The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-22 00:00:00

rHE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 22, 1858.

OPERATIONS IN OUDE.
{Continued from the Times of December 21.)
THE CAMP, PURSAIDEPORE, Nov. 9.
At 4 o'clock this morning the first bugle sounded.
At 5 the column marched from Beylah to Leowlie,
10 miles distant on the road to Amethie. Those
Indian marches, picturesque enough at the close, and
interesting when the sun rises, are -immensely dis-
agreeable in their preliminaries and their com-
mencement. Only an iron will and long experience
can enable one to overcome the tumult which reigns
all the night before, and to snatch a fw hours of
sleep. The klassies, or tent pitchers,e are a most
peculiar class of men. The moment the tent is
pitched their cares for the day are over, and all the
day they sleep under the eaves of the tent accord-
ingly, but as darkness falls they get up and wander
about stealthily, tapping tent-pegs and preparing
for the great business of their existence. It is in
vain that order after order has been issued to the
klassies not to touch a tent-peg till the first bugle
sounds. It is their caste to tap tent-pegs ; they '
are born to it, bred to it, and die to it. The whole
race of men belonging to this order would endure
martyrdom in the faith that tent-pegs, when in the
ground, are to be knocked out of it, and when out
of the ground are to be knocked into it. When
awake they can no more resist their impulses on this
head than a London pickpocket can refuse the ap-
peal of an easy pocket handkerchief. Soon after
dusk the noise begins—tap ! tap! tap ! far and near
like a fire of musketry, for many a weary acre of
canvas-covered ground. This is called tonking—
striking the long deep Indian tent-pegs on the
sides, so as to loosen them in the earth, and to pre-
pare them for easy extrication when the tent is
to be struck. The ground shakes with those
myriad knockings—one gets feverish, restless,
rushes out on th persecuting klassie, and, as he
falls in the dark over the tent ropes, beholds a
white, ghost-like form glide away into obscurity.
The shouts, cries, and noises of the bazaars swell
into a tempest as the sutlers prepare to pack up
their goods and move off in the early night. Then,
long before the first of the small hours, the camels
which are to move your house and furniture are
brought close to the head of your bed. The " ships
of the desert" are anchored beside you, and the
canvas offers no resistance either to the dreadful
vapours which come from the holds of those ships
or the sounds which rage on board. Those ships
are always in a state of mutiny. , A camel's life is
a long and loud protest against the load that is put
on his back, and he wisely enters his protest be-
fore his suffering begins. I know of no sound
more sleep-destroying. Then there is the trum-
peting of elephants, the barking of dogs, the yell-
ing of jackals, and, above all these, the hideous
dissonance of the many-voiced camp. The camp
bells and gongs, too, vary in time. They are
generally a quarter of an hour or more before they
finish striking one o'clock. The smoke of the camp
fires steals into the tent and half chokes one. Look
out and you will see something like a Fuseli's
dream of Pandemonium—blazing fires, surrounded
by black men in white clothing, moving to and
fro, with strange quaint heads of camels, elephants,
and other animals peering. through and above them.
A reddened smoke hangs in the air like a pall over
the scene. Towards morning the horses begin to
neigh, and those animals are mostly sound-lunged,
and are picketedclose behind the tents, so that—but
what is the use of my endeavouring to describe the
sights or sounds of an Indian camp ? My letter has
already exceeded the limits of newspaper capacity
in its most indulgent moments " out of the season.
It is written, too, with difficulty on a table 18 inches
high, from a stool a foot higher. We marched then
from Beylah to Dehmah, about 12 miles, where we
halted for the day. In the evening the messengers
from Amethie came in with more letters, but the
authorities, civil and military, stuck to their text,
and Lord Clyde refused to see the Vakeel at all.
On the morning of the 9th, at dawn, the columns
marched towards Amethie, and reached the plain at
the eastern angle and face of the work about 11
o'clock. Here they halted and pitched their tents
about 1 o'clock, within 21 miles of the fort ; the
jungle round which could be seen distinctly, and a
small portion of one of the interior buildings from
a knoll in our front. About 12 30, as we were rest-
ing in a tope by a Hindoo temple, waiting for our
tents to be pitched, the sound of a heavy gun from
the fort roused us all up; again and again the
sound of the shotted gun was heard, and some sup-
posed that it was Sir Hope Grant actually attack-
ing the place on his own account, but the appear-
ance of that gallant officer in camp with a small
escort, enabled us to learn that the guns we had
heard were fired upon him as he rode across the
plain from his camp to visit the Commander-in-
Chief. He rode over to look at the place, and the
Sepoys at once opened two guns on his escort at
500 yards distance, which forced them to retreat
abruptly. Here was a new complication--Lull
Madho's people had fired on our troops. Lord Clyde
was somewhat put out by the occurrence, which he
could have wished undone if that were possible, al-
though he was irritated against the Rajah on account
of the tone of his last letter, in which he actually
asked for an indemnity, and took a most ridiculous
stand as to guarantees for the promises made to
him. The reply was decisive. If the Rajah did not
come in before 10 a.m. on the 10th, the British
columns would assault the place. Again the Vakeel
came in to Major Barrow, and at night it was
whispered among a few that the Rajah had sub-1
mitted. In fact, at 1 p.m. on the 9th, three
British forces—one under Lord Clyde, the other
under Sir Hope Grant, and the third under Briga-
dier Wethcrall—had pitched their tents, one on
each accessible face of the defences of Amethie.
