ANNEXATION OF PUNJAUB.--INCREASE OF CORPS OF GUIDES AT
PESHAWUR.--TRANSFER TO CIVIL DEPARTMENT AS ASSISTANT
COMMISSIONER.
_April 17th, 1849._
You will have heard of the great events of the last month;
how on the 26th March, the Punjaub became "forever" a
British Province, governed by a Triumvirate; and how the
Koh-i-noor was appropriated as a present to the Queen,--and
all the rest of it; you may imagine the turmoil and unrest
of this eventful time; but I defy you to imagine the
confusion of the process which converts a wild native
kingdom into a police-ridden and civilian-governed country.
I had anticipated and wished for this measure. I did not,
however, expect that it would be carried out so suddenly and
so sweepingly as it has been....
I have been _annexed_ as well as the Punjaub! my
"occupation's gone," and although efforts have been and are
making for my restoration to "the department," yet at
present I am shelved. I shall know more next month.
Meanwhile, I am off with the new Commissioner to instruct
him in the details of his province, which I had governed and
_won_ from the rebels during the last six months, but in
which I am not now accounted worthy to be a humble
assistant. There's fame! Well, something will turn up, I
suppose. I hope to remain here, however, under the
Commissioner, for a time, that I may get acquainted with
this wonderful civil system. It is as well to know how the
mill works.
I got quite fond of Lord Gough. I was his guest at Lahore
for a month, and his noble character and fire made one
condone his mistakes.
We are now on the "_qui vive_" for his successor. I long for
Sir C. Napier, but the Court of Directors seem determined to
hold out.
The Guides are at Peshawur, where I shall probably join
them.
Lieutenant Hodson's descent in position, upon the annexation of the
Punjaub, was, perhaps, unavoidable, though it was very natural that he
should feel it. So soon as the country was placed under the government
of the East India Company, the regulations of the service with regard
to seniority of course took effect, and it was not to be expected that
a subaltern of less than five years' standing should be continued in
so important a charge, however well qualified he might have proved
himself for it in the most trying times. His position altogether had
been a peculiar and exceptional one.
We shall see, however, that his disappointment did not prevent his
throwing himself with his usual energy into whatever duties were
assigned to him.
* * * * *
_To his Brother._
PESHAWUR, _May 14th, 1849_.
My stay here is very uncertain. I merely came to settle
affairs with Lumsden relative to the increase of the Guides.
Meantime, I have been much interested with my first visit to
this Affghan province and to the Indus. You will see at once
that though it gives us a very strong military frontier,
only passable to armies in half a dozen points, and
therefore infinitely less difficult to hold than a long line
of river, which is ever "a silent highway for nations," yet
at the same time we have once more established a footing in
Affghanistan from which there is no receding, as we did when
we went as allies to the puppet Shah Soojah. Our next stride
must be to Herat, I fancy; _when_ the day will come no man
can say, but "the uncontrollable principle," which,
according to Sir R. Peel, took us there before, will not be
the less active in its operation now that we have no longer
the court and camp of Runjeet Singh between us and these
wild tribes. It is to be hoped that "the uncontrollable
principle" will not appear so very like an _un_controllable
want of it as it did in days gone by! However, go we must,
and shall _some_ day,--so hurrah for Cabul!
I wish you would hit upon some plan for keeping me more "au
fait" with the events of your home world. My time has been
occupied so constantly since I came to India, that, though I
may have made some progress in the knowledge of _men_, I
have made but little in that of _books_. We are sadly off
for military works in English, and few sciences require more
study than the art of war. You might get me a list of good
works from the "United Service Institution" at Charing
Cross. I want the best edition of Caesar procurable; also
Xenophon and Arrian. I fancy the last has been very well
edited.
* * * * *
PESHAWUR, _June 8th, 1849_.
This is the first time I have written to you from
Affghanistan. Who shall say whence my letters may be
directed within a few months. Are we to advance on Cabul and
Candahar, and plant the Union Jack once more on the towers
of Ghuznee? or are we to lie peacefully slumbering on the
banks of the Indus? Are our conquests at an end? or will it
be said of Lord Dalhousie--
Ultra et Garamantas et Indos
Proferet imperium?
