaction in the presence of two males, or one male and

two female witnesses; and the omission of this formality would always

throw a doubt upon the intention of the parties finally to conclude a

marriage. It is even said that the absence of such witnesses would

justify a judge in annulling the marriage. Minors of either sex may be

given in marriage by their guardian, and the transaction will be

irrevocable if the guardian be the father or any direct male ascendant.

In any other case the marriage may be repudiated when the minor arrives

at the age of puberty, but the repudiation is not effectual until

confirmed by a judge of the civil court. A marriage may be conducted

through agents. A woman can have only one husband; a man can have four

wives; if he married a fifth the marriage would be annulled by a judge

on the application of the woman. Mahommedans have a table of prohibited

degrees within which parties cannot marry not very dissimilar to that in

force in Great Britain. Nor can a man be married at the same time to two

women nearly related to each other, as to two sisters. It is also

considered that if a woman take a child to nurse she contracts a sort

of maternity towards it, and that if a boy and girl are nursed by the

same woman they become brother and sister, and, in a general way, it is

said "that whatever is prohibited in consanguinity is prohibited in

fosterage"; but it is doubtful whether the law goes so far. The widow,

or a divorced woman, is not allowed to marry again during her _iddut_.

This is a period of chastity which a woman is bound to observe in order

to avoid confusion of issue. If she is pregnant it lasts until the child

is born; if not, then in case of divorce it lasts through three periods

of menstruation; if she is a widow it lasts for four months and ten

days. A Mahommedan man cannot marry an idolatress, but Jews and

Christians are not thereby excluded, because, although infidels, they

are not idolatresses. A woman is forbidden by Mahommedan law to marry

any one who is not a Mahommedan; but if the marriage took place in

conformity with the Act of 1872 it might be valid, if it amounted to a

repudiation by the woman of her Mahommedanism. It is important to

remember, when considering the validity of a Mahommedan marriage, that a

distinction is drawn between marriages which are simply void (_batil_)

and those which can only be annulled by judicial decision (_farid_), for

such a decision has no retrospective effect, so that the children

already born are legitimate; and if no step is taken to obtain such a

decision during the existence of the marriage, it cannot be questioned

afterwards. What marriages are absolutely void, and what are only

capable of being declared void, is not very clearly settled, but the

evident leaning of Mahommedan law is against absolute invalidity, and

there is strong authority for the opinion that no marriages are

absolutely void except a marriage by a woman who has a husband living

and such as are declared to be incestuous.

Divorce.

A Mahommedan has the absolute right to divorce his wife whenever he

pleases without assigning any reason whatever for doing so. There are,

however, very strong social reasons which have considerable influence in

restraining the arbitrary exercise of the power. The power to divorce

remains notwithstanding any formal promise by the husband not to

exercise it, and it is even said that a divorce pronounced in a state of

intoxication, or by a slip of the tongue, or under coercion, is valid.

The divorce can, however, be revoked by the husband, but not after it

has been three times pronounced, or after the _iddut_ has been passed by

the woman. Nor can the husband remarry his divorced wife unless she has

been again married, and has been again divorced or become a widow, and

the intermediate marriage must have been consummated. The power to

divorce a wife may be entrusted by the husband to an agent acting on his

behalf, and this contrivance is sometimes made use of to enable a

woman's friends to rid her of her husband if he ill-treats her. The

husband may even empower the wife to divorce herself. If the husband or

the wife should happen to die whilst the divorce is still revocable, he

or she will inherit; and even a triple repudiation pronounced during

"sickness," that is death-sickness, will not deprive the woman of her

inheritance if the _iddut_ has not been passed. Of course there is

nothing to prevent the husband and the wife from agreeing to a divorce,

and to the terms on which it is to take place, and such an arrangement

is very common. The treatment of the wife by the husband is not a ground

upon which the marriage can be dissolved, but the impotence of the

husband is a ground of dissolution. The courts in India consider that

they have the power under Mahommedan law to grant a decree for the

restitution of conjugal rights.

Dower.

Dower in Mahommedan law is in the nature of a gift from the husband to

the wife on the marriage, like the _donatio propter nuptias_ of the

Roman law, or the _morgengabe_ of Teutonic nations. It may be either

"prompt," that is, payable at once, or the payment of it may be

deferred, or it may be partly the one and partly the other. The amount

of the dower and the time of payment ought to be settled by agreement

before the marriage takes place; if this is not done there is some

trouble in ascertaining the rights of the parties. It seems clear that a

woman is entitled as a matter of right to what is called a "proper

dower" if the dower is payable at once the woman may, before

consummation, refuse herself to her husband unless it is paid; whether

she can do so after consummation is doubtful. If the husband

capriciously repudiates the wife before consummation, or the wife before

consummation repudiates the husband for his misconduct, then half the

dower agreed on must be paid. If it is her misconduct which has caused

the repudiation, she is not entitled to anything. Deferred dower becomes

payable on the dissolution of the marriage either by death or by

divorce. Probably a judge, when called upon to dissolve or annul a

marriage, could make reasonable stipulations as to the dower. The dower

is the wife's own property, and, as the wife is entirely independent of

the husband in regard to her property, she can sue him or his

representatives for the dower like any other creditor. Mahommedans

generally before marriage enter into a formal contract which regulates

not only the dower, but various other matters under the control of the

parties, such as the visits the wife is to pay or receive, the amount of

liberty which she is to have and so forth.

Pre-emption.

The right of pre-emption under Mahommedan law is the right of a third

person, in certain circumstances, to step in and take the place of a

buyer, at the same price and on the same conditions as the buyer has

purchased. It applies only to the purchase of real property, and it can

only be exercised upon one of the three following grounds: (1) That the

claimant is owner of property contiguous to that sold; (2) that he is a

co-sharer in the property of which a share is being sold; (3) that he is

a participator in some right over the property, such, for example, as a

right of way over it. The claimant must announce his claim as soon as he

hears of the sale, and he must follow up this announcement by a further

claim in the presence of witnesses and of the seller, or, if possession

has been transferred, of the buyer.

Shiah System.