The effect of this apparition on the Rajah's Councils
may be conceived. But 12 hours before he had
been full of mighty airs; he had been talking of
his honour, of his losses, and of material guarantees.
Now he sat down and wrote as follows :
TRANSLATION OF A LETTER FROM RAJAH LULL MADHO
SINGH, OF AMETHIE, TO MAJOR BARROW, Nov. 9.
After compliments.—" My Vakeel had not come in (from
our camp) when the cavalry of the Atiha Division (Sir
Hope Grant and his escort) neared my fort, and were fired
on by the sepoys. When my Vakeel returned I then learnt
that you would at a distance wait my reply to your pro-
posals, and for this reason you had encamyed one koss from
the fort. But the cavalry of the division caused the sepoys
to tire on them by advancing so close to the fort. As I
have no wish to encounter the troops of the Government,
I therefore beg for some pledge from Governmemt that I
may appear and remove myself to some other British town.
The Government can do as they please with the fort and
cannon." (Sealed and signed by the Rajah.)
Thus lie made ample submission in words ; ex-
cused himself for the act of the sepoys, very in-
geniously throwing the blame on us, who had
broken an agreement, and it only remained to see
it he carried his promises into effect. That night,
as we heard, he left the fort stealthily, and repaired
to a village near at hand. He neither told his fol-
lowers of the negotiation, of the Proclamation, nor
of the amnesty. He said he dared not tell them.
He left them to find it out.
Major Barrow, having arranged with the Rajah
of Amethie that he should come in the morning
before 10 o'clock, rode out to the village appointed
as the place of rendezvous, about a mile in front of
our camp, accompanied by Colonel Sterling, Mili-
tary Secretary to the Commander-in-Chief. The
Rajah, with two or three attendants, was waiting
o receive them on horseback. He is a square-
-wilt, powerfully-moulded man, rather below the
middle height. His features are regular, his eyes
full and intelligent; his black hair falls in -loose
locks over his shoulders from beneath the folds of
his turban ; and the jet of his bushy moustache,
beard, and whiskers, is not streaked by a single
gray hair. As he approached our camp, in com-
pany with the British Commander, the officer of
one of our pickets, seeing the small body of horse-
men advancing towards his post, mounted his
Dragoons' and rode to meet them, at which the
Rajah showed some signs of uneasiness, but the
matter was soon explained. Soon, however, the
Rajah had cause for greater uneasiness. Three
.yultures, which were gorging themselves with offal
In his path, rose with a heavy flapping from the
ground.
shied The Rajah's horse, a remarkably fine
animal, iviolentl and fell, throwing the
Rajah to the ground with considerable force so
that the party were obliged to continue their jour-
ney to the camp on foot. An occurrence of this
kind was calculated to produce the very deepest
impression on the mind of a man, like jpoots,
a firm
exceedingly superstitious, and believer in
signs and tokens, and his demeanour became
very subdued and sullen. His arrival in our camp
was not very dignified. The soldiers of one of
the English regiments turned out of their tents to
look at him, and no doubt would have " chaffed"
him, as his Vakeel had been subjected to that
peculiar exercise of the esprit moqueur of the
British infantry, had they been permitted to do so.
