Kootûb, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 1839.
We made this our first march, as most of the camp have not seen it. It
is the most magnificent pillar, I suppose, in the world, and looks as if
it had been built yesterday; but all the fine ruins about it have
crumbled away sadly, even since we were here two years ago.
Those diamond bracelets were not worth half what the man asked for them,
which I am rather glad of, as I think it would have been a waste of
money, and we do not want more trinkets.
G. and I had to go last night to a play, got up by amateurs, which was
rather a failure, because the chief character did not happen to know a
single word of his part, and that put out all the others, but they
thought it rather good themselves.
This morning the General insisted on having all the troops paraded at
six in the morning, and so, as F. still has her cold, and G. hates being
left by himself, I had to ride out of camp. It was nearly dark, and they
fired the salutes right into the horses' faces, and then poked their
colours into their eyes, and drummed 'God save the King' into their
ears, all which induced them to prance. I thought it rather dangerous,
very noisy, and extremely tiresome, and I could not think of a word to
say to General M. that I had not said at least eight times over in the
last three days, so I was glad when he thought he had convoyed us out of
his grounds, and if we ever go back to Delhi again I hope there will be
a new General, so that the same topics may serve me again and look
fresh.
I had a great mind to tell him that I felt very ill, which was quite
true, but as the water at Delhi is invariably a rank poison that would
have been nothing new.
Bullumghur, Friday, Nov. 29.
We had made a pretty arrangement yesterday to go to a small private camp
at Toglichabad; a very old town with some splendid ruins about it, and
there had been a road made for us, and supplies sent; but then F.'s cold
was still bad, and my Delhi illness was worse than ever, so we gave it
up, though it looked inconsistent and foolish after all the fuss that
had been made, and X. says there was a quantity to see and sketch. I
have only been able to make four sketches since we left Simla, for
dearth of subjects; but I am glad we did not go, I had such a headache.
Half the camp was poisoned at Delhi.
Sunday, Dec. 1.
We are all well again; and just think of the pleasure of the October
mail arriving this morning, only a fortnight after the last. G. has a
letter of the 16th, only just six weeks old, but there is some mistake
about yours and the letters of the family in general. They are sent off
a fortnight too soon: at least we always have public letters and papers
dated a fortnight later, and those newspapers, besides taking off the
edge of the news for half the next month, put me in a fright. I am so
afraid, after hearing that you were well and prosperous the 8th of
September, of finding in the 'Morning Chronicle' of October 12th, that
C. D., Esq., who lives not 100 miles from Newsalls, was taken before the
magistrates for beating M. his wife, and tearing her hair and her best
shawl; or else that your new house in Stratton Street had been burnt
down before you could insure it, and that you had lost your little all,
and perhaps were found begging in the streets, surrounded by your nine
children, and causing an obstruction at Hyde Park Corner. Do you know,
that whenever I read a heap of English papers at once, 'indeed, indeed
I'm very very sick,' there is such a quantity of crime. This time the
cruelty to children and apprentices has put me in a frenzy, and there
are at least eight exemplary wives murdered by their husbands, and one
murderer gets off with six months' imprisonment, because his lawyer
chooses to make a pert attack on Lord ----, which pleases the
Recorder--so like English justice. I am also very low about politics. I
hate all those last changes, and I wish the Whigs would go quietly and
respectably out in a body, and leave the Tories and Radicals to fight it
out.
Wednesday, Dec. 4.
Last night, when we were playing at whist, I saw X. fidgeting about
behind G.'s chair with a note in his hand, and began to think you were
ill, and had sent for me to your tent, or something of that sort; but it
turned out to be an express with another little battle, and a most
successful one. The Khan of Khelât was by way of being our ally and
assistant, and professing friendship; did himself the pleasure of
cutting off the supplies of the army when it was on its way to Cabul;
set his followers on to rob the camp; corresponded with Dost Mahomed,
&c.