My own belief is, that I shall live to see both the places I
have mentioned, and Herat, occupied by British troops; at
least, I hope so.
I think I told you how it had pleased the Governor-General
to reward "my distinguished services," toils, troubles, and
dangers, by kicking me out of the coach altogether. Did I
not? Well, after that close to my civil duties, after having
"initiated" the new Commissioner into his duties, I was sent
up hither to augment recruits and train the Guides. And now
daily, morning and evening, I may be seen standing on one
leg to convince their Affghan mind of the plausibility and
elegance of the goose step. I am quite a sergeant-major just
now, and you will well believe that your wandering brother
is sufficiently cosmopolized to drop with a certain
"aplomb" into any line of life which may turn up in the
course of his career. I was always fond of "soldiering," and
there is a species of absurdity in dropping from the
minister of a province into a drill-sergeant, which is
enlivening. By the next mail I may have to report my
transformation into some new animal. So "vive la gloire."
* * * * *
PESHAWUR, _July 19th, 1849_.
I hope that you got my letter about sending me books. There
is a remarkable dearth of them here just now. You know it
was a flying column which came on here after Goojerat,
composed of regiments hurried up to the field from Bombay,
Scinde, and Hindostan. They came in light marching order.
Books are not a part of that style of equipment. Suddenly a
Government order consigned them to Peshawur, for seven
months at least,--10,000 men, with an unusually large number
of Europeans and officers, _and no books_! Pleasant during
the confinement caused by the hot season. I was better off,
because, being a nomad by profession, I carry a few books as
a part even of the lightest equipment, but I have read them
all till I am tired, except Shakspeare. _My_ time is pretty
fully occupied, but there are dozens of regimental officers
who have not an hour's work in two days, and I do pity them
from my heart. Then of course there are no ladies here, and
consequently no society, or _reunions_, (as they are called
when people _live_ together,) and people are pitched
headlong on to their own resources, and find them very _hard
falling indeed_! I have nothing personal to tell you, except
that when the last mail went out I was in bed with a sharp
attack of fever, which left me without strength, flesh, or
appetite,--a regular blazing eastern fever, the sort of
thing which burns so fast, that if it don't stop quickly, it
burns you well down into the socket, and leaves you there
without strength to splutter or flicker, and you go out
without the satisfaction of a last flare-up at expiring. I
am thankful to say I am well again now, and picking up
strength fast.
They are increasing our corps of Guides to 1,000 men, so
that I shall have enough on my hands, especially as our
Commandant leaves almost everything to me. Sir H. Lawrence
writes from Simla that I am to be appointed an Assistant
Commissioner under the new Board of Administration. I was
the only one of the late Assistants to the Resident who was
not included at first in the new _regime_.
* * * * *
LAHORE, _Sept. 3d, 1849_.
On my arrival here I found your note of 18th June. You may
imagine how wild I was with pleasure at seeing your
handwriting again, as I had been deeply anxious since the
arrival of my father's and George's letters of the 4th June.
These brought me the first tidings of our darling's death.
Happily I saw no newspaper by that mail, and the black edges
first startled me from the belief that you were all well and
happy. The blow was a bitter one indeed, and its utter
suddenness was appalling. Indeed, the prevailing impression
on my mind for days was simple unbelief of the reality of
that sweet child's actual death. I have been so long
_alone_,--home has been for so long a time more a pleasant
dream than a reality,--I have been for so many a weary day,
as it were, dead to you all, and the sense of separation
has grown so completely into one's being, that I find it
difficult to separate that which it is possible to see again
from that which is impossible. Thus it seems to me
incredible that any greater barrier can sever me from this
darling child than that ever-present one which divides me
from all of you. Can you understand this? I know it to be a
delusion, and yet I cannot shake it off. Yet 'tis a good
delusion in one way. It deadens the sense of grief which the
full realization of her death would overwhelm me with.
I have been unfortunate again, and had a second sharp attack
of fever since my arrival. I am about again, but not able to
work. Sir H. Lawrence is very unwell; I fear that his
constitution is utterly broken down, and that he will either
have to go away from India for two years or more, or that
another hot season will kill him. He is ten years older in
every respect than he was during our Cashmere trip in 1846.