Mahommedan law, so far as it is administered by the courts of British

India for Sunnites of the Hanafite school--that is, for the great bulk

of Mahommedans--has attained a fair degree of precision, owing to the

care bestowed on their decisions by the judges of those courts, and the

assistance derived from Mahommedan lawyers. But much difficulty is

experienced as soon as we come to deal with Mahommedans of any other

description. No doubt in India any clearly-established custom prevalent

amongst a well-defined body of persons would be recognized, or any rule

of law founded upon texts which they accepted as authoritative. But it

is not always easy to determine when these conditions have been

satisfied. And to allow Mahommedans to set up a standard of rights and

duties different from that of the bulk of their correligionists without

this proof would lead not only to confusion but injustice. There is the

further difficulty that Mahommedan law, as applied to any Mahommedans

except those of the Hanafite school, has as yet been comparatively

little studied by modern lawyers, so that very little that is certain

can be said about it. There is, however, a considerable body of Shiites

in India whose legal system undoubtedly differs in some material

particulars from that of the Sunnites. The Mahommedans of Oudh are

generally Shiites, and Shiah families, mostly of Persian descent, are to

be found in other parts of India. The following points seem clear. A

marriage which the parties agree shall last for a fixed time, even for a

few hours only, is a valid marriage, and at the expiration of the time

agreed on the marriage ceases to exist. The relatives of the deceased,

whether male or female, and whether tracing their connexion through

males or females, may be sharers or residuaries. Both as sharers and

residuaries the children can claim to take the place of their parents in

the succession upon the principle of what we call representation. If

there are parents or descendants of the deceased, and the sharers do not

exhaust the property, the surplus is distributed amongst the sharers of

that class in proportion to their shares. If the property is not

sufficient to pay in full the shares of all the sharers, the shares do

not abate rateably; e.g. as between daughters and the parents, or the

husband, or the wife of the deceased the whole deduction is made from

the daughters' share.

AUTHORITIES.--(Mahommedan Law), Neil Baillie, _Digest of Mahommedan

Law_ (London, 1865); Sir R. K. Wilson, _Introduction to the Study of

Mahommedan Law_ (London, 1894); _Digest of Anglo-Mahommedan Law_

(London, 1895); Charles Hamilton, _The Hedaya translated_ (London,

1791); Syed Ameer Ali, _Lectures on Mahommedan Law_ (2 vols.,

Calcutta, 1891, 1894); Mahomed Yusoof, _Tagore Law Lectures_ (Calcutta

1895); Alfred v. Kremer, _Culturgeschichte des Orients_ (2 vols.,

Vienna, 1875). (W. Ma.)

INDIAN MUTINY, THE, the great revolt of the Bengal native army in 1857,

which led to the transference of Indian government from the East India

company to the crown in 1858. The mediate cause of the Mutiny was the

great disproportion between the numbers of British and native troops in

India, which gave the sepoys an exaggerated notion of their power; its

immediate causes were a series of circumstances which promoted active

discontent with British rule.

Disaffection in the Native Army.

During the century which elapsed between the victory of Plassey and the

outbreak at Meerut, the East India company relied mainly on native

troops with a stiffening of British soldiers--especially artillery--for

the successful conduct of its wars. The warlike Hindu and Mahommedan

races supplied excellent fighting material, when led by British

officers, and the sepoy army took a distinguished part in every Indian

battle, from Assaye to Gujarat. At the close of Lord Dalhousie's

administration (1856) British India was held by some 233,000 native and

some 45,000 British troops--roughly a proportion of 5 to 1. It was

already clear to some of the men who knew India best that this was a

dangerous state of things, though when the Mutiny broke out the relative

numbers were 257,000 native to 36,000 British soldiers. It had long been

a fundamental principle of Indian government that the sepoy would always

be true to his salt--knowing, as Macaulay wrote in 1840, that there was

not another state in India which would not, in spite of the most solemn

promises, leave him to die of hunger in a ditch as soon as he had ceased

to be useful. But the history of the sepoy army might have shown that

this was an over-estimate of its loyalty. As early as 1764 it was

necessary to stamp out mutiny by blowing thirty sepoys away from guns.

In 1806 the family of Tippoo Sultan produced a dangerous mutiny at

Vellore, which was nipped in the bud by the prompt action of Gillespie

and his dragoons. In 1824 the 47th Bengal infantry refused to march when

it was ordered for service in Burma, and after being decimated by

British artillery was struck out of the army list. In 1844, after the

disasters of the Afghan war had shaken the prestige of British arms in

India, no less than seven native regiments broke into open mutiny over

grievances both real and fancied; and this time the old stern measures

were not adopted to stamp out military disobedience. Lord Ellenborough

often said that a general mutiny of the native army was the only real

danger with which the British empire in India was threatened, and his

warning was solemnly repeated by Sir Charles Napier. A still more

explicit warning was uttered by General Jacob, who declared in 1853 that

the normal state of the Bengal army was a state of mutiny, and wrote to

_The Times_ as follows: "There is more danger to our Indian empire from

the state of the Bengal army, from the feeling which there exists

between the native and the European, and thence spreads throughout the

length and breadth of the land, than from all other causes combined. Let

government look to this; it is a serious and most important truth."

Its causes in 1857.

The causes which, in the middle of the 19th century, were thus tending

to sap the long-tried fidelity of the sepoy army were partly military

and partly racial. The professional conditions of the sepoy's career,

especially in Bengal, were no longer so tempting as they had been in the

first generations of the company's rule. The pay and privileges of the

sepoy were steadily being diminished, and the increased demands made on

the army by the great extension of the company's territory were by no

means grateful to the average Bengal sepoy. Owing to the silladar

system, under which the Indian sowar provided his own horse and

provender in return for a monthly wage, the Indian cavalry were almost

to a man in debt, and therefore favoured any attempt to upset the

existing régime, and with it to wipe out the money-lender and his books;

and the general enlistment order passed in July 1856, for the purposes

of the war in Persia, made the Hindu sepoys afraid of losing caste by

crossing the sea.

The Indian government failed to take sufficient account of the social

and religious feelings of their native soldiers, whilst a rigid

insistence on the principle of seniority had greatly diminished the

efficiency of the British regimental officers. Out of 73 mutinous

regiments, only four colonels were found worthy of other commands. At

the same time, there were deeper reasons for discontent with British

rule, which specially affected, the classes from which the Bengal sepoys

were drawn. Chief among these was Dalhousie's policy of annexation,

which brought under British dominion such small states as Satara, Nagpur

and Jhansi, and finally the kingdom of Oudh. The insistence on the right

of lapse, i.e. the refusal to allow an adopted, son to inherit a native

throne, and the threat of annexation on purely humanitarian grounds

seriously alarmed the native princes of India, besides creating a class

of malcontents, among whom the Nana Sahib, the adopted heir of the

peshwa, made himself most infamous. The annexation of Oudh, which was

the chief recruiting ground of the Bengal army, probably caused wider

disaffection in the ranks of that army than any other act or omission of

the government. There can also be little doubt that the social reforms

of Lord Dalhousie and his predecessors had disturbed men's minds in

Bengal. Thus the Brahmans were offended at the prohibition of suttee and

female infanticide, the execution of Brahmans for capital offences, the

re-marriage of widows, the spread of missionary effort and the extension

of Western education. The Mahommedan zemindars were injured by the

reassessment of the land revenue, which was carried through in the

interests of the ryots, and the power of the zemindars was formidable,

while that of the ryots was negligible; though it must be remembered

that the peasantry as a whole gave no assistance to the mutineers. To

all these causes must be added--not least important in dealing with

orientals--the widespread feeling since the Afghan disaster that the

star of the company was in the descendant, and that there was truth in

the old prophecy that the British would rule in India for a bare century

from Plassey (1757). Bazaar rumours of British reverses in the Crimea

and in Persia increased the temptations for a general rising against the

dominant race.

