The Press. — London, England, 1857-10-10 00:00:00

INDIA. THE CALCUTTA MAIL. The Wits arrived on Wednesday at Southampton with the heavy portion of the Indian, China, and Australian mails. her dates are—Alexandria, Sept. 23; Malta, 27 ; Gibraltar, Oct. 1. She bas brought home about 150 passengers, many of whom are refugees from India. The scene presented by their friends meeting these passengers was one of overwhelming excitement. Many burst into a flood of tears, and were deprived almost of the power of utterance. The Lady Mayoress of London, the Mayor of Southampton, Mr. Alderman Andrews, and a number of ladies and gentlemen, went on board the Indus to receive the refugees. Many of the fugitives were from Cawnpore, Allahabad, and other places in the upper provinces of Bengal. Numbers also have fled from Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta in alarm About forty children have come home in the humus. Amongst the passengers is Lieutenant Chapman, who was shot by the mutineers at Bemires. A bullet went right through his cheek and carried away part of the roof of his mouth. His speech is scarcely intelligible. He is quite a youth, not above nineteen years of age. Another of the passengers is Captain Montague, with his wife; he belonged to the Irregulars, and was in command of a company of Sikhs ; he is injured in the shoulder and side. He belonged to General Havelock's army, and fought on the march to Cawn pore. He lost his two children through want and exposure while coming down the Ganges from Alla habad. He knew Nana Sahib, and was present at a ball given Ir* him at Cawnpore about a month before the mutiny broke out. It was the most magnificent ball ever given at Cawnpore; all the English were present, most of whom were afterwards mercilessly slaiulitered by the scoundrel. Captain Mont ague and his wife left Cawnpore before it was captured by the mutineers. The passengers say that almost the only man who escaped the massacre of Cawnpore has gone raving mad. This is an officer, a Mr. Brown, who after he got away, suffered great hardships, and lay hidden in a nnllah, without food, during three days and nights. A Miss Goldie, a very beautiful young lady, and daughter of Colonel Goldie, was taken by Nana Sahib to his harem, and is believed to be alive now. When the passengers in the Indus left Calcutta only three thousand troops had arrived there since the outbreak. Unless Capt. Peel makes his way up the river very quickly, and before the rains cease, it is scarcely believed that he will get his guns up to Delhi; but if he cannot carry his guns beyond Allahabad he will, it is expected, push on for Delhi without them. Should the water carriage fail, it would be extremely difficult, on account of the badness of the roads, to convey such heavy guns (one of them an 8-I.pounder) to Delhi by land. Lucknow, it is feared, will fall before assistance can reach it. Between Cawnpore and Luckuow there were about thirty-five thousand mutineers, and it is con sidered doubtful whether Sir J. Outratn will be successful in passing up the Gogra; the river is lined with forts, well manned with mutineers. Outram's advance, however, up the Gogra will, it is hoped, draw off the mutineers from Havelock, and enable him probably to escape from the dilemma in which he is placed. Nana Sahib has resolved not to fall alive into the hands of the English. He has a body-guard, who are engaged to deprive him of life, should he be likely to be taken prisoner by the English. No fear is entertained but that the Sikhs will prove true to the English in fighting against both Maho medans and Hindoos ; but the feeling generally in India is, that unless English troops arrive out soon, the Sikhs may, atter they have put down the sepoys, turn against us. It is believed by msny persons at Calcutta that as soon as the English troops arrive out in India the mutiny will suddenly cease. The sepoys will bury the money and treasure they have obtained, and lay down their arms. They are in the utmost terror of the English soldiers. There were many English at Calcutta when the Indus left that port who had had perilous escapes from the upper provinces, and who are expected to arrive at Southampton by the next India mail packet. Letters continue daily to appear in the columns of our contemporaries. The general tone is that the THE PRESS, OCTOBER 10, 1857. Home Government completely misunderstands the nature of the contest in which our countrymen are ------- -- - engaged. " Things are in a very bad state all over India (says one writer, August 2:3rd) ; in Bengal they could hardly be worse, the result of incapacity and want of energy on the part of our rulers here, which is only surpassed by the culpable neglect and idiotic blindness of the Government at home." The Euro peans, too, without exception, bitterly deplore the apathy of the Government as exhibited in their refusal to despatch troops overland. " regi ments (observes the above writer) sent out at once by the Red Sea would have had more effect, moral and physical, than all the troops they are sending out round the Cape." " It is painful (observes another writer, August 14, from Calcutta) to real the amount of misappre- pension at home on the subject of the rebellion " : Colonel Sykes and the Daily News still speak of it. as a religious question, the former " feeling that the sepoys were animated with as high a principle as hail in times past carried Latimer and Ridley to the stake "—the latter, supported by Mr. Mangles, seem ing to ascribe it to the " officers being too proud