This is a hard, wearing, dry climate, which, though
preferable to Hindostan, is destructive to the weak and
sickly. It is quite sad to feel how, little by little, one's
strength and muscle and energy fade, and how one can
perceive age creeping in upon one so early.
* * * * *
LAHORE, _Sept. 24th, 1849_.
You know that I have left the Guides (alas!) and have been
transformed into a complete civilian, doomed to pass the
rest of my career in the administrative and executive duties
of the Government of this last acquisition of the English in
India. To tell the truth, I had much rather have remained
with the Guides; a more independent, and very far pleasanter
life, and I think one that will in the end be more
distinguished. However, I was guided by Mr. Thomason's and
Sir H. Lawrence's advice, and must take the consequences. It
would be difficult to define or explain the exact nature of
my new calling, but in brief, you will comprehend that in
their respective districts the Deputy Assistant
Commissioners perform the whole of the judicial, fiscal, and
magisterial duties which devolve upon the Government of a
country in Europe, with the addition of collecting from the
cultivators and landholders the rent of all lands under
cultivation and pasture, and the duties which in Europe
devolve on an owner of landed property. Police, jails,
quarter-sessions, committals to prison, jury, judge, excise,
stamps, taxes, roads, bridges, ferries, woods and forests,
and finally rent! think what these imply, and you will form
some idea of the employment of an official in the Punjaub
under the "Board of Administration." I have not yet dipped
very deep into this turbid stream of ever-recurring work,
since the great amount of arrears consequent on the break-up
of one Government, and the establishment of another,
including the paying-up and discharge of vast civil and
military establishments, have rendered it necessary to
employ any available head and pair of hands for some months
at head-quarters. The army has fallen to my share, and I
have to examine into the claims of innumerable fine old
hangers-on of the Lahore State to grants or pensions, to
record their rights, and report on them for the decision of
Government. Then there are upwards of 2,000 old women, wives
and mothers of soldiers killed in war, whom I have to see
and pay the pittance decreed by their masters. Lord
Dalhousie, and his secretaries and officials, are stern and
hard taskmasters, and are not unworthily represented by the
new Board, the only merciful member of which (Sir H.
Lawrence) is left in a minority, and is, moreover, too ill
to do much.
* * * * *
CAMP, PATANKOTE, _Jan. 21st, 1850_.
I at length got away from Lahore on the 7th. I had been
ordered merely to seek change of air, but Sir H. Lawrence
was starting on a long tour of inspection, and offered me
the option of accompanying him, and doing a little work by
the way, which I very much preferred; so here we are, after
visiting the sacred city of Umritsur, and the scenes of my
last year's adventures in Butala, Deenanuggur, and Shahpoor,
all between the Ravee and Beas; and are now on our way to
the mountain stations of Kangra, &c. We then go to the
westward again, and I hope to see
Our coursers graze at ease,
Beyond the blue Borysthenes,
as I have dubbed the Indus, ere we again return to civil
life, which does not suit my temperament or taste half as
well as this more nomad life. I am able to ride again,
though not quite with the same firmness, in the saddle as of
yore. I have no doubt, however, that ere we do see the
"Borysthenes," I shall be as "game" for a gallop of one
hundred miles on end, as I was last year at this season.
* * * * *
UMRITSUR, _March 4th, 1850_.
I am at last in a fair way of being stationary for a time at
Umritsur, the sacred city of the Sikhs, and a creation
entirely of their genius. Lahore, as of course you know,
was the old Mussulman capital, and was not built by the
Sikhs, though used by them as the seat of government and
head-quarters of the army. Umritsur is larger than Lahore by
a third or more of people, and half as much again of space.
It is five miles in circumference, very strongly fortified,
and covered by the fortress of Govindghur on the west, and
by a large fortified garden on the north. I am Assistant
Commissioner under the Deputy Commissioner in charge of the
district, Mr. Saunders, a civilian, a very nice sort of
fellow, with an exceedingly pretty and nice wife. Mr.
Montgomery is our Commissioner. I like all I have seen of
him very much indeed. He is a very able man, and at the head
of his service in many respects. Lahore is only about
thirty-five miles hence,--quite within visiting distance in
India.