The greased cartridges.

To this accumulation of inflammatory materials a spark was put in 1857

by an act of almost incredible folly on the part of the military

authorities in India. The introduction of the Minié rifle, with its

greased cartridges, was accompanied by no consideration of the religious

prejudices of the Bengal sepoys, to whom, whether Hindus or Mahommedans,

the fat of cows and pigs was anathema. It was easy for agitators to

persuade the sepoys that the new cartridges were greased with the fat of

animals sacred to one creed or forbidden to another, and that the

British government was thus engaged in a deep-laid plot for forcing them

to become Christians by first making them outcasts from their own

religions. The growth of missionary enterprise in India lent colour to

this theory, which was supported by the fact that no precautions had

been taken to grease the Indian cartridges with a neutral fat, such as

that of sheep and goats. The researches of Mr G. W. Forrest in the

Indian government records have shown that the sepoys' fears of

defilement by biting the new cartridges had a considerable foundation in

fact. At a court-martial in 1857 Colonel Abbott, inspector general of

ordnance, gave evidence that "the tallow might or might not have

contained the fat of cows." No attempt, in fact, had been made to

exclude the fat of cows and pigs, and apparently no one had realized

that a gross outrage was thus being perpetrated on the religious

feelings of both Hindu and Mahommedan sepoys. The low-caste natives

employed in the arsenals knew what grease was actually being employed,

and taunted the Brahman sepoys with the loss of caste that would follow

their use of the new cartridges. Refusals to accept the suspected

cartridges were soon heard in the Bengal army. The numerous agitators

who had their own reasons for fomenting mutiny rose to the occasion, and

In the first months of 1857 the greater part of the Bengal presidency

was seething with sedition. At this time took place the mysterious

distribution of chapatis, small cakes of unleavened bread, which had

previously been known in connexion with the mutiny at Vellore (1806).

"From village to village, from district to district, through hill-land

and lowland, the signal--unexplained at the time, inexplicable

still--sped; and in village after village, in district after district,

the spreading of the signal was followed by the Increased excitement of

the people."

The first signs of the approaching trouble were displayed at the great

military station of Barrackpur, 16 m. from Calcutta, in January 1857.

The minds of the native regiments quartered there were maddened by

rumours of the defilement which the new Minié cartridges would entail

upon them, and incendiary fires broke out in the lines. The trouble was

allayed by the tact of General Hearsey, who reported the incident to the

Indian government on the 24th of January. A fortnight later he wrote, as

the result of his inquiries, "We have at Barrackpur been dwelling upon a

mine ready for explosion." At Berhampur, 100 m. to the north, on the

27th of February, the 19th Bengal infantry refused on parade to take

their percussion caps, on the ground that to bite the new cartridges

would defile them. The absence of any European troops made it impossible

to deal with this act of mutiny on the spot. The defaulting regiment was

marched down to Barrackpur for punishment. On the 29th of March, two

days before its arrival, a sepoy named Manghal Pandi, from whom the

mutineers afterwards came to be spoken of as "Pandies," drunk with bhang

and enthusiasm, attempted to provoke a mutiny in the 34th Bengal

infantry, and shot the adjutant, but Hearsey's personal courage

suppressed the danger. Two days later the 19th were publicly disbanded,

but no further punishment was attempted. This was partly due to Lord

Canning's personal inclination to temper justice with mercy, but partly

also to the fact that there was no adequate European force at hand to

execute a severer sentence. Bengal had been recklessly depleted of white

troops, and there was only one European regiment between Calcutta and

Dinapur, a distance of 400 m. Canning sent at once for more British

troops from Burma. Meantime new accounts of refusals to use even the old

cartridges came from distant parts of Hindostan, from Umballa under the

very eyes of Anson, the commander-in-chief, and from Lucknow, the

capital of the newly annexed kingdom of Oudh. Lord Canning, the

governor-general, who had at first hoped that he had only to deal with

isolated cases of disaffection, at last recognized that the plague was

epidemic, and that only stern measures could stay it. But before he

could take the necessary steps, there reached Calcutta the news of the

outbreak at Meerut and the capture of Delhi.

The outbreak at Meerut.

Meerut, 25 m. from Delhi, was an important military station, under the

command of Colonel Archdale Wilson: the district was commanded by

General Hewitt, one of the old and inefficient officers whom the rigid

system of seniority had placed in so many high commands. At Meerut were

quartered, besides one regiment of native cavalry and two of native

infantry, a strong force of British troops, horse, foot and guns.

Nevertheless, 85 men of the native cavalry regiment, driven to despair

by the persistent rumours of the danger to their caste, refused on the

24th of April to accept their cartridges. For this offence they were

condemned to ten years' imprisonment with hard labour on the roads, and

on the 9th of May they were publicly stripped of their uniforms and

marched off to gaol. The next day was a Sunday; and in the evening,

whilst the British troops were parading for church, the native cavalry

armed themselves, galloped to the gaol and released their comrades.

Almost simultaneously the two infantry regiments shot down their

officers and broke into open revolt. The badmashes, or criminal class,

broke forth from their quarter and began to burn and plunder the

dwellings of the British. A few of the mutineers took part in this work;

but the great majority of them, fearing the vengeance of the British

troops, hastened to move off, rather a mob than an army, upon the Delhi

road. There is a general agreement that if a man like Gillespie or

Nicholson had been in command of the station, the strong force at his

disposal would have enabled him to strike such a deadly blow at the

fleeing mutineers as might have stamped out the Mutiny. But Hewitt was

too old and Wilson was lacking in initiative; the opportunity was lost,

and no attempt was made to do more than clear the cantonments.

The Revolt of Delhi.