Many of the men in full undress followed him
into head-quarters camp, and the camp followers,
syces, grasscutters, and peons, idling about, swelled
the crowd, which thronged the end of the main
street of the camp till it was dispersed by the sen-
tries. The Rajah, wearing his shoes, entered, with
Major Barrow, inside his tent, and then the diplo-
matic and civil portion of the proceedings com-
menced. I cannot say that the results were so
satisfactory as could be desired. The Rajah stated
that he had inside his fort 1,500 sepoys of the 15th
Native Infantry and other regiments, and 2,500 of
his own followers. These men were all in perfect
ignorance of the Queen's Proclamation and of the
amnesty, as the Rajah said he did not dare to ac-
quaint them with the contents of those documents, nor
had he given them the least hint of the negotiations
with Government. In fact, he had left the fort by
stealth, and had concealed his surrender from his

garrison. So far therefore it was impossible to
know what course this force would adopt; but the
Rajah was of opinion that his adherents were strong
enough to compel any dissentients to obey his orders,'
and he declared that he had no doubt he could hand
us over the fort, the guns, and the arms of his fol-
lowers. His Vakeel or minister was despatched to
make known to the garrison the fact of the Rajah's
submission and the surrender by him of his fort and
materiel of war. After a long interview, the Rajah
was taken by Major Barrow to Lord Clyde, who re-
ceived him in his dinner tent in the presence of the
chief of his staff and one or two officers. The Com-
mander-in-Chief was no doubt rather disappointed
when he heard of the real state of the case. The
Rajah, indeed, had surrendered, and so far had com-
plied with the terms granted to him, but his fort
was still in the hands of those who might turn out
to be our enemies, and some of whom were certainly
guilty sepovs, whose escape it was most desirable to
prevent. i3esides, they might be making use of
this time to drag away the guns, and to desert
through the dense jungles which enclosed one side of
the fort. Still, we could not precipitate matters by
attacking the place before the Rajah had tested his
authority. We had promised not to close in upon
Amethie for the day, so that a considerable time
would be afforded to the Sepoys to take to flight,
which, indeed, we could not prevent under any
circumstances, as the force at our command could
not surround the place, one side of which, as
already stated, melts, as it were, into a formidable
swampy jungle, extending many miles towards the
south-west, through which are paths known only
to a few natives. When the visit to Lord Clyde
was over the Rajah again went to Major Barrow,
and messengers were despatched to the fort with
instructions as to the surrender of the place ; but
Lall Madho remained in the neighbourhood of our
camp with one of his friends, not daring to show
himself among his followers. The chief of a neigh-
bouring fort also came in and made his submission
to Mr. Carnegy, the Assistant-Commissioner of his
district. This gentleman, " Pretty Poll Singh" by
name (I am not quite sure about the spelling),
arrived in a palanquin, preceded by a bearer with a
large silver mace, and followed by servants and
men armed with flint carbines and matchlocks. He
is a tall, stout man, of a stern face, ornamented by
snow-white moustaches, and was
shawls and stuffs—making a far greater show than
the Rajah, as was natural from the circumstances
under which the latter came in. He sat in his
litter at the end of the " street," smoking his
hookah, and surveying the few promenaders be-
tween the canvass houses with great equanimity.
In his train came a hackery, in which lay
.an old
iron carronade much the worse for age, a six-bar-
relled revolving matchlock, several flint pistols in
various stages of decomposition, some bearing
marks of being recently burnished, half-a-dozen
swords, and a few old firelocks, mostly fired by
matches. These were his arms, of which he pro-
fessed to have made a total surrender, but
I fear our friend of the simple and eccentric
name was playing the gay deceiver, and that
in various jeels and ponds and wells there are
lying now (in a different sense from the talookdar's
lying) some of those four or five cannon as to which
the Commissioner made such tender inquiries in
vain, as well as those stands of arms which the chief
is believed to have possessed. -What the result of
these inquiries may be it is difficult to say. The
talookdar declared himself pleased at the surrender
of his arms to the Queen's Government, and as a
token of goodwill brought in plenty of lambs, kids,
fresh vegetables, and such like pastoral and Oriental
blandishments.
Nor was he our only conquest this morning.
Several landholders of greater or less importance
presented themselves, and Humrunt Singh, of Kal-
likunker, on the Ganges, who was recently amusing
himself by plumping round shot into our steamers,
is now quite domesticated on the premises, and
waddles up and down our street in a pleasant free-
and-easy manner quite charming. to behold. One
looks at him very much with the same sensations as
Mr. Briggs must have felt when he had Rarey-fied
his horse, and reduced him to complete submission.
He is an agreeable old person, very like a Turkish
pasha, being stout and bow-legged, salaams genially
to us all, and seems altogether the last man in the
world who would regard the firing of 12-pounders,
double-shotted, against passenger boats as an agree-
able pastime. Pretty Poll Singh is not nearly
so nice a person. Indeed, if stories be true, our
friend, whose name suggests such nice reminis-
cences of little boys in the street addressing the
feathered captives of one's household through the
domestic area railings, was in times gone by a per-
son of the most perverted notions on the great
questions involved in the observance of the laws
of real and personal property. Whenever our
officers went out shooting in this district, they were
always enjoined to " look out for Pretty Poll
Singh' castle. By Jove, if he sees you he'll be
down upon you." The creature was a bird of prey,
and maintained his rights of sporting with more
than the tenacity of a Norfolk parson. No doubt,
he will make an admirable subject of the Queen's
but I would not advise any one to shoot over his
tiger preserves without leave, for the process in his
courts was, and may be yet, very. sharp and very
short. A police thannah may clip his wings and
cut his claws.
