The Indian Camp—The Sortie from the Fort
HEADQUARTERS, MORELLA: _October_ 3, 1838
It is a balmy night. I hear the merry jingle of the tambourine, and the
cheery voices of the girls and peasants, as they dance beneath my
casement, under the shadow of the clustering vines. The laugh and song
pass gaily round, and even at this distance I can distinguish the
elegant form of Ramon Cabrera, as he whispers gay nothings in the ears
of the Andalusian girls, or joins in the thrilling chorus of Riego’s
hymn, which is ever and anon vociferated by the enthusiastic soldiery
of Carlos Quinto. I am alone, in the most inaccessible and most
bomb-proof tower of our little fortalice; the large casements are
open—the wind, as it enters, whispers in my ear its odorous
recollections of the orange grove and the myrtle bower. My torch (a
branch of the fragrant cedar-tree) flares and flickers in the midnight
breeze, and disperses its scent and burning splinters on my scroll and
the desk where I write—meet implements for a soldier’s authorship!—it
is _cartridge_ paper over which my pen runs so glibly, and a yawning
barrel of gunpowder forms my rough writing-table. Around me, below me,
above me, all—all is peace! I think, as I sit here so lonely, on my
country, England! and muse over the sweet and bitter recollections of
my early days! Let me resume my narrative, at the point where
(interrupted by the authoritative summons of war) I paused on the last
occasion.
I left off, I think—(for I am a thousand miles away from proof- sheets
as I write, and, were I not writing the simple TRUTH, must contradict
myself a thousand times in the course of my tale)—I think, I say, that
I left off at that period of my story, when, Holkar being before
Futtyghur, and I in command of that fortress, I had just been compelled
to make away with his messenger: and, dressed in the fallen Indian’s
accoutrements, went forth to reconnoitre the force, and, if possible,
to learn the intentions of the enemy. However much my figure might have
resembled that of the Pitan, and, disguised in his armour, might have
deceived the lynx- eyed Mahrattas, into whose camp I was about to
plunge, it was evident that a single glance at my fair face and auburn
beard would have undeceived the dullest blockhead in Holkar’s army.
Seizing, then, a bottle of Burgess’s walnut catsup, I dyed my face and
my hands, and, with the simple aid of a flask of Warren’s jet, I made
my hair and beard as black as ebony. The Indian’s helmet and chain hood
covered likewise a great part of my face, and I hoped thus, with luck,
impudence, and a complete command of all the Eastern dialects and
languages, from Burmah to Afghanistan, to pass scot- free through this
somewhat dangerous ordeal.
I had not the word of the night, it is true—but I trusted to good
fortune for that, and passed boldly out of the fortress, bearing the
flag of truce as before; I had scarcely passed on a couple of hundred
yards, when lo! a party of Indian horsemen, armed like him I had just
overcome, trotted towards me. One was leading a noble white charger,
and no sooner did he see me than, dismounting from his own horse, and
giving the rein to a companion, he advanced to meet me with the
charger; a second fellow likewise dismounted and followed the first:
one held the bridle of the horse, while the other (with a multitude of
salaams, aleikums, and other genuflexions) held the jewelled stirrup,
and kneeling, waited until I should mount.
I took the hint at once: the Indian who had come up to the fort was a
great man—that was evident; I walked on with a majestic air, gathered
up the velvet reins, and sprung into the magnificent high- peaked
saddle. “Buk, buk,” said I. “It is good. In the name of the forty-nine
Imaums, let us ride on.” And the whole party set off at a brisk trot, I
keeping silence, and thinking with no little trepidation of what I was
about to encounter.
As we rode along, I heard two of the men commenting upon my unusual
silence (for I suppose, I—that is the Indian—was a talkative officer).
“The lips of the Bahawder are closed,” said one. “Where are those birds
of Paradise, his long-tailed words? they are imprisoned between the
golden bars of his teeth!”
“Kush,” said his companion, “be quiet! Bobbachy Bahawder has seen the
dreadful Feringhee, Gahagan Khan Gujputi, the elephant-lord, whose
sword reaps the harvest of death; there is but one champion who can
wear the papooshes of the elephant-slayer—it is Bobbachy Bahawder!”
“You speak truly, Puneeree Muckun, the Bahawder ruminates on the words
of the unbeliever: he is an ostrich, and hatches the eggs of his
thoughts.”
“Bekhusm! on my nose be it! May the young birds, his actions, be strong
and swift in flight.”
“May they _digest iron!_” said Puneeree Muckun, who was evidently a wag
in his way.
“O—ho!” thought I, as suddenly the light flashed upon me. “It was,
then, the famous Bobbachy Bahawder whom I overcame just now! and he is
the man destined to stand in _my_ slippers, is he?” and I was at that
very moment standing in his own! Such are the chances and changes that
fall to the lot of the soldier!