So many of the chief actors in the Mutiny on the native side carried

their secrets into dishonoured graves that it is impossible to know

exactly what schemes the household of the king of Delhi had concerted

with the disaffected sepoys. But when the mutineers reached Delhi they

were at once joined by the city mob and the king's guards in proclaiming

a revival of the Mogul empire. For a few hours the native troops of the

British garrison awaited the turn of events; but when it became apparent

that the British troops from Meerut were afraid to move, there was a

general flame of revolt, and Delhi at once became the headquarters of

the Mutiny. Most of the British officers and residents were massacred

then or afterwards. The great magazine was gallantly defended for a time

by nine Britons under Lieutenant Willoughby, and was blown up by them

when all hope of relief had vanished. A young telegraph clerk sent the

news to Umballa, continuing to signal until he was cut down at his post.

Before the authorities in Calcutta and Lahore could take any steps to

deal with the long-prophesied danger, the whole of the North-West

Provinces were in revolt. Fortunately the two men on whom the chief

responsibility fell in this great crisis were equal to their task.

Canning in Calcutta, John Lawrence in the Punjab, were men indeed equal

to any burden; and the stress of the Mutiny, ending once and forever the

bad old system of seniority, brought to the front so many subordinates

of dauntless gallantry and soldierly insight that a ring of steel was

rapidly drawn round the vast territory affected. Lawrence saw that the

surest way to prevent the Mutiny from spreading from the sepoy army of

Bengal to the recently conquered fighting races of the Punjab was to

hurl the Sikh at the Hindu; instead of taking measures for the defence

of the Punjab, he acted on the old principle that the best defence is

attack, and promptly organized a force for the reduction of Delhi, with

the ardent co-operation of born leaders like John Nicholson, Neville

Chamberlain and Herbert Edwardes. Anson, the commander-in-chief, died of

cholera before he had had a chance to act on Lawrence's telegram,

"Clubs, not spades, are trumps." He was succeeded by Sir Henry Barnard

in command of the Delhi field force, then amounting to about 3000

British troops with 22 field guns, in addition to a few Gurkhas and

Punjab native troops. The loyalty of the independent Sikh chiefs, headed

by Patiala, and the stern measures which had been taken with the sepoy

regiments enabled Lawrence to reinforce this little army with every

available man and gun from the Punjab, in addition to Sikh and Pathan

levies. It was to the insight of Lawrence and the splendid organization

of the Punjab province--the spoilt child of the Indian government, as it

had been called in allusion to the custom of sending thither the best of

the Indian officials and soldiers--that the reduction of Delhi and the

limitation of the outbreak were due. Meantime Canning was manfully

playing his part at Calcutta. In the hour of danger he was undismayed,

as in the hour of victory he was just and merciful. He telegraphed for

reliefs from every available quarter, fortunately being able to divert

the troops then on their way to China. The native armies of Bombay and

Madras remained loyal, and the former in particular--thanks to Lord

Elphinstone--furnished valuable reinforcements. Sir Colin Campbell, a

veteran soldier whose laurels had been won in many battles from the

Peninsula to the Crimea, was despatched from England to take command of

the army in India. But even before he could arrive, the outspread of the

Mutiny had already been checked by the gallantry and skill of a mere

handful of Britons and their faithful native allies.

The Siege of Delhi.

Canning and Lawrence, at opposite ends of the disaffected districts,

alike perceived that Delhi was the centre of peril, and that all other

considerations must be subordinated to striking a decisive blow at that

historic city. Both flung to the winds the European rules of warfare,

which highly trained officers like Wilson had allowed to hamper their

movements. "Make as short work as possible of the rebels," wrote

Canning. "Where have we failed when we acted vigorously?" asked

Lawrence. Though the nominal commanders of the army which captured Delhi

were in turn Barnard, Reed and Wilson, the policy thus stated by Canning

and Lawrence was really carried out by their subordinates--Baird Smith,

Nicholson and Chamberlain. The Meerut troops, at last roused from their

inaction, joined Barnard on the 7th of June, after a successful affair

with the mutineers, and the next day the action of Badli-ki-Serai

enabled the British force to occupy the famous Ridge, which they never

abandoned till the final assault. At first the British troops,

outnumbered by more than three to one by the mutinous regiments alone,

were rather besieged than besiegers. Baird Smith indeed urged an

immediate assault upon Delhi, on the ground that audacity is the best

policy in Indian warfare; but it was not until the arrival of Nicholson

on the 7th of August with the last Punjab reinforcements that the force

was strong enough, in the opinion of its commander, to take offensive

action. On the 14th of September, after three days of artillery

preparation, the assault was delivered, under Nicholson's leadership.

Two practicable breaches had been made by the siege guns, and a party of

engineers under Home and Salkeld blew in the Kashmir gate. The assault

was successful, in so far as a firm lodgment was made in the city,

though the loss of Nicholson was a heavy price to pay for this success.

Wilson actually thought of retreating; but Baird Smith and Chamberlain

insisted on perseverance, and the city was captured after six days' hard

fighting. The mutineers were completely cowed; the king of Delhi was

taken and reserved for trial; and his sons were shot by Captain Hodson,

after unconditional surrender, an act which has since been the theme of

much reprobation, but which commended itself at the time to Hodson's

comrades as wise and justifiable. The siege of Delhi, which was the

turning-point of the Mutiny, had lasted for more than three months,

during which thirty minor actions had been fought in the almost

intolerable heat of the Indian midsummer.

The Massacre at Cawnpore.

The stern determination of the British troops, which alone made possible

the reduction of Delhi with so inadequate a force, was intensified, if

possible, by the ghastly story of Cawnpore. That important military

station, lying on the Ganges on the confines of Oudh, was under the

command of Sir Hugh Wheeler, an old but still efficient and experienced

officer. It was garrisoned by about 3000 native troops, with a mere

handful of white soldiers. When the news of the Meerut outbreak reached

Wheeler, who had already noted many symptoms of disaffection in his own

station, he was placed in a very difficult position. Under his care was

a large body of non-combatants--women and children in great numbers

among them. To occupy the one defensible position in the station, the

magazine by the river with its vast military stores and its substantial

masonry walls, would have involved steps which Wheeler regarded as

certain to precipitate an outbreak. It was then thought that, if the

sepoys mutinied, they would march off to Delhi, and Wheeler contented

himself by throwing up a rude entrenchment round the hospital barracks,

where he thought that the Europeans would be safe during the first

tumult of a rising. All might have fallen out as he anticipated, had it

not been that the Nana Sahib, the adopted heir of the late peshwa, was

rajah of Bithur in the neighbourhood. This young Mahratta, since known

to universal execration as the arch-villain of the Mutiny, was secretly

burning with a sense of injury received from the Indian government. He

was also ambitious; and when, on the 4th of June, the Cawnpore garrison

broke into open mutiny, he prevailed on them to stay and help him to

carve a new kingdom out of the company's territory, instead of throwing

in their lot with the Delhi empire. From the 6th to the 27th of June the

handful of British soldiers, who composed the garrison of a

fortification that could not have resisted a serious assault for a

single hour, held out with the greatest gallantry in hope of relief.