Yesterday, as we were breakfasting on the
ground, under some trees, the instinct of our syces
told them—for they could not see it—that there
was a stack of forage inside the wooded enclosure,
where we lay like serpents on our bellies, devour-
ing our meal. In a very few minutes the stack was
resolved into peripatetic bundles or trusses suffi-
ciently large to conceal the bearers to the calf of
the leg, which were being duly carried off for the
horses, when Major Barrow interfered and ordered
them to put down their loads. He was at once
obeyed, and I was pondering on the wonder of the
farmer, when he came back, at finding his huge
stack scattered all over the ground in separate
heaps, when the Major's departing lsft the ground
to the syces, who, at once reappearing from among
the trees through which they had vanished, gathered
up their trusses and walked off with them uninter-
ruptedly. Flogging does no good. If the whole
army were turned into provost-marshals' assistants,
or flaoellators under the orders of the civil magis-
trate, they could not flog all the offenders. Sowers
charge over the plains in vain. Capt. Thomson was
told by the Commander-in-Chief that he might have
any number of cavalry he required to prevent or
arrest depredators, for Lord Clyde has all an old
soldier's detestation of plundering ; but still the
work goes bravely on. Last night a village was set
on fire, and the flames lighted up the heavens in
front of the camp. The villagers are apprehensive
of being punished if they defend their property, for
they are told that if they fire a shot against us they
are doomed to destruction ; but they are now in -
formed they may protect their goods, chattels, and
crops against camp followers, though they must not
use force to check any depredations on the part of
soldiers, as the latter will be punished by the mili-
tary authorities. At present, however, the soldiers
are not guilty of any such offences. One or more
of our camp followers lay dead in the field near the
camp this morning, but it is impossible to say whe-
ther the enemy's Sowers, some of whom were caper-
ing about near our posts, or the villagers resisting
plunder, perpetrated the deed. Certainly, the Oude
farmer has been placed in a most anxious position
during the last 12 months. Left at the mercy of the
rebel chiefs, he was compelled, no matter what his
inclinations, to pay taxes and revenue to the rebels.
If he fled, all his property was taken and his land
confiscated. Where, indeed, could he fly ? If he re-
mained he was called upon for military service. At
the same time he knew that when our power was
restored he was liable to be hanged, and that he
would have to pay the revenue over again. Surely
he must have thought his deities unkind and his
lot miserable !
Of this I can say no more. Major Barrow's mes-
sengers could gain no admittance to the fort. , The
gates were closed all day. The Rajah either had,
or pretended he had, no communication from inside
the fort. Orders were accordingly given for the ap-
proach of our columns the following morning.
Nov. 11.
On the morning of the 11th, at daybreak, all the
troops of the three different columns were paraded,
ready for action, in front of their respective camps.
Thus the pickets of the enemy (if they had any)
would have seen the cavalry, infantry, and artil-
lery of Sir Hope Grant's force arrayed against
them on the north. Not quite two miles to the
left flank they would have beheld the troops under
the Commander-in-Chief in person, and again, at
right angles to the left flank of that little
army, would have been visible the squadrons,
battalions, and guns of the force under Brigadier
Wetherall, about three miles intervening, which
would have been speedily filled up by the expansion
of the troops into line intervening between the two
columns. But on the southward and westward of
the fort the enemy would have beheld their sure
allies extending as far as the eye couldreach. There
--up t othe parapets
Rajah's
courtyard, o
were
erf thee p
files
I adceen—s e aanudd enteringfinn t
as he
iron
of prickly thorn, adamantine shrub, and bamboo,
set column upon column' so that wild beast or man
could steal with difficulty through the devious
tracks.