I suppose everybody—everybody who has been in India, at least—has heard
the name of Bobbachy Bahawder: it is derived from the two Hindustanee
words—_bobbachy_, general; _bahawder_, artilleryman. He had entered
into Holkar’s service in the latter capacity, and had, by his merit and
his undaunted bravery in action, attained the dignity of the peacock’s
feather, which is only granted to noblemen of the first class; he was
married, moreover, to one of Holkar’s innumerable daughters; a match
which, according to the _Chronique Scandaleuse_, brought more of honour
than of pleasure to the poor Bobbachy. Gallant as he was in the field,
it was said that in the harem he was the veriest craven alive,
completely subjugated by his ugly and odious wife. In all matters of
importance the late Bahawder had been consulted by his prince, who had,
as it appears (knowing my character, and not caring to do anything rash
in his attack upon so formidable an enemy), sent forward the
unfortunate Pitan to reconnoitre the fort; he was to have done yet
more, as I learned from the attendant Puneeree Muckun, who was, I soon
found out, an old favourite with the Bobbachy—doubtless on account of
his honesty and love of repartee.
“The Bahawder’s lips are closed,” said he, at last, trotting up to me;
“has he not a word for old Puneeree Muckun?”
“Bismillah, mashallah, barikallah,” said I; which means, “My good
friend, what I have seen is not worth the trouble of relation, and
fills my bosom with the darkest forebodings.”
“You could not then see the Gujputi alone, and stab him with your
dagger?”
[Here was a pretty conspiracy!] “No, I saw him, but not alone; his
people were always with him.”
“Hurrumzadeh! it is a pity; we waited but the sound of your jogree
(whistle), and straightway would have galloped up and seized upon every
man, woman, and child in the fort: however, there are but a dozen men
in the garrison, and they have not provision for two days—they must
yield; and then hurrah for the moon-faces! Mashallah! I am told the
soldiers who first get in are to have their pick. How my old woman,
Rotee Muckun, will be surprised when I bring home a couple of Feringhee
wives,—ha! ha!”
“Fool!” said I, “be still!—twelve men in the garrison there are twelve
hundred! Gahagan himself is as good as a thousand men; and as for food,
I saw with my own eyes five hundred bullocks grazing in the courtyard
as I entered.” This _was_ a bouncer, I confess; but my object was to
deceive Puneeree Muckun, and give him as high a notion as possible of
the capabilities of defence which the besieged had.
“Pooch, pooch,” murmured the men; “it is a wonder of a fortress: we
shall never be able to take it until our guns come up.”
There was hope then! they had no battering-train. Ere this arrived I
trusted that Lord Lake would hear of our plight, and march down to
rescue us. Thus occupied in thought and conversation, we rode on until
the advanced sentinel challenged us, when old Puneeree gave the word,
and we passed on into the centre of Holkar’s camp.
It was a strange—a stirring sight! The camp-fires were lighted; and
round them—eating, reposing, talking, looking at the merry steps of the
dancing-girls, or listening to the stories of some Dhol Baut (or Indian
improvisatore)—were thousands of dusky soldiery. The camels and horses
were picketed under the banyan- trees, on which the ripe mango fruit
was growing, and offered them an excellent food. Towards the spot which
the golden fish and royal purdahs, floating in the wind, designated as
the tent of Holkar, led an immense avenue—of elephants! the finest
street, indeed, I ever saw. Each of the monstrous animals had a castle
on its back, armed with Mauritanian archers and the celebrated Persian
matchlock-men: it was the feeding time of these royal brutes, and the
grooms were observed bringing immense toffungs, or baskets, filled with
pine-apples, plantains, bananas, Indian corn, and cocoa-nuts, which
grow luxuriantly at all seasons of the year. We passed down this
extraordinary avenue—no less than three hundred and eighty-eight tails
did I count on each side—each tail appertaining to an elephant
twenty-five feet high—each elephant having a two-storied castle on its
back—each castle containing sleeping and eating rooms for the twelve
men that formed its garrison, and were keeping watch on the roof—each
roof bearing a flagstaff twenty feet long on its top, the crescent
glittering with a thousand gems, and round it the imperial
standard,—each standard of silk velvet and cloth-of-gold, bearing the
well-known device of Holkar, argent an or gules, between a sinople of
the first, a chevron truncated, wavy. I took nine of these myself in
the course of a very short time after, and shall be happy, when I come
to England, to show them to any gentleman who has a curiosity that way.
Through this gorgeous scene our little cavalcade passed, and at last we
arrived at the quarters occupied by Holkar.