When this hope had died away, they surrendered to the Nana on his solemn

promise that all their lives should be spared and that they should have

a safe conduct to Allahabad. The Nana, partly urged by his native

cruelty, partly, no doubt, by the wish to commit his followers beyond

all possibility of composition, massacred the entire garrison in the

boats which should have taken it down the river, reserving only some two

hundred women and children for a later death. These poor victims were

confined in a house known as the Bibigarh. On the 15th of July, when

Havelock's avenging army was within a march of Cawnpore, they were all

hacked to death and their bodies--some still faintly breathing--were

thrown down the adjacent well which is to-day one of the most famous

monuments of British rule in India. No single act of the Mutiny elicited

such a storm of fierce anger among the British, both those who were

fighting in India and those who supported them at home; for none was a

more terrible vengeance taken, though the Nana himself escaped from his

pursuers.

The Defence of Lucknow.

Meanwhile Lucknow, the capital of Oudh, was the scene of a historic

defence. It was the headquarters of Sir Henry Lawrence, one of the most

far-seeing of Indian statesmen, who was well aware of the mutinous state

of the native army. On the 18th of April he warned Lord Canning of some

manifestations of discontent, and asked permission to transfer certain

mutinous corps to another province. On the 1st of May the 7th Oudh

infantry refused to bite the cartridge, but on the 3rd they were

disarmed by other regiments. When the news of the outbreak at Meerut

reached Lucknow, Sir Henry Lawrence recognized the gravity of the crisis

and summoned from their homes two bodies of pensioners, one of sepoys

and one of artillerymen, to whose loyalty, and to that of the Sikh

sepoys, the successful defence of the residency was largely due. This

position was immediately fortified. On the 30th of May the native troops

broke into mutiny. On the 4th of June there was a mutiny at Sitapur, a

large and important station 51 m. from Lucknow. This was followed by

another at Fyzabad, one of the most important cities in the province,

and outbreaks at Daryabad, Sultanpur and Salon. Thus in the course of

ten days English authority in Oudh practically vanished. On the 30th of

June Sir Henry Lawrence ordered a reconnaissance in force from Lucknow,

which met the enemy at Chinhat; but the native sepoys and artillerymen

turned traitors, and Sir Henry was forced to retreat to the residency,

where the siege now began. The first attack was repulsed on the 1st of

July, when the separate position of the Machchhi Bhawan was evacuated,

and all the troops concentrated in the residency. The entrenchments

surrounding this building covered some 60 acres of ground, and included

a number of detached houses and buildings, knit together by ditches and

stockades. In a military sense the position was indefensible. The

garrison consisted of 1720 fighting men, of whom 712 were native troops,

153 civilian volunteers, and the remainder were British officers and

men. This small force had to defend 1280 non-combatants. At the very

beginning of the siege Sir Henry Lawrence was fatally wounded by a

shell, and died on the 4th of July, thus depriving the defence of its

guiding spirit. The command then developed upon General Inglis, who met

the incessant attacks of the enemy with counter-sorties. On the 21st of

July news was received that General Havelock was advancing, had defeated

the Nana, and was master of Cawnpore; but it was still more than two

months before even the first relief of Lucknow was achieved. During

those two months every device was employed, by direct assault and by

mining operations, to reduce the garrison, who held out nobly, meeting

assault with sortie and mine with countermine. But the loyalty of the

native troops began to waver as the weeks dragged by and no sign of

relief appeared. On the 23rd of September, however, the sound of distant

guns in the direction of Cawnpore was heard, and on the 25th General

Havelock's relieving force entered Lucknow. During the 87 days of the

siege the strength of the garrison had diminished to 982, and many of

these were sick and wounded. Against these were arrayed six thousand

trained soldiers and a vast host of undisciplined rabble. For nearly

three months their heavy guns and musketry had poured an unceasing fire

into the residency entrenchment from a distance of only 50 yds. During

the whole time the British flag flew defiantly on the roof of the

residency. The history of the world's sieges contains no more brilliant

episode.

First Relief of Lucknow.

On the 5th of June the troops at Benares mutinied, but were disarmed by

Neill; and on the 6th of June the 6th native infantry at Allahabad

mutinied and shot down their officers, but the fort was held until the

arrival of Neill, who promptly restored order. On the 30th of June Sir

Henry Havelock, who had been appointed to the command of the relieving

column, arrived at Allahabad from Calcutta, and on the 7th of July he

set out for the relief of Lucknow. His force consisted of some two

thousand men all told, of whom three-quarters were British. On the 12th

of July he fought the action of Fatehpur, and gained his first victory,

though the irregular cavalry misbehaved and were subsequently disarmed.

On the 15th the village of Aong was captured, and on the 16th the Nana's

force was utterly shattered in the battle of Cawnpore. In nine days

Havelock had marched 126 m. and fought three general actions under a

broiling sun in the hottest season of the year; but the women and

children whom it had been his object to save had already been massacred.

Leaving Neill in command at Cawnpore, Havelock started out again on the

29th of July with ten light guns and 1500 men in the desperate attempt

to relieve Lucknow, which was 53 m. away. On the 29th he gained two

victories at Unao and Busherutgunge, but considering himself too weak to

advance, he fell back two marches upon Mangalwar. This decision was

badly received by his troops, who were burning to avenge their

countrywomen, and by General Neill, whom Havelock was obliged to

reprimand for insubordination. Being slightly reinforced, he advanced on

the 5th of August, and again turned the enemy out of Busherutgunge, but

was again obliged by cholera to retreat to Mangalwar; and on receipt of

news from Neill that the enemy were assembling at Bithur, he returned to

Cawnpore, and abandoned for the time the attempt to relieve Lucknow. On

the 16th of August he defeated the mutineers at Bithur. At this point

General Havelock was joined by Sir James Outram, who would have

superseded him in the command had not Outram himself, with unequalled

generosity, proposed to accompany Havelock only in his civil capacity as

chief commissioner of Oudh and to serve under him as a volunteer. On the

21st of September Havelock started on his second attempt to relieve

Lucknow, and won the victory of Mangalwar. On the 23rd another victory

was gained at Alam Bagh, and news reached the force of the fall of

Delhi. From Alam Bagh there were four possible routes of advance to the

residency, and Outram considered that the route chosen by Havelock,

lying through the streets of Lucknow, involved unnecessary losses to the

troops. Neill was killed in the streets, and the little force lost in

all 535 officers and men; but on the 26th of September it entered the

residency, and the first relief of Lucknow was accomplished.