its
Far away to the horizon, and miles beyond
spreading. and growing
wider and
denser, lay this safe svisible line,
refuge of the enemy. And they
sought it. Hour after hour passed away in impati-
ence, the troops standing to their arms, officers
(booted and spurred) walking up and down the
streets of the camp, asking for news in vain, for
news there was none, each man enforcing the rea-
sons why he thought the enemy -would fight or
would not fight, as the case might be. Major Barrow
still confident "it Would all be right," other poll-

ticals equally positive " it would all be wrong,"
and the military and some civilians convinced that
it was a mistake to have anything to do with poli-
ticals in such matters at all. The Rajah's messen-
gers were in the fort, but still no news came from
them. The Rajahhimself was in camp with Major
Barrow, but could say nothing, except that he knew
nothing. What the Sepoys would do he knew not,
but he was of opinion they would not fight. At
last it was announced that if the Rajah's servants
had not returned at 9 o'clock the assault on the
place would be ordered forthwith. Long before that
hour arrived, perhaps half-past 7or so, a Sikh trooper
rode into our camp with the intelligence that the
place was evacuated, and that not a soul was to
be found but some old men and servants within
the walls of Amethie. It turned out that the
trooper formed one of a picket outside the place,
and that early in the morning they observed a
man near the ditch whose appearance attracted
their attention. On his approach they challenged
him, and, in reply to their questions, he said he was
not afraid of going near the batteries, because all
the garrison had marched off through the jungles
during the night. The picket tested the truth of
the man's story ; they made him lead the way, saw
that the place was abandoned, and returned to Sir
Hope Grant with the news. He sent off the trooper
to head-quarters, and the news was soon diffused
that there was to be "no fight," and some appre-
hensions were expressed that the Rajah was play-
ing us false, and that he knew well the Sepoys and
his matchlock men were escaping. Before this
news reached us it became known that 600 Sepoys
had actually got into the jungles in the course of
the night, but it was believed that the others would
fight to the last, as they declared they would, and
that the matchlock men, mostly dependents of the
Rajah, would sneak quietly away to their villages.
Orders were at once issued for the occupation of
Amethie. Col. Harness, Royal Engineers, with a
company of Royal Sappers and Miners (Major Len-
nox), Lieut. Beaumont, Royal Engineers •, Colonel
Riddle, Royal Artillery ; Major 'Turner, Royal Ar-
tillery ; a detachment of Royal Artillery, a party
of H.M.'s 54th Regt., and a troop of the 6th Dra-
goon Guards (Carabineers), under Capt. Betty,
Capt. Bradford, Capt. Russell (Commissary of Ord-
nance), and Capt. Thompson (Civil officer), preceded
by a guide and the Vakeel of the Rajah, set out
from camp before 9 o'clock for that purpose. The
plain is nearly a clear level, intersected here and
there by irrigation cuts, dotted with pools, where
the surface sinks below the general level, degene-
rating at some places into marshy soft soil, covered
with rank vegetation. Crops of dall and various
cereals surround the villages, which consist of only
six or seven houses, low crowned, and hidden
under groves of trees. Having marched a mile or
so, the trace of an earthen bank became visible in
our front and on our left, but the gaps in the low
jungle before it and in the trees which covered it
only permitted occasional glimpses of the outer
works of Amethie. Above the trees the high walls
of a flat-roofed house shone brightly in the sun, and
the cupola of a small" temple was visible in another
direction inside the fort. With the exception of a
red flag waving above the trees, and the bare patches
of earthen parapet, nothing else could be seen. As
we jogged on, however, and inclined more to the
right, making s. sweep to avoid some marshy ground,
two bastions of considerable command, artfully con-
structed among the trees which grew out of the
parapet of the outer defences, could be discerned,
and on getting nearer it could be ascertained that
there were embrasures in the rampart itself, nearly
flush with the level of the plain. As this was the
first of those famous jungle fortresses we had seen,
its outward aspect was examined with eager interest.
I confess my impression was that there was very
little to see. The parapet in front of us did not rise
more than four feet at the outside above the level of
the ground; beyond it there was nothing but stunted
bushes, and it was very difficult to make out the
actual line of the defences at all, only three bas-
tions or elevated earthen platforms with embrasures
being discoverable along the front. As we got nearer
there was nothing more to be seen. We passed a
deserted village, which had been plundered by the
followers of the Rajah, so it was said, and then,
taking a half turn to the left, advanced directly
towards the Fort. It is not more than two miles
and a half from the front of our camp. When we
had come within about 150 yards of the principal
bastion we perceived that at its base was a pond, or
piece of dirty water, about 30 yards across at its
broadest, and on our left narrowing into the dimen-
sions of a ditch. On our right, where it narrowed
in the same way, a ramp of earth crossed it to the
top of the ramparts. A flimsy gateway of rough
wood guarded the passage of the ramp, which was
about six yards broad and as many long. The top
of the rampart was about the same breadth. We
now observed that there was a very deep ditch in
places filled with water between the rampart and
the plain—in fact, a regular ditch, with scarp and
counterscarp. It varied in depth from 15 to 25 feet,
and seemed to be about 20 feet wide at the top.