That celebrated chieftain’s tents and followers were gathered round one
of the British bungalows which had escaped the flames, and which he
occupied during the siege. When I entered the large room where he sat,
I found him in the midst of a council of war; his chief generals and
viziers seated round him, each smoking his hookah, as is the common way
with these black fellows, before, at, and after breakfast, dinner,
supper, and bedtime. There was such a cloud raised by their smoke you
could hardly see a yard before you- -another piece of good-luck for
me—as it diminished the chances of my detection. When, with the
ordinary ceremonies, the kitmatgars and consomahs had explained to the
prince that Bobbachy Bahawder, the right eye of the Sun of the Universe
(as the ignorant heathens called me), had arrived from his mission,
Holkar immediately summoned me to the maidaun, or elevated platform, on
which he was seated in a luxurious easy-chair, and I, instantly taking
off my slippers, falling on my knees, and beating my head against the
ground ninety-nine times, proceeded, still on my knees, a hundred and
twenty feet through the room, and then up the twenty steps which led to
his maidaun—a silly, painful, and disgusting ceremony, which can only
be considered as a relic of barbarian darkness, which tears the knees
and shins to pieces, let alone the pantaloons. I recommend anybody who
goes to India, with the prospect of entering the service of the native
rajahs, to recollect my advice, and have them _well wadded_.
Well, the right eye of the Sun of the Universe scrambled as well as he
could up the steps of the maidaun (on which, in rows, smoking, as I
have said, the musnuds or general officers were seated), and I arrived
within speaking distance of Holkar, who instantly asked me the success
of my mission. The impetuous old man thereon poured out a multitude of
questions: “How many men are there in the fort?” said he; “how many
women? Is it victualled? have they ammunition? Did you see Gahagan
Sahib, the commander? did you kill him?”
All these questions Jeswunt Row Holkar puffed out with so many whiffs
of tobacco.
Taking a chillum myself, and raising about me such a cloud that, upon
my honour as a gentleman, no man at three yards’ distance could
perceive anything of me except the pillar of smoke in which I was
encompassed, I told Holkar, in Oriental language of course, the best
tale I could with regard to the fort.
“Sir,” said I, “to answer your last question first—that dreadful
Gujputi I have seen—and he is alive: he is eight feet, nearly, in
height; he can eat a bullock daily (of which he has seven hundred at
present in the compound, and swears that during the siege he will
content himself with only three a week): he has lost, in battle, his
left eye; and what is the consequence? O Ram Gunge” (O
thou-with-the-eye-as-bright-as-morning and-with-beard-as-black-as-
night), “Goliah Gujputi—NEVER SLEEPS!”
“Ah, you Ghorumsaug (you thief of the world),” said the Prince Vizier,
Saadut Alee Beg Bimbukchee—“it’s joking you are;”—and there was a
universal buzz through the room at the announcement of this bouncer.
“By the hundred and eleven incarnations of Vishnu,” said I, solemnly
(an oath which no Indian was ever known to break), “I swear that so it
is: so at least he told me, and I have good cause to know his power.
Gujputi is an enchanter: he is leagued with devils; he is invulnerable.
Look,” said I, unsheathing my dagger— and every eye turned instantly
towards me—“thrice did I stab him with this steel—in the back,
once—twice right through the heart; but he only laughed me to scorn,
and bade me tell Holkar that the steel was not yet forged which was to
inflict an injury upon him.”
I never saw a man in such a rage as Holkar was when I gave him this
somewhat imprudent message.
“Ah, lily-livered rogue!” shouted he out to me, “milk-blooded
unbeliever! pale-faced miscreant! lives he after insulting thy master
in thy presence? In the name of the Prophet, I spit on thee, defy thee,
abhor thee, degrade thee! Take that, thou liar of the universe! and
that—and that—and that!”
Such are the frightful excesses of barbaric minds! every time this old
man said, “Take that,” he flung some article near him at the head of
the undaunted Gahagan—his dagger, his sword, his carbine, his richly
ornamented pistols, his turban covered with jewels, worth a hundred
thousand crores of rupees—finally, his hookah, snake mouthpiece,
silver-bell, chillum and all—which went hissing over my head, and
flattening into a jelly the nose of the Grand Vizier.
“Yock muzzee! my nose is off,” said the old man, mildly. “Will you have
my life, O Holkar? it is thine likewise!” and no other word of
complaint escaped his lips.