Second Relief of Lucknow.

But the two thousand men who had thus entered the residency entrenchment

under Havelock and Outram, though sufficient to reinforce the garrison

and save it from destruction, were not strong enough to cut their way

back to safety, hampered with the women and children and wounded,

amounting to 1500 souls, and the siege now recommenced upon a larger

scale. Havelock's task, however, was accomplished, and Outram now took

command of the residency. A detachment had been left in the Alam Bagh,

which was short of provisions; some attempts were made to open up

communication with it, but without success. Subsequently it was

reinforced from Cawnpore. Upon the fall of Delhi the troops before that

city were freed for the operations in Oudh, and on the 24th of September

a column of 2790 men under Colonel Greathed left Delhi. On the 29th a

successful action was fought at Bulandshahr, and on the 10th of October

the column reached Agra. Here they were surprised by the enemy, but

drove them off with considerable loss. On the 14th of October the column

left Agra under Colonel Hope Grant, and on the 26th reached Cawnpore,

where news was received that the commander-in-chief was coming to take

command of the operations. Sir Colin Campbell had been sent out from

England to suppress the Mutiny, and had assumed command of the Indian

army on the 17th of August, but could not immediately proceed to the

front. It was his first task to reorganize the administrative and

transport departments; only on the 27th of October did he leave

Calcutta. On the 3rd of November he reached Cawnpore, and on the 12th

marched upon Lucknow under the guidance of Thomas Henry Kavanagh, who

had made his way from the residency disguised as a native for that

purpose. Campbell had with him 4500 men with whom to raise a siege

maintained by 60,000 trained soldiers occupying strong positions. On the

12th of November the force reached the Alam Bagh, and on the 14th

advanced upon Lucknow, proceeding on this occasion across the open plain

by the Dilkusha and Martinière instead of through the narrow and

tortuous streets of Lucknow. On the 16th the Sikandra Bagh was stormed;

on the following day Campbell joined hands with Outram and Havelock, and

the relief of Lucknow was finally accomplished.

Capture of Lucknow.

Sir Colin Campbell now decided to withdraw the garrison and women and

children from the residency, and to hold Lucknow by a strong division

operating outside the city. The residency was evacuated on the night of

the 22nd of November; but the success of the operations was marred by

the death of Havelock. On his return to Cawnpore Campbell found that

General Windham was being attacked at that place by the Gwalior

contingent. On the 6th of December he defeated the Gwalior contingent in

the battle of Cawnpore, though he had only 5000 men against the enemy's

25,000. His next task was to clear his line of communications with Delhi

and the Punjab, and this he accordingly undertook. Lord Canning now

decided that the next step should be the reduction of Lucknow, on the

ground that it, like Delhi, was a rallying point of the Mutiny, and that

its continuance in the hands of the enemy would mean a loss of prestige.

General Franks' column advanced to Lucknow from the eastern frontier of

Oudh, defeating the enemy in four actions. Meanwhile Outram had held his

own at the Alam Bagh for over three months with only 4000 men against

120,000 rebels. An offer of help from Nepal had been accepted in July,

and now Jung Bahadur, the prime minister of Nepal, was advancing with

10,000 Gurkhas to aid in the operations against Lucknow; but the

lateness of his arrival delayed the opening of the siege until the 2nd

of March 1858. The Martinière was captured on the 9th of March and the

Begum Kothi on the 11th. On the 14th the Imambara was stormed, and the

Kaisar Bagh, and on the 16th the residency was once more in British

possession. The enemy were thoroughly routed, but Campbell lost the

opportunity of pushing the victory home by forbidding Outram to cross

the bridge in pursuit if he thought he would lose a "single man," and by

sending the cavalry away from the environs of the city at the critical

moment. Upon the fall of Lucknow Lord Canning's Oudh proclamation was

issued, confiscating almost the entire lands of the province, and

ensuring only their lives to those rebels who should submit at once.

Outram considered the terms of this proclamation dangerously severe, and

Lord Ellenborough, president of the board of control, thus criticized it

in a hasty despatch, the publication of which necessitated his own

resignation. It was afterwards acknowledged that the Oudh proclamation,

interpreted as Canning meant it should be, was a wise piece of

statesmanship. After the fall of Lucknow Canning insisted that Sir Colin

Campbell should take immediate action against the rebels in Oudh and

Rohilkhand, and a number of petty and harassing operations were carried

out by detached columns; but Campbell moved too slowly to bring his

guerrilla opponents to book, and the rebellion was really brought to a

conclusion by Sir Hugh Rose's brilliant campaign in Central India.

The Central India Campaign.