At the inner face of the rampart (which was formed
by the earth thrown up to make the ditch) there
was nothing visible but jungle. This inner face
was about five feet deep to the terreplein, and there
was a regular banquette for musketry. A space of
10 or 12 feet had been cleared away between the
base of the rampart and the jungle, in which,
shaded by the overhanging trees, lay the bedsteads
of the Sepoys who had recently garrisoned the
place. Their cooking places had recently been
used. Some articles of their clothing still lay on
the ground, and in one place their chupatties, or
wheaten cakes, remained half-baked by the open
hearth. Turning along the rampart to the left,
' the top led us to a gateway in a strong mud wall
pierced for musketry, near which rose the bastion,
one side of which swept the ramp and the top of
the rampart for a couple of hundred yards with its
fire. There were no guns to be seen in the embra-
sures. Sentries were placed on the gate with orders
to let no one out, and a party of the 54th marched
into the Fort, while the Carabineers were ordered
to keep watch and ward outside the exterior wicket.
Dismounting, the party of officers proceeded to walk
round the rampart towards their right, placing
sentries as they advanced. The line of rampart
was very irregular ; there was no flanking fire
whatever. The principal damage to be feared
would be from the fire of musketry on assailants at
the other side of the ditch, whose heads would be
about on a level with the heads of the defenders of
the rampart as they aimed through their loopholes.
The batteries, such as they were, consisted of small
mud works a few feet inside the rampart, and just
high enough to carry the fire from the embrasures
over it. From these very narrow paths led through
the jungle. The first battery we came on contained
a very feeble cohorn mortar in an early stage of
infancy, mounted on a primitive and very imbe-
cile carriage. This piece of ordnance did not
exceed, I should say, two inches in diameter ;
close to it was an old iron 9-pounder' the trail
secured with rope. It had been recently discharged,
and was, no doubt, the gun from which the sepoys
had fired six or seven round shot on Sir Hope
Grant's reconnaissance two days before, for the
cheeks of the embrasure were all blackened with
powder. We continued our promenade on the top
of the low rampart—the ditch and the open country
on our right, the interior of the fort and the jungle
on our left—till it struck us that it was rather a
foolish thing to leave our horses outside such a fine
sunshiny day—and that we might as well have rode.
Now and then we came upon zigzags cut in the
jungle with great labour, trenches intended for rifle
pits and wells. At last a stria bastion seemed to
close up our researches, and we were glad to climb
up through the embrasure, where an eight-inch
short brass howitzer, laden to the muzzle and with
fresh priming laid, was waiting to receivo us. But
there was no one to fire it. Descending into the
battery by means of this gun, we took a path
which led through the jungle, preceded by our
guide, and made towards the inner lines of the fort.
The jungle was silent and savage as need be. If
one of those brutal little bushes but caught a hold
of you, how he tore and scratched and bled you !
We walked on and on and on, winding here and
there through the walls of sharp verdure—leaves
of broken bottles and stems of fishhooks—till at last
we came to a high mud wall with a battery sweep-
ing the flank of a zigzag approach to a large gate-
way of wood. The guide knocked and shouted, so
did the Vakeel. Some one approached from inside,
the wicket was thrown open, and in we marched to
the inner fort of Amethie. But with the exception
of the defences I have mentioned, and the natural
strength of the jungle, there was really and truly
nothing to give one the' idea that an assault of in-
fantry, provided with ladders to cross the ditch, and
covered by artillery fire would not carry the place
in ten minutes. The wall round this part of the
place was very bad, only one weak bastion was
visible. Inside it lay the village or dependencies of
Amethie, the palace itself surrounded by another
mud wall, being close at hand before us. The
houses of the village were of the usual Indian type
—rather worse, perhaps than usual. The guide
pointed out to us a large building with the ground
story open andlaised on pillars, which was, he said
the mansion provided by the Rajah for strangers.
There were some fine bullocks wandering about,
looking uneasily for their gun carriages, no doubt.
Others were in large cow-yards on our right. Two
greyhounds, hearing our voices, leaped out and
bayed at us, but presently the clink of sword and
spur brought out a few men—the Rajah's retainers
—to watch the unaccustomed intruders. They were
sullen, sulky, gloomy, and uncommunicative, and
the presence of their master's Vakeel scarcely made
them respectful. Colonel Harness and most of the
party halted to take angles and directions and
indulge in scientific abstractions, while two or
three,' with less of duty and more curiosity on hand

advanced straight on to the gateway of the mud wall
around the palace and Zenana itself. The sepoy
on duty scowled as we entered and passed him.