or lazy to mingle with the men ;" and " the native soldiers being galled by the impossibility of their ever rising above a very subordinate rank "! A brilliant display of the amount of knowledge of the manners and customs of the natives of India, and the constitution of the native army, attained by those who profess to lead public opinion I Colonel Sykes's speech at this moment only excites a derisive smile; but even Lord Ellenborough appears to ascribe the revolt to "the apprehensions of the troops that their religion would be interfered with." Mr. Lewin, in his pamphlet, " The Way to Lose India," however, has looked a little deeper into the millstone, and strikes at the root of the evil, which he shows to he, not in the cartridge manufactory at Dum Dum, but in a certain establishment in Leadenhall street. Meantime all admit the danger of the crisis. What steps have you taken to avert it ? 11,000 men are on their way—round the Cape, and will arrive here in October and November. The Earl of Hardwicke seems to have been the only man who remembered that England had available troops in the Mediterranean, and the overland route to bring them at once to the shores of India. Earl Granville hesitates to admit the extent of the danger, prompted by the " pooh•pooh " Government here, and waits before taking further measures, afraid that the world should think him afraid. Here, the non despatch of troops overland, and the appa rent total absence of all intention of sending any by that route, is exciting a universal feeling of disappointment—l insy almost write dismay. Surely neither France nor Egypt. who so gladly allowed us to send forces from this to the Crimea by the Red Sea, will object to the passage of a few of those regiments now lying idle in the Mediterranean to help us here in our utmost need ? Surely the crisis was sufficiently alarming to have adopted such a course. If not, will it be thou/lit so now ? What will you say when you hear that the rebellion has spread to within 104) miles of Calcutta itself, which is kept in subjection by the presence of several European regiments, and the emus rnent of its comparatively small European population? " As to the mutinies (writes another correspon dent), matters look worse every day, and the mutineers, instead of being crushed, are daily gaining strength and power " : Agra and Lucknow are so critically situated that every day may bring us news of the fall of one or both of these important places. General Havelock, after retaking and leaving Cawnpore on his way to relieve Lucknow, had to retreat, the rebels being in such force as to put it beyond the power of his little column of 1,000 men, with a long train of sick and wounded, to force a passage. The road was cut across, bridges broken down, and every village intreoched. Ave, the seat of Go vernment of the northwest provinces, is taken, and the officials and Europeans there are defending themselves in the fort. The native troops throughout Bengal have all mutined. The whole of our northwest provinces, including Lucknow, may be virtually said to be separated from our Indian possessions, and our hold upon the districts between Allahabad and Calcutta is but by a thread ; in fact, the late mutiny of three regiments at Dinapore has cut off communication, except by steamers on the river, between Allahabad and Calcutta. The mutiny at Dinapore is the most serious affair that has happened lately, inas much as the whole of that district— licrar—within !VW miles of Calcutta, is now in a blaze, and troops intended for the northwest and Delhi have now to be halted there to protect lienares, Patna, Gazeepore, and other important towns. . • • . . To day a report has arrived that the Santhals have again risen, and the state of Bengal—overrun with 150,fita1 savages, who delight in blood, plunder, and rapine —will indeed be terrible. In the hands of such a race Bengal will become a howling desert. From Shergotty, in the south, to ISO miles north of Meerut in the north, and from the confines of Nepaul in the east, to Indore and Mhow in our Presidency, the whole country, excepting the few spots held by Europeans, is in the hands of a savage and insatiable soldiery. It is most extraordinary that in a country many times larger than the British Isles, in which were many thousands of commissioned officers, cjvil servants, commis sioners, collectors, magistrates, courts, judges. police, innumerable, no one should have been found to tell the Government of the gigantic plot which has been visibly hatching since last January, when the celebrated chupattie cakes were circulated throughout the country. The fatuity and blindneas of the Government officials continue to the 9SI present day, and they have mail after mail, It is now dis covered, been wilfully misleading the Queen's Ministers as to the real state of affairs in this country ; in fact, they do not appear able to realise it to this present day, and, like the ostriches biding their heads, fancy there is no danger because they see it not. Before Delhi, our little force is the besieged, not the besiegers, and the utter absurdity of the mail boats having been detained time after tilne that intelligence of the fall of Delhi might be conveyed home by that opportunity was auparent to all but the Government. I fancy we have seen the last of the East India Company, and it is time. Excess and abuse of patronage, nearly every member of the Company's service being nearly related to the directors, who promote according to stupidity, in c , pacity, and nearness of relationship, whenever