Though the two great princes of Central India, Sindhia and Holkar,

wisely and fortunately remained true to the British, troops belonging to

both of them joined the mutineers. The Gwalior contingent of Sindhia's

army mutinied in the middle of June, and on the 1st of July Holkar's

troops revolted at Indore, and the resident, Henry Durand, was forced to

leave the residency. The rani of Jhansi also rose in rebellion, to

become known as "the best man upon the side of the enemy." The rising in

this quarter received little attention until January 1858, when Sir Hugh

Rose was given the command of two brigades, to act in concert with Sir

Colin Campbell, and he immediately began a campaign which for celerity

and effectiveness has rarely been equalled in India. His principle was

to go straight for the enemy wherever he found him, and pursue him until

he had exterminated him. He was hampered by none of that exaggerated

respect for the rebels which earned Sir Colin Campbell the nickname of

Old Khabardhar (Old Take-Care); but carried to an extreme the policy of

audacity. Advancing from Bombay Sir Hugh Rose relieved Saugor on the 3rd

of February, after it had been invested by the rebels for upwards of

seven months. On the 3rd of March he forced the pass of Madanpur, and

took the whole of the enemy's defences in rear, throwing them into

panic. On the 21st he began the siege of Jhansi, the stronghold of the

mutineers in Central India, with a garrison of 11,000 men. During the

course of the siege Tantia Topi, the most capable native leader of the

Mutiny, arrived with a fresh force of 20,000 men, and threatened the

British camp; but Sir Hugh Rose, with a boldness which only success

could justify, divided his force, and while still maintaining the siege

of the fort, attacked Tantia Topi with only 1500 men and completely

routed him. This victory was won on the 1st of April, and two days later

Sir Hugh carried Jhansi by assault. On the 1st of May the battle of

Kunch was fought and won in a temperature of 110° in the shade, many of

the combatants on both sides being struck down by heat apoplexy. On the

22nd of May the battle of Kalpi was won, though the European troops were

hampered by defective ammunition and Sir Hugh himself here received his

fifth sunstroke. In five months he had beaten the enemy in thirteen

general actions and sieges, and had captured some of the strongest forts

in India. News now arrived that the rebel army under Tantia Topi and the

rani of Jhansi had attacked Sindhia, whose troops had gone over to the

rebels and delivered Gwalior into their hands. Sir Hugh marched against

Gwalior at once, captured the Morar cantonments on the 16th of June, and

carried the whole of the Gwalior positions by assault on the 19th, thus

restoring his state to Sindhia within ten days of taking the field. This

was the crowning stroke of the Central India campaign, and practically

put an end to the Mutiny, though the work of stamping out its embers

went on for many months, and was only completed with the capture and

execution of Tantia Topi in April 1859.

Not a national rising.

The Indian Mutiny was in no sense a national rising. The great mass of

the people in the affected districts either stood neutral, waiting with

the immemorial patience of the East to accept the yoke of the conqueror,

or helped the British troops with food and service, in many cases also

sheltering British fugitives to the best of their ability. The attempt

to throw off the British yoke was confined to a few disaffected

ex-rulers and their heirs, with their numerous clansmen and hangers-on,

besides the badmashes and highwaymen who saw their way to profit by the

removal of the British administration under which their peculiar talents

found no safe outlet. The Bengal native army was their tool, which

circumstances put into their hands at the psychological moment when

British power seemed to be at its lowest point. But the fighting races

of the Punjab saw no reason for casting in their lot with the mutineers,

and the great majority of the independent princes who had nothing of

which to complain, like Patiala in the Punjab, Holkar and Sindhia in

central India, preserved a loyal or at least an interested friendship.

The Sikhs showed their appreciation of Lawrence's admirable

administration by keeping faith with their recent conquerors, and the

Gurkhas of Nepal did yeoman service for their fathers' enemies. The lack

of any central principle or common interest was shown in the divided

counsels and sporadic action of the mutineers and their allies, which

made them an easy prey to the solid and audacious British forces.

The result of the Mutiny.

The chief result of the Indian Mutiny was to end the government of India

by the East India company. It was felt that a system of administration

which could permit such a catastrophe was no longer desirable. On the

2nd of August 1858 the queen signed the act which transferred the

government of India to the crown. On the 1st of November Lord Canning,

now viceroy of India, published the noble proclamation in which the

change was announced, and a full amnesty was offered to all the rebels

who had not been leaders in the revolt or were not guilty of the murder

of British subjects. Even before the fall of Delhi, Canning had been

adversely criticized--"Clemency Canning" he was scornfully called--for

announcing his intention to discriminate between the guilt of various

classes of mutineers. But a wiser view soon prevailed, and the natives

of India at large gratefully accepted the queen's proclamation as the

charter of their lives and liberties.

See G. W. Forrest, _History of the Indian Mutiny_ (1904), and

_Selections from State Papers_ (1897); T. R. E. Holmes, _History of

the Indian Mutiny_ (1898); _Kaye and Malleson's History of the Indian

Mutiny_ (1864-1888); R. S. Rait, _Life of Lord Gough_ (1903); Sir W.

Lee-Warner, _Life of Lord Dalhousie_ (1904); Sir H. Cunningham, _Lord

Canning_ ("Rulers of India" series), (1890); Sir Owen Tudor Burne,

_Clyde and Strathnairn_ (1895); Lord Roberts, _Forty-One Years in

India_ (1898); and Sir Evelyn Wood's articles in _The Times_ in the

autumn of 1907.

INDIAN OCEAN, the ocean bounded N. by India and Persia; W. by Arabia and

Africa, and the meridian passing southwards from Cape Agulhas; and E. by

Farther India, the Sunda Islands, West and South Australia, and the

meridian passing through South Cape in Tasmania. As in the case of the

Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the southern boundary is taken at either

40° S., the line of separation from the great Southern Ocean, or, if the

belt of this ocean between the two meridians named be included, at the

Antarctic Circle. It attains its greatest breadth, more than 6000 m.

between the south points of Africa and Australia, and becomes steadily

narrower towards the north, until it is divided by the Indian peninsula

into two arms, the Arabian Sea on the west and the Bay of Bengal on the

east. Both branches meet the coast of Asia almost exactly on the Tropic

of Cancer, but the Arabian Sea communicates with the Red Sea and the

Persian Gulf by the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb and Ormuz respectively.

Both of these, again, extend in a north-westerly direction to 30° N.

Murray gives the total area, reckoning to 40° S. and including the Red

Sea and Persian Gulf, as 17,320,550 English square miles, equivalent to

13,042,000 geographical square miles. Karstens gives the area as

48,182,413 square kilometres, or 14,001,000 geographical square miles;

of these 10,842,000 square kilometres, or 3,150,000 geographical square

miles, about 22% of the whole, lie north of the equator. For the area

from 40° S. to the Antarctic Circle, Murray gives 9,372,600 English

square miles, equivalent to 7,057,568 geographical square miles, and

Karstens 24,718,000 square kilometres, equivalent to 7,182,474

geographical square miles. The Indian Ocean receives few large rivers,

the chief being the Zambezi, the Shat-el-Arab, the Indus, the Ganges,

the Brahmaputra and the Irawadi. Murray estimates the total land area

draining to the Indian Ocean at 5,050,000 geographical square miles,

almost the same as that draining to the Pacific. The annual rainfall

draining from this area is estimated at 4380 cubic miles.

_Relief._--Large portions of the bed still remain unexplored, but a

fair knowledge of its general form has been gained from the soundings

of H.M.S. "Challenger," the German "Gazelle" Expedition, and various

cable ships, and in 1898 information was greatly added to by the

German "Valdivia" Expedition. A ridge, less than 2000 fathoms from the

surface, extends south-eastwards from the Cape. This ridge, on which

the Crozet Islands and Kerguelen are situated, is directly connected

with the submarine plateau of the Antarctic. From it the depth

increases north-eastwards, and the greatest depression is found in the

angle between Australia and the Sunda Islands, where "Wharton deep,"

below the 3000-fathom line, covers an area of nearly 50,000 sq. m.