Before us, in one enclosure, about 60 or 70 yards
square, stood the Rajah's palace, filling one
side of the square. On the right was the bare
wall ; on the left an arched building of brick,
not yet finished of cemented, and behind us was
the continuation of the bare wall, the gateway, and
some storehouses. A tank and well lay in front of
us. A kind of dry well served as the chief maga-
zine, but it was empty. The house itself presented
a fair facade, divided into three parts, the Royal
fish of Lucknow over the entrance, and fish and
cocks ornamenting the battlements. It was
covered with white chunam or cement, and shone
like marble. In one angle of the court was a child's
plaything—a half-pounder brass gun on a carriage,
all the arms we saw. Some servants came out, and
one led us up by a tall-stepped staircase to the first
floor. The divan was plainly carpeted—a large
viol or bandoline stood in the corner, and at the
end were some cushions. All the valuable fur-
niture had been secreted or removed. The other
rooms were plainer still. We mounted to the
flat roof and looked out on the jungle, spread-
ing away like a dark green sea, and on the
defences of the place. Was this really the fort
before which three columns of English soldiers had
been assembled for siege and assault ? As we were
examining the features of the landscape and de-
termining the localities of our camps, the tramp
of men in the courtyard below announced the
arrival of our party. The Engineers at once set
to take some angles and make some observations ;
the Artillery to hunt for stores and munitions of
war. Their orders were, " Break open doors, if
locked, and eases—take arms, ammunition, and no-
thing else." The doors—for all were locked—soon
went merrily—and the arms began to be collected
in the open yard in the centre of the house. Tul-
wars, old flint pistols, two antique fowling pieces,
a few shields, half a dozen matchlocks, constituted
the arms, but now and then one of our men bowled
out a brass shell recently cast and filed—some of
eight or nine inches, others of three or four inches
diameter. In all parts the artillery continued
their search with avidity and care. Boxes of
matches for matchlocks were discovered, earthen
pitchers filled with bullets, cartridges in no great
quantity, and numbers of our Mime and Enfield
bullets, which had been flattened and put out of
shape from having been fired, and were afterwards
picked up by the rebels. While these works were
being prosecuted, Lord Clyde, attended by the
Rajah and Major Barrow, Sir W. Mansfield, and a
number of Staff officers, rode into the courtyard.
His lordship was evidently much displeased. He
had heard that only nine guns of all sorts could be
found in the fort and works, and he had seen the
nature of the latter with his own eyes. The im-
pression was natural that the Rajah had been
duping him, or was trying to do so. " Tell the
Rajah," exclaimed Lord Clyde with great energy,
" that he must produce his guns. Tell him I
know he never would have dared to dream of re-
sisting me, aware, as he was, that I had 80 pieces
of artillery, if he had not the guns of which
we have heard." Major Barrow explained
to the Rajah what the Chief had said, and sternly
accused him of saying that which was not. The
Rajah seemed uneasy, but affected to believe we
had all the guns he ever had. " Tell him, Major
Barrow," said Lord Clyde, " that I will keep him
prisoner till he produces the guns •, I will stand no
nonsense." In fact, the Chief had seen that the
place could not have stood against us for one hour,
and he was naturally irritated at the presumption
of the Rajah, who had treated his earlier offers
with something amounting to insolence. He had
a shrewd suspicion, too, that the strict seclusion of
the fort of the previous day had been a device to
prevent our knowing.what was being done inside
while the guns were in the course of removal, and
he felt that his forbearance had been met with
ingratitude and deceit. Major Barrow could, of
course, exculpate himself from any charge on that
head, but no doubt the General, as Generals in
India often have had cause to do, chafed against
the restraints imposed on him, and felt that the
surrender of the walls of Amethie without guns or
garrison was but a poor conquest for the com-
mander of such an army. Still the civilians might
have been deceived. They might have erred when
they fixed the number of guns in Amethie at 22,
and finally increased them to 30. As to the se-
poys, there could be no mistake. The Rajah him-
self confessed that 1,500 of them, belonging to
30 or 40 different regiments of our old native
army, had been in his service. They had run,
he said, because they could not believe in
a day or two that we were going to undo all the
rope we had twisted in a year. As to his match.
lockmen, they were his own villagers, and he pro-
mised to make them bring in their matchlocks.
