The Press.
London, England, 1858-01-30 00:00:00

THE BATTLE AT CAWNPORE.

An officer, an eyewitness of the recent fighting at
Cawnpore, gives the following graphic description of
the affair. It will be seen that the rebels not only
out.generalled us, but fairly beat us back from our
position. Of course the numbers were in their
favour as ten to one ; but still the result shows that
these men are being beaten into generalship—not a
desirable end where our success depends upon the
skill and daring we exhibit, so as to compensate fully
for the tremendous disproportion of force :
The Trenches, Cawnpore, Dec. 4, 1857.
Early, then, on the morning of the 20th of November
we turned out at four a.m., and having been inspected by
Generals Windham, Dupuis, and Attie (all of whom, by
the bye, took notice of and spoke to me), we, the 82nd,
B'fth, some Sikh cavalry, Rifles, and four or five guns,
marched up the banks of the Ganges canal. About three
miles on the other aide, the sharp whiz of the grape sal
round shot commences, and we are for the first time Ist
our life under fire. I am not going to describe all the
different feelings, &a., which all people talk shoat r
having experienced when just going into the fight, bat
all I say is, that at that particular moment I would rather
have been quietly smoking a cheroot at a comfortable
distance off ; but then, at the smack of the rifle mingles
with the boom of the cannon, and as with a British cheer
we rash forward over the paddy fields to drive in the posi-
tion of the mutineers, the feeling chang.,s; we feel as if we
are on wings, and begin to enjoy ourselves amazingly. And
now fast and thick fly the musket balls of the enemy, and
thick and fast fall those who are hit; but we don't look to
the rear, it is all front work, and we keep going on alter
the already retreating sepoys, until suddenly the cry of
" Cavalry coming!" is raised, and quick as thought the
34th Queen's form square, and with one thundering volley
we reddea the young rice before us with the blood of all
but five. Then on again , • a little more grape, shell, and
road, find

but five. Then on again ; a little more grape, anon, ono uvr.—
round shot, and we form on the Calpee road, find that we inviting him to send a force to liotalt. They attacked the income
000 more of oUr beat soldiers to India, then we
_
have not lost any offloers, but plenty of men, and with palace, and seized the Minister. 100,

104

may possibly put down all opposition by main force, but
esi bono ? What we want is, not that we should merely be
able to beat the enemy in the field, but thit there should
be no enemy to beat either in the field or out. What can
we expect from prolonged war ? Solitudinem fariunt parent
vacant. What use to us will be plundered cities, and
devastated villages, and depopulated districts? Whet
we really want is submission without destruction,
pacification without that heart-sickening effusion
of blood that is now deluging the plains of India.
I can picture to myself that the natives of India, in trans-
ferring their allegiance from the Company to the Crown,
would consider the oil account settled, and would thus
believe in the reality of an amnesty, which to be effective
should be simultaneous with the transfer; while at the
same time if a scion of Royalty, a Prince of the blood.
Royal, could be sent out to inaugurate the change, I should
anticipate the mast happy effects. The presence, indeed,
in India of a son of the Queen of England, at the same
moment that the imperial phantom of Islam, the last
descendant of the House of Timour, was vanishing from
the throne of Delhi, would revive and concentrate in
favour of the former all those feelings of loyalty and love,
that childlike reverence for kings, for the Lord's anointed,
which has been the characteristic of Oriental nations from
the patriarchal ages, and would thus bring about a moral
revolution in the country of more value to England than
any successes she could achieve at the expense of millions
of treasure, or the blood of hundreds of thousands of her
soldiers. lam aware that in throwing out this suggestion
I expose myself to ridicule. Matter of fact, practical,
hardheaded Englishmen will be inclined to deride a
scheme which savours so much of theatrical claptrap;
but we are not dealing with practical Englishmen,—we
are dealing with the natives of India, who are the creatures
of impulse and feeling, and who of all people in the
world would be most likely to be influenced by a royal
pageant. Successful statesmanship depends as much on
consulting the folliei and weaknesses of mankind as in
providing for their real wants or studying their material
Interests ; and I trust, therefore, that the tinsel character

of the, scheme may not be any bar to its adoption.

Such a step be hoped and believed would be identical
. with peace in the first instance and security for the
future ; with the pacification of Oude and the resto•
ration of the landholders to their respective talooks ;
with the entire suppression of the system of annexa-
tion; with the abolition of the contingents in the
native States, and the grant of a much greater liberty
of action to the rulers; with the restoration, perhaps,
of his provinces to the Nizam ; with justice to the
holders of the old Five-per-Cent. Loan ; with a con-
cession of the right of purchasing the fee simple of
lend throughout the empire ; with the extinction of
the Insm Commissions wherever they exist ; with
measures, in fact, not of stringency, harshness, or
severity, but rather of greater liberalty and greater
consideration than the natives have hitherto ex-

perienced.
Captain Shepheard, Sir F. Currie, and Mr. Mac-
naghten followed in support of the petition of the
East India Company, and the meeting was ulti-
mately adjourned until the following day, when the
debate was resumed, and at length concluded, an
amendment to the original motion being rejected,
and the motion adopting the petition agreed to, there
being only two dissentients.

THE COURT OF EAST INDIA DIRECTORS have again
bad under their consideration the question of tele-

tic communication with India, and have again
Bair willingness to grant to the Red Sea
Company such support and assistance as
amble them to raise the necessary capital for
IYs uniertaking. We believe that the amount esti-
mated for a line of telegraph from Suez to Kurrachee
ta 700,001. ; and the Court, we understand, are pre-
pared to join with her Majesty's Government in gua-
tantoeing a revenue equivalent to five per cent. upun
that sum, so soon as the work is finished, and as long
St it is kept in good order. The proposition now
*sly awaits the ratification of her Majesty's Treasury,
to whom, by the-bye, a similar plan was submitted
four months ago without eliciting any expression of
approval or support.

THE REFORM MEETINGS held during the week
have been but feebly supported. The City of London
Ladies' Shoemaker Society have met and passed a
resolution in favour of the ballot and annual parlia-
ments, and have resolved " not to remain silent
till justice is done to the toiling millions of the
country," and a circular has emanated from some
quarters, in which we are invited to lend our aid to
what " may be the happiest, as it is the most impor-
tant movement, our country has witnessed in modern
times—a union between the middle and the working
classes for political reform " :
To effect this object the advanced political reformers
among the working classes have agreed to waive, for a
time, a portion of that politifti programme to which they
hove been so low, and are still so ardently attached. and
to offer manhood suffrage and the repeal of the property
qualification for members of Parliament, as a basic of union
with the reformers of all classes, leaving it to the middle
classes to add as much or as little as they may think proper
to the above two points.
A conference has been called to meet in London on
the 11th of February, at nine a.m., in St. Martin's-
ball, Long-acre, for the purpose of realising, if
possible, the projected union, which wo are assured
Rill preaorye Silo limo of Ltizlaud,