Immediately to the north of Wharton deep is the smaller "Maclear

deep," and the long narrow "Jeffreys deep" off the south of Australia

completes the list of depressions below 3000 fathoms in the Indian

Ocean. The 2000-fathom line approaches close to the coast except (1)

in the Bay of Bengal, which it does not enter; (2) to the south-west

of India along a ridge on which are the Laccadive and Maldive Islands;

and (3) in the Mozambique Channel, and on a bank north and east of

Madagascar, on which are the Seychelles, Mascarene Islands and other

groups.

_Islands._--Like the Pacific, the Indian Ocean contains more islands

in the western than in the eastern half. Towards the centre, the

Maldive, Chagos and Cocos groups are of characteristic coral

formation, and coral reefs occur on most parts of the tropical coasts.

There are many volcanic islands, as Mauritius, the Crozet Islands, and

St Paul's. The chief continental islands are Madagascar, Sokotra and

Ceylon. Kerguelen, a desolate and uninhabited island near the centre

of the Indian Ocean at its southern border, is noteworthy as providing

a base station for Antarctic exploration.

_Deposits._--The bottom of the Bay of Bengal, of the northern part of

the Arabian Sea, of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, and of the

narrow coastal strips on the east and west sides of the ocean, are

chiefly covered by blue and green muds. Off the African coasts there

are large deposits of Glauconitic sands and muds at depths down to

1000 fathoms, and on banks where coral formation occurs there are

large deposits of coral muds and sands. In the deeper parts the bed of

the ocean is covered on the west and south by Globigerina ooze except

for an elongated patch of red clay extending most of the distance from

Sokotra to the Maldives. The red clay covers a nearly square area in

the eastern part of the basin bounded on two sides by the Sunda

Islands and the west coast of Australia, as well as two strips

extending east and west from the southern margin of the square along

the south of Australia and nearly to Madagascar. In the northern

portion of the square, north and east of Wharton deep, the red clay is

replaced over a large tract by Radiolarian ooze.

_Temperature._--The mean temperature of the surface water is over 80°

F. in all parts north of 13° S., except in the north-west of the

Arabian Sea, where it is somewhat lower. South of 13° S. temperature

falls uniformly and quickly to the Southern Ocean. Between the depths

of 100 and 1000 fathoms temperature is high in the north-west, and in

the south centre and south-west, and low in the north-east, the type

of distribution remaining substantially the same. At 1500 fathoms

temperature has become very uniform, ranging between 35° and 37° F.,

but still exhibiting the same type of distribution, though in a very

degenerate form.

_Salinity._--The saltest surface water is found in (a) the Arabian Sea

and (b) along a belt extending from West Australia to South Africa,

the highest salinity in this belt occurring at the Australian end.

South of the belt salinity falls quickly as latitude increases, while

to the north of it, in the monsoon region, the surface water is very

fresh off the African coast and to the north-east. Little is known

with certainty about the distribution of salinity in the depths, the

number of trustworthy observations available being still very small.

Probably the northern and north-eastern region, within the monsoon

area, contains relatively fresh water down to very considerable

depths.

_Circulation._--North of the equator the surface circulation is under

the control of the monsoons, and changes with them, the currents

consisting chiefly of north-east and south-west drifts in the open

sea, and induced streams following the coasts. During the northern

summer the south-west monsoon, which is sufficiently strong to bring

navigation practically to a standstill except for powerful steamers,

sets up a strong north-easterly drift in the Arabian Sea, and the

water removed from the east African coast is replaced by the upwelling

of cold water from below; this is one of the best illustrations of

this action extant. Along the line of the equator the _Indian

counter-current_ flows eastwards all the year round, acting as

compensation to the great _Equatorial current_ flowing westwards

between the parallels of 7° and 20° S. The equatorial current, on

meeting the northern extremity of Madagascar, sends a branch

southwards along the east coast of that island, sometimes called the

_Mascarene current_. When the main equatorial current reaches the

African coast a minor stream is sent northwards to the source of the

Indian counter-current, but the discharge is chiefly by the

_Mozambique current_, which south of Cape Corrientes becomes the

_Agulhas current_, one of the most powerful stream currents of the

globe. On the west coast of Madagascar and on the banks of the African

coast south of 30° S., reaction currents or "back-drifts" move in the

opposite direction along the flanks of the Agulhas current; these

back-drifts are of great importance to navigation. On clearing the

land south of the Cape the waters of the Agulhas current meet those of

the _west wind drift_ of the Southern Ocean, and mingle with them in

such a manner as to produce, by interdigitation, alternate strips of

warm and cold water, which are met with at great distances south-west

and south of the Cape. Between South Africa and Australia the waters

form a part of the great west wind drift. The waters of this drift

are, in general, of very low temperature, but it is remarkable that

the interdigitation just mentioned continues far to the eastward, at

least as far as Kerguelen. This fact is probably due partly to the

actual intrusion of warm water from the Mascarene current east of

Madagascar, and partly to the circumstance that the different

temperatures of the waters are so compensated by their differences of

salinity that they have almost precisely the same specific gravity _in

situ_. The west wind drift sends a stream northwards along the west

coast of Australia, the _West Australia current_, the homologue of the

Benguela current in the South Atlantic. The principal feature in the

circulation in the depths of the Indian Ocean is a slow movement of

Antarctic water northwards along the bottom to take the place of that

removed from the surface by evaporation, and by currents in the lower

latitudes. Little is known beyond the bare fact that such movement

does take place. (H. N. D.)

INDIANOLA, a city and the county-seat of Warren county, Iowa, U.S.A.,

about 18 m. S. by E. of Des Moines. Pop. (1890) 2254; (1900) 3261;

(1905) 3396; (1910) 3283. It is served by the Chicago, Burlington &

Quincy and the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific railways. Indianola is the

seat of Simpson College (coeducational, Methodist Episcopal, 1867), with

a college of liberal arts, an academy, a school of education, a school

of business, a school of shorthand and typewriting, a conservatory of

music, a school of oratory, a school of art and a military academy. In

1908 the college had 32 instructors and 905 students. The city lies in a

rich farming region, and has a considerable trade in butter and eggs,

vegetables and fruits, and in coal, lumber and live stock from the

surrounding country. Indianola was laid out and was selected as the

county-seat in 1849, and building began in the following year; it was

incorporated as a town in 1864, and was chartered as a city of the

second class in 1884.