the latter is combined with the former—maladministration of India and misgovernment will about sound their dying knell, and time it should. Last March several Fakeers (or religious mendicants), tattooed and besmeared, were observed to be travelling all over Bengal and the north-west on elephants, which excited general remark from everyone but the Government officials. They allowed these men to pass unquestioned, and it now turns out they were the King of Delln's sons and nephews calling for the chupattie cakes and settling arrangements for the mutiny. . . . . . There have been queer doings at Deese, in Guzerat, with the 12th Native Infantry and 3rd Cavalry, but then the 200 Europeans were handled with energy, and the whole regi ment disarmed and dismounted in twelve minutes, forty five being killed in trying to bolt after being made prisoners, and fur the tresent things seem quiet there. The Nth Madras Cavalry refused to embark at Madras for Calcutta, and they were disarmed and dismounted, and the Govern ment General Body Guard, the Prtetorian guards of India, have had to be treated in the same way. They would not, they said, go to tight against their countrymen. Our Bombay officers say they could not depend upon their men to draw trigger upon the mutineers, so if once they were brought in contact with them there would 'se a grand ex plosion, with murder and revolting cruelties as usual. Here we are going through an anxious period, the festival of the Mohurrum, which ends to-morrow. Luckily we have hail several bodies of troops from the Mauritius in lately, and have about 1,000 men, infantry and artillery, to awe the population if riotous, and every proper precaution has been taken. They are not such fools, however, as to take us when prepared for them, but will doubtless try to catch the " weasel asleep," if they intend trying it on at all. The Poona!' ant Sattara moulvies and Sattara Rajah, who were found plotting and conspiring, were quietly captured, and are now awaiting their fate on board a man•of•war in this port. Rumours are abroad that the 10th Native Infantry here w re disarmed yesterday, being in an excited state, but this is untrue ; their pouches and ammunition only were collected by a European force sent into their lines for the purpose ; but this is kept dark, and stoutly denied by the officers and authorities, under pain of a severe punish. ment if found divulging it, though how they can keep it quiet Ido not see. All of us are armed, and I and my friends near about are ready to mount, fully equipped with sabres and revolvers, at any time at night, to assist in the orgies. The formation of a volunteer corps is strongly wished fur by all, but pig headed red•tepists oppose it, and ask, with a sneer, " Where is the danger ?" Colonel used this very expression a few days since at a meeting called to propose a volunteer corps being formed. Of such are the kings of' India ! Another correspondent writes to a friend in Edin burgh : Calcutta, Aug. 21. We have so few men that are worth twopence out here, that the doings of those two men, Generals Neill and Havelock, With their handful of British soldiers, cause their names to be the pride of every British heart in this country. Every one considers such a man as Sir Colin Campbell a perfect godsend. Troops are looked for with the greatest anxiety. Poor fugitives arrive in Cal cutta daily, some having scarcely clothes to cover them. The scenes which have taken place up country cannot be conceived, far less described. Calcutta is considered very safe. We have for our protection a large body of volunteer foot, another of horse, and a third of artillery, with four guns, besides those of her Majesty's troops who are still here. There are also several men of-war steamers in the river ready to shell the native town should any attempt at a rise be made. The volunteer horse patrol the streets at night, and the foot are stationed at different parts of the city in the public buildings. During the Mohurrum all the volunteers are to be out, instead of only a part. The artillery are also to be out with their guns. The Free Church is in the centre of the Mussulman huts, but I sup pose during the Mohurrum we shall have two guns for our protection, as we had during the 13uckreed. All those who have friends in Calcutta may keep their minds easy, and be thankful they arc not up country. I forgot to tell you that Lord Elgin is now here, and that the troops that were sent to China are all •_o be brought here ; some have already arrived. Some of the budzats (worthless folk) of sepoys are to be sent to fight the Chinese, which is the best thing that can be done with the wretches, I think. A lady at Calcutta writes on the Bth August : We are encompassed by dangers open and hidden, and the latter p:edominate; such awful tragedies have taken place all over the country that one's nerves get quite shaken, and every mail has taken home worse and worse news. It is again worse this mail, and there is a talk of sending the ladies horn. How ignorant were we of the volcano upon which our Government here was standing, and which they have wilfully ignored and neglected, both here and in England. Sir Charles Napier spoke out and got into disgrace—every word he wrote and uttered has come true ; but lie gave offence, and therefore his superior sagacity was of no avail. Hundreds of English have been brutally tortured, ill-used, and then murdered, ladies especially; the papers dare not tell half they know, in respect to the feelings of the friends of the murdered,