There was no time to fight with him then, and I suppose he was beginning
to think himself secure; but G. directed the Bombay army, on its way
home, to settle this little Khelât trouble. General ---- was led to
suppose his place was not a strong one, and took only 1,000 men with
him, but he found Khelât a very strong fort with plenty of guns, and the
Khan at the head of 2,000 soldiers. It was all done in the Ghuznee
manner--the gates blown in and the fort stormed--but the fighting was
very severe. The Khan and his principal chiefs died sword in hand, which
was rather too fine a death for such a double traitor as he has been;
and one in six of our troops were either killed or wounded, which is an
unusual proportion. They found in the town a great many of our camels
and much of the property that had been pillaged from the army. Also
there will be a great deal of prize money. Another man has been put on
the Khelât throne, so that business is finished.
Bindrabund, Saturday, Dec. 7.
This is a famous Hindu place, and we have come a march out of the way to
look at it, partly because there is a great deal to see, and then that
the sepoys and half our camp may perform their devotions. The Hindu
devotions are always inexplicable, except in the simple fact that the
Brahmins cheat them out of a quantity of money, and our Mussulmaun
servants cannot be sufficiently contemptuous to-day as to the state of
affairs.
Monkeys and peacocks are sacred here, and consequently abound; and then
they have a tradition that Krishna (who seems to have been a larking
sort of Apollo) played various pranks here, and, amongst other little
jokes, stole all the clothes of the wives of the cowherds when they went
into the river to bathe, and carried them to the top of a tree, to which
they were obliged to come and beg, before he would give them back. He is
adored here for the delicacy of this freak, and a temple has been built
to commemorate it.
We went yesterday to visit all the temples and ruins under the guidance
of ----, who led us quite wrong and wasted our time at modern temples,
when we wanted to see the old ruins, but he rather made up for it by
taking us in boats on the Jumna to look at the ghauts. However, the
whole thing was done in state, with tribes of elephants, and dust, and
all the camp, and the secretaries, who never let us say or see anything
comfortably; so F. and I settled to stay behind to-day, when the camp
moved, and to pass our morning in an old Jain temple of singular beauty,
red granite magnificently carved, but the roof and half the heads of the
statues were knocked off by Aurungzebe in a fit of Mussulmaun bigotry.
X. and P. stayed with us, and we all settled ourselves in different
corners of the building, with a quantity of grains and sweetmeats in the
middle, to keep the monkeys quiet. Our breakfast was laid out in a sort
of side aisle of grotesque Hindu columns, and at each column was a
servant with a long stick keeping off the monkeys from the tea and
chocolate. One very enterprising monkey rushed down and carried off my
Indian rubber, which is a great loss to me, and I trust it disagreed
with him. It was an elaborate building to sketch, and we were nearly
four hours about it, but we all succeeded more or less; and it was so
cool and dark in the temple, it made it quite a pleasant morning, to say
nothing of a brass antique teapot and some lovely little brass goats
which X. bought for me coming back.
Muttra, Sunday, Dec. 8.
We came on in the evening to camp, and found G. at a durbar receiving a
Vakeel from the Bhurtpore Rajah and a visit from Luckund Chund, the
richest banker in India. He has two millions of money in Company's paper
at Calcutta, and only draws the interest once in four years. He is a
jeweller also by trade, and has some very handsome emeralds in camp to
dispose of. He brought 101 trays of presents, which gladdened Mr. C.'s
heart. We had a large congregation this morning, as there is a troop of
artillery here, and the English soldiers looked so well and homelike at
church.
Goverdun, Monday, Dec. 9.
These have been very good sight-seeing days, and I think I like Hindus
just now better than Mussulmauns. They consider trees sacred, and that
makes their country so much prettier. We went to a beautiful tomb this
afternoon surrounded by old temples and tombs belonging to the Bhurtpore
Rajah. The inside of one temple is painted with the original siege of
Bhurtpore and Lord Lake running away--the Europeans were originally
painted running away without their heads, but that has been rectified.
Then we went to what they call a chuttree, or something of that kind, a
place where there has been a suttee, and there are some lovely temples
built over the ashes. There never is time enough for sketching, which is
a pity.