You must not talk of getting "acclimatized." There is no way
of becoming so but by avoiding the climate as much as
possible. I have had a bad time of it since I left Peshawur,
three and a half months almost entirely on my back, which
reduced me terribly. Then just as I was getting well, the
other day I had a fit of jaundice, which has only just left
me; altogether, in health and in prospects I have come "down
in my luck" to a considerable extent; not that, _per se_, I
ought, as a subaltern of not quite five years' service, to
grumble at my present position, if I was now starting in the
line for the first time; but I can't forget that I came into
the Punjaub two years and a half ago, and have had no little
of the "burden and heat of the day" to bear, when to do so
required utter disregard of comfort and personal safety and
of rest. It is now two years since I was made an Assistant
to the Resident, and within a few months of that time I took
absolute charge of a tract of country (in a state of war,
too) comprising three modern districts, in one of which I am
now playing third fiddle. Surely annexation was a "heavy
blow and a great discouragement" to me, at least. In the
military line, too, I have been equally unlucky, from the
fact of my services having been with detachments instead of
with the main army. I held my ground (and cleared it of the
enemy, too) for weeks, with only 120 men at my back, and
when every officer, from General Wheeler downwards,
entreated me to withdraw and give it up; I fed 5,000 men and
horses for six months by personal and unremitting exertion;
collected the revenues of the disturbed districts, and paid
15,000_l._ over and above, into the treasury, from the
proceeds of property taken from the rebels. Besides this, I
worked for General Wheeler so satisfactorily, that he has
declared publicly that he could have done nothing without
me. So much were the Sikhs enraged[13] at my proceedings,
that party after party were sent to "_polish_" me off, and
at one time I couldn't stir about the country without having
bullets sent at my head from every bush and wall. However, I
need not go on with the catalogue, I have been egotistical
enough as it is. The "reward" for these services was losing
my civil appointment, and being reduced to half pay or
little more for three months, and the distinction of being
the only subaltern mentioned in despatches for whom nothing
has been done either "in praesenti" or "in prospectu." "Had
your name been Hay or Ramsay," said General Wheeler to me
the other day, "no honors, no appointments, no distinctions
would have been considered too great to mark the services
you have rendered to Government." Well, we shall live to see
more wars, or I am sadly mistaken, and _then_--I leave you
to finish the sentence.
Speaking of the system of the Indian army:--
_March 18th, 1850._
At the age at which officers become colonels and majors, not
one in fifty is able to stand the wear and tear of Indian
service. They become still more worn in mind than in body.
All elasticity is gone; all energy and enterprise worn out;
they become, after a fortnight's campaign, a burden to
themselves, an annoyance to those under them, and a terror
to every one but the enemy! The officer who commanded the
cavalry brigade which so disgraced the service at
Chillianwalla, was not able to mount a horse without the
assistance of two men. A brigadier of infantry, under whom I
served during the three most critical days of the late war,
could not see his regiment when I led his horse by the
bridle until its nose touched the bayonets; and even then he
said faintly, "Pray which way are the men facing, Mr.
Hodson?" This is no exaggeration, I assure you. Can you
wonder that our troops have to recover by desperate
fighting, and with heavy loss, the advantages thrown away by
the want of heads and eyes to lead them?
A seniority service, like that of the Company, is all very
well for poor men; better still for fools, for they must
rise equally with wise men; but for maintaining the
discipline and efficiency of the army in time of peace, and
hurling it on the enemy in war, there never was a system
which carried so many evils on its front and face.
I speak strongly, you will say, for I feel acutely; though I
am so young a soldier, yet the whole of my brief career has
been spent in camps, and a year such as the last, spent in
almost constant strife, and a great part of it on detached
and independent command, teaches one lessons which thirty
years of peaceful life, of parades and cantonments, would
never impart.
There are men of iron, like Napier and Radetzky, aged men,
whom nothing affects; but they are just in sufficient
numbers to prove the rule by establishing exceptions. Depend
upon it, that for the rough work of war, especially in
India, your leaders must be young to be effective.