Still Lord Clyde was mulch dissatisfied. He went
into the house and had the Rajah called before him,
and there, by the mouth of Colonel Metcalfe, head
interpreter and commandant of head-quarters, he
administered a verbal castigation to the chief,
which made the wily Asiatic turn almost pale with
fear and anger. Meantime more stores of war had
been found in the Palace out-offices,—thousands of
cannon shot of all sorts and sizes, some shell, and
very few arms. The chief offered to show with his
own hands where the magazines were, and led
Major Barrow and Major Turner to most artfully
constructed powder magazines in the depths of the
jungle. While the Rajah on horseback was de-
fending himself as well as he could against the ac-
cusations preferred with too much show of justice
against his good faith, his eye caught the figures
of our soldiers wandering through his rooms ; he
heard the crashing of his doors, the creaking of his
hinges, the bursting of his storehouses, and saw his
shot and shell, hurled by invisible hands, hopping
and clinking from cellars and dark rooms out into
the open day in his court-yard. A man stepped
out with a velvet cramoisie saddle and holsters, but
the glance of General Mansfield detected the act,
and ho ordered the soldier to take it back, and
leave it whore he had found it. No wonder the
Rajpoot, within whose halls no alien had ever set
foot, felt bitterly. Externally, however, he showed
little emotion, but once as a pile of firelocks fell
'with a crash behind him he gave a little nervous
turn on his horse, and I could see he was making
great efforts to conquer his feelings of apprehen-
sion and indignation. Again he was pressed on
the subject of his guns. With the coarseness
which characterises Asiatic finesse now and then
he overdid his part. He protested, "'pan honour,"
then, with sublime impu-
dence,head man, requested that
enough to try and recollect how
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dr; andhis
many guns were inside the fort. The Vakeel
said there were nine—the orthodox number.
Major Barrow, however, persisted. Lord Clyde de-
clared he would keep him prisoner. Here seemed
a pretty beginning for our treaty, and amnesties,
and proclamations—forced to break faith by the
perfidy of our friend, or rather forced to appear as
if we had done so by the neglect of this man to per-
form his promises. By degrees the Rajah dis-
covered what we were driving at, poor innocent
man! He had only nine guns ; but there were
other guns in the fort. For instance, one neighbour
of his--some Ram, or Singh, or Bux—had deposited
three guns in the fort, which did not belong to him !
" Did we want those ? Oh, really ! Well, then, we
could have them ;" and so on. By the evening,
between the admissions of the Rajah and the
researches of the artillery, we had screwed 16 guns
more out of the place. The civilians have been
greatly in error if there were not 14 more. If they
were right, what has become of those gins ? The
chief returned to camp, and, as there was nothing
but jungle to be seen in the fort, ;most of us fol-
lowed his example. The Rajah rode back quasi
free, but a pledge for guns, beside Major Barrow,
He stays in a neighbouring village with his friend
and our friend, Ajeet Singh. He is melancholy
and sad, and, though he does not think much of
telling a lie, is very tender with respect to his de-
parted honour. His house has been entered by
strangers, his fort will be dismantled, his guns
destroyed. And yet this man has had the address
to save all his garrison, to open a shower of round
shot against an English general, and to see gather-
ing against his fort the armies of England, led by
the Commander-in-Chief and two other Generals !
• Nov. 13 AND 14.
The fort of Amethie, thus for the time in our
possession, will be made the head-quarters of the
Sultanporo force, under Brigadier Pinckney, the
garrison being composed of two guns of Gordon's
Battery, three companies of her Majesty's 54th
Regiment, a wing of the 9th Punjab Native In-
fantry, and the Pathan Horse. When the premises
are returned to the Rajah he will find them very
much altered. His ramparts will fill up his ditch,
his bastions will form agreeable mounds from which
to survey the place where the jungle once offered
an impenetrable barrier to man and beast. But at
present the Rajah has no desire to return. He
is humiliated, or pretends to be so. He prays to
be permitted to live in some city far away from his
estates, and that we will manage them for him, and
he has got a month to consider whether he wishes
to make a formal application to this effect or not.
The pontoon train, no longer required, returned to
Pertabghur on the morning of the 12th, and Sir
Hope Grant's force had broken up camp, and were
in full march to the westward before 3 o'clock on
the afternoon of the 11th. Our next step will be to
reduce Beni Madho to submission, and it is pro-
bable that the terms which the clemency of the
Government may enable the Commander-in-Chief
to offer to that notorious rebel chief will at moo
dissuade him from hopeless resistance, and make
him only too happy to accept such pardon and
generous forgiveness. On the_ 12th sir. Hove

Grant marched towards Pursaidepore ; Wetherall's
column marched in the same direction. On the
morning of the 13th Lord Clyde and head-quarters,
escorted by the Carabineers and her Majesty's sth
Fusiliers marched to Adcypore, 19 miles on the
road to Pursaidepore, which we reached to-day at
10 o'clock. Sir Hope Grant is on our right ; Beni
Madho has sent in to know what terms he may
expect, and the Governor-General has enabled
Major Barrow to relax the strictness of the condi-
tions originally prescribed, and to offer this leader
in the revolt something more than his life. The
Amethie Rajah has been left behind; his castle
walls are fast coming down.