Of all these missiles, though a pistol and carbine had gone off as the
ferocious Indian flung them at my head, and the naked scimitar,
fiercely but unadroitly thrown, had lopped off the limbs of one or two
of the musnuds as they sat trembling on their omrahs, yet, strange to
say, not a single weapon had hurt me. When the hubbub ceased, and the
unlucky wretches who had been the victims of this fit of rage had been
removed, Holkar’s good-humour somewhat returned, and he allowed me to
continue my account of the fort; which I did, not taking the slightest
notice of his burst of impatience: as indeed it would have been the
height of impoliteness to have done, for such accidents happened many
times in the day.
“It is well that the Bobbachy has returned,” snuffled out the poor
Grand Vizier, after I had explained to the Council the extraordinary
means of defence possessed by the garrison.
“Your star is bright, O Bahawder! for this very night we had resolved
upon an escalade of the fort, and we had sworn to put every one of the
infidel garrison to the edge of the sword.”
“But you have no battering train,” said I.
“Bah! we have a couple of ninety-six pounders, quite sufficient to blow
the gates open; and then, hey for a charge!” said Loll Mahommed, a
general of cavalry, who was a rival of Bobbachy’s, and contradicted,
therefore, every word I said. “In the name of Juggernaut, why wait for
the heavy artillery? Have we not swords? Have we not hearts? Mashallah!
Let cravens stay with Bobbachy, all true men will follow Loll Mahommed!
Allahhumdillah, Bismillah, Barikallah?”[7] and drawing his scimitar, he
waved it over his head, and shouted out his cry of battle. It was
repeated by many of the other omrahs; the sound of their cheers was
carried into the camp, and caught up by the men; the camels began to
cry, the horses to prance and neigh, the eight hundred elephants set up
a scream, the trumpeters and drummers clanged away at their
instruments. I never heard such a din before or after. How I trembled
for my little garrison when I heard the enthusiastic cries of this
innumerable host!
There was but one way for it. “Sir,” said I, addressing Holkar, “go out
to-night, and you go to certain death. Loll Mahommed has not seen the
fort as I have. Pass the gate if you please, and for what? to fall
before the fire of a hundred pieces of artillery; to storm another
gate, and then another, and then to be blown up, with Gahagan’s
garrison in the citadel. Who talks of courage? Were I not in your
august presence, O star of the faithful, I would crop Loll Mahommed’s
nose from his face, and wear his ears as an ornament in my own pugree!
Who is there here that knows not the difference between yonder
yellow-skinned coward and Gahagan Khan Guj—I mean Bobbachy Bahawder? I
am ready to fight one, two, three, or twenty of them, at broad-sword,
small-sword, single- stick, with fists if you please. By the holy
piper, fighting is like mate and dthrink to Ga—-to Bobbachy, I
mane—whoop! come on, you divvle, and I’ll bate the skin off your ugly
bones.”
This speech had very nearly proved fatal to me, for, when I am
agitated, I involuntarily adopt some of the phraseology peculiar to my
own country; which is so un-eastern, that, had there been any suspicion
as to my real character, detection must indubitably have ensued. As it
was, Holkar perceived nothing, but instantaneously stopped the dispute.
Loll Mahommed, however, evidently suspected something; for, as Holkar,
with a voice of thunder, shouted out; “Tomasha (silence),” Loll sprang
forward and gasped out -
“My lord! my lord! this is not Bob—”
But he could say no more. “Gag the slave!” screamed out Holkar,
stamping with fury; and a turban was instantly twisted round the poor
devil’s jaws. “Ho, furoshes! carry out Loll Mahommed Khan, give him a
hundred dozen on the soles of his feet, set him upon a white donkey,
and carry him round the camp, with an inscription before him: ‘This is
the way that Holkar rewards the talkative.’”
I breathed again; and ever as I heard each whack of the bamboo falling
on Loll Mahommed’s feet, I felt peace returning to my mind, and thanked
my stars that I was delivered of this danger.
“Vizier,” said Holkar, who enjoyed Loll’s roars amazingly, “I owe you a
reparation for your nose: kiss the hand of your prince, O Saadut Alee
Beg Bimbukchee! be from this day forth Zoheir u Dowlut!”
The good old man’s eyes filled with tears. “I can bear thy severity, O
Prince,” said he; “I cannot bear thy love. Was it not an honour that
your Highness did me just now when you condescended to pass over the
bridge of your slave’s nose?”
The phrase was by all voices pronounced to be very poetical. The Vizier
retired, crowned with his new honours, to bed. Holkar was in high
good-humour.
“Bobbachy,” said he, “thou, too, must pardon me. _A propos_, I have
news for thee. Your wife, the incomparable Puttee Rooge” (white and red
rose), “has arrived in camp.”
“My WIFE, my lord!” said I, aghast.
“Our daughter, the light of thine eyes! Go, my son; I see thou art wild
with joy. The Princess’s tents are set up close by mine, and I know
thou longest to join her.”
My wife? Here was a complication truly!