If you _could_ but see my beautiful rough and ready boys,
with their dirt colored clothes and swarthy faces, lying in
wait for a Sikh, I think it would amuse you not a little. I
must try and send you a picture of them. Alas! I am no
longer a "Guide," but only a big-wig, administering justice,
deciding disputes, imprisoning thieves, and assisting to
hang highwaymen, like any other poor old, fat, respectable,
humdrum justice of the peace in Old England.
* * * * *
UMRITSUR, _April 5th, 1850_.
I quite agree with all you say about Arnold. His loss was a
national misfortune. Had he lived, he would have produced an
impression on men's minds whose effects would have been felt
for ages. As it is, the influence which he did produce has
been most lasting and striking in its effects. It is felt
even in India; I cannot say more than _that_.
You should come and live in India for five years if you
wished to feel (supposing you ever doubted it) the benefit
of our "established" forms of Christianity. Even the outward
signs and tokens of its profession--cathedrals, churches,
colleges, tombs, hospitals, almshouses--have, I am now more
than ever convinced, an influence on men's minds and
principles and actions which none but those who have been
removed from their influence for years can feel or
appreciate thoroughly. The more I think of this, the more
strongly I feel the effect of mere external sights and
sounds on the inner and better man. Our Gothic buildings,
our religious-looking churches, have, I am sure, a more
restraining and pacifying influence than is generally
believed by those who are habituated to them, and have never
felt the want of them. A few cathedrals and
venerable-looking edifices would do wonders in our colonies.
Here we have nothing physical to remind us of any creed but
Islamism and Hindooism. The comparative purity of the
Moslem's creed is shown admirably in the superiority in
taste and form of their places of prayer. Christianity alone
is thrust out of sight! A barrack-room, a ball-room, a
dining-room, perhaps a court of justice, serve the purpose
for which the "wisdom and piety of our ancestors"
constructed such noble and stately temples; feeling, justly,
that the human mind in its weakness required to be called to
the exercise of devotion by the senses as well as by reason
and will; that separation from the ordinary scenes of
every-day life, its cares, its toils, its amusements, is
necessary to train the feelings and thoughts to that state
in which religious impressions are conveyed. I have not seen
a church for three years and more, nor heard the service of
the Church read, save at intervals, in a room in which,
perhaps, the night before, I had been crushed by a great
dinner party, or worn out by the bustle and turmoil of
suitors. The building in which one toils becomes intimately
associated with the toil itself. That in which one prays
should at least have some attribute to remind one of prayer.
Human nature shrinks for long from the thought of being
buried in any but consecrated ground; the certainty of lying
dead some day or other on a field of battle, or by a
roadside, has, I have remarked, the most strange effect on
the soldier's mind. Depend upon it the same feeling holds
good with regard to consecrated places of worship. You may
think this fanciful, but I am sure you would feel it more
strongly than I do, were you to live for a time in a country
where everything _but religion_ has its living and existent
memorials and evidences.
But to return to reality: I have just spent three days in
Sir Charles Napier's camp, it being my duty to accompany him
through such parts of the civil district as he may have
occasion to visit. He was most kind and cordial, vastly
amusing and interesting, and gave me even a higher opinion
of him than before. To be sure his language and mode of
expressing himself savor more of the last than of this
century,--of the camp than of the court; but barring these
eccentricities, he is a wonderful man; his heart is as
thoroughly in his work, and he takes as high a tone in all
that concerns it, as Arnold did in his; that is to say, the
highest the subject is capable of. I only trust he will
remain with us as long as his health lasts, and endeavor to
rouse the army from the state of slack discipline into which
it has fallen. On my parting with him he said, "Now,
remember, Hodson, if there is any way in which I can be of
use to you, pray don't scruple to write to me." I didn't
show him his brother's[14] letter,--that he might judge for
himself first, and know me "per se," or rather "per me;" I
will, however, if ever I see him again.
FOOTNOTES:
[13] Such an impression had my brother's daring and activity produced
upon the minds of the Sikhs, that several years afterwards it was
found that the Sikh mothers still used his name as a threat of terror
to their children, reminding one of the border ballad,--
Hark ye, hark ye, do not fret ye,
The black Douglas shall not get ye.
[14] Sir W. Napier.