The Sun.
London, England, 1844-12-20 00:00:00

infirnita Al/L

LONDON, FRIDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1844.

When the question of the occupation of Sinde by
British troops under the command of Sir CHUILES
N'Arlnst was before the public, engrossing people's
attention in no ordinary degree, and creating a sin-
gular diversity of opinion among men of all parties,
The Sun was among the few journals that, from the
very first mooting of the question, strenuously
ins,isted on the occupation of that Indian province.
The majority of our Contemporaries were decidedly
,pposed to us on this knotty point, arguing that the
British Government had no moral or legal right to
make war on Sinde, and that it was a most iniquitous
:I,r, of aggression, which would scarcely fail, in the
run, to be attended with disastrous consequences.
:Despite these arguments, which were urged from
time to time with considerable force and ingenuity,
we_still adhered to our original opinion ; for, in the
first' place, we were well aware of the treacherous
conduct of the Sindian Ameers, who set at nought
their most solemn and deliberate pledges; laughed at
the idea of maintaining the faith of treaties, and
made them with us and broke them just as it suited
their Convenience, so that there was absolutely no
raiying on their sense of honour and justice; secondly,
it Was a notorious fact that these degraded Ameers
were tyrants of the most remorseless and incurable
character, who oppressed the miserable people sub-
jected to their sway with the most cruel exactions,
exceeding in this respect all that has been recorded of
Tirsioo Sam and his father, HYDER ALI, and had,
consequently, no claim on the forbearance of the
British Government, with which they had so often
played fast and loose ; and, thirdly, they had the un-
controlled possession of the river Indus from its
mouth fur several hundred miles up the country, and
Hooked us out, whenever they pleased, from this
great highway of nations, thereby crippling our
means of extending and multiplying the commercial
resources of India, and preventing us from keeping
that quick, vigilant watch on the Affghans, the
Belochees, and the wild tribes of the contiguous pro-
vinces, which recent events have shown to be indis-
pensably necessary to the safety of our Indian em-
pire. For these and other reasons, not necessary
here to enumerate, The Sun was a constant advocate
for the occupation of Sinde; and we are glad to find
our view of the case adopted by the celebrated author
of the " History of the Peninsular War," Major-
General NAPIER, who, in his work on the " Conquest
of .S. de"—the first part of which has just made its
appearance—insists that the occupation of that
country was a step necessarily growing out of Lord
AUCKLAND'S mistaken policy, and which subsequent
events had rendered every way defensible.
of the Sindian Ameers, for whose downfal soakingmuc
spurious sympathy was at one time expressed in Eng-
land, the gallant author says—" Their stupid,
selfish policy, was to injure agriculture, to check

commerce, to oppress the working man, and to accu-
mulate riches for their own selfish pleasures. What
are the people to us ? was the foul expression of Nooß
MOHAMED to Lieutenant EASTRICK. Poor or rich,
what do we care ! If they pay us our revenue, give
us our hunting-grounds and enjoyments, that is all
we require. The most fertile districts was made a
wilderness to form their hunting-grounds. Their
Zenanas were filled with young girls torn from their
friends, and treated when in the harem with revolting
barbarity. In fine, the life of an Ameer was one of
gross pleasures, for which the labour and blood of
men were remorselessly exacted, the honour and hap-
piness of women savagely sacrificed." As regards
their observance of treaties, we are told that " con-
stant evasions or direct violations of every article
attended the conclusion of every treaty. Forged
letters, false seals, secret forms of instruction, false
assertions as to promises which had never been made
by the opposite party—such were the means dili-
gently, systematically, and not unskilfully employed
by the Ameers at all times in their intercourse with
British political agents." Truly it was high time
that such a fertile territory as Sinde, peopled, too, by
inhabitants, simple, hardy, and industrious in their
habits, should be freed from the grinding oppressions
and cruelties of rulers like these ; and we can well
believe that the vast mass of the Sindian population
bless the hour when they were
.first liberated by
British policy and valour from the heart-withering
despotism of their Ameers. The present part of
General NAPIER'S work is, as might be expected,
merely introductory, and is principally devoted to a
consideration of the many causes which rendered it
absolutely indispensable in Lord ELLENDOROUGH to
take the bold step of occupying Sinde with a
British army. Of that Noble Lord's system of
Indian policy the gallant author expresses himself
in warm terms of approbation, and hints indirectly
that he fell a victim to a tribe of jobbers and selfish
civilians, by whom he was uniformly misrepresented
to the Court of Directors, who have themselves a
lurking taste for " nepotism," which the Governor-
General did all in his power to suppress. The
gallant author's work is written in a style of manly
glowing eloquence, and as a record of military
achievements, is worthy to vie with the ablest that
has ever appeared in England. Perhaps the follow-
ing particulars respecting the Conqueror of Sinde
may amuse our readers :
" Sir Charles Napier embarked at Bombay in the
Zenobia steamer on the 3d of September; thus com-
mencing his new career upon Oliver Cromwell's fortu-
nate day, a coincidence which he did not fail to note
with some satisfaction as a good omen. Yet the augury
seemed at fault in the beginning; for scarcely had the
vessel, which was full of troops, gained the open sea,
when cholera broke out in the worst form, and the
hideous misery of the voyage, which lasted until the 9th,
shall be given in his own words:—
"'ln those six bitter days and nights we cast fifty-
four dead into the sea, just one-fourth of our com-
panions! One passenger, it happened, was a surgeon,
and he was assisted by two native apprentices belonging
to the hospitals: fortunately, only two of the sailors
died, or we should have been lost for want of hands.
The engineer perished the third day, but happily, there
were amongst the passengers two others going to the
steamers on the Indus. Since landing, ten more soldiers
have died, and one captain, making sixty-four in all !
This pulls down the spirits of men. It was the worst
description of blue cholera. The agonies, the convul-
sions, the dreadful groans, were heart-rending: and then
the screams of the poor women who lost their husbands
and children! And, amidst all this, in the darkness of
the night, the necessity of throwing the dead ov...rboard
the instant life was extinct, to make room for the living!
Then also, added to this scene of human wretchedness,
the violent effects of the disease could not be cleaned,
and extreme filth increased the misery. Well ! God be
praised! it has ceased, but more troops are on this
voyage, and
,I dread to hear iof similar sufferings, for
most of it has been caused by neglect. I have made a
formal complaint to Sir George Arthur, who, I am
sure, will stir about the matter. The Commander of the
Zenobia, Mr. Newman, is a noble fellow. I believe all
that were saved owe their lives to him; and we, the
officers, have given him a gold snuff-box in token of' our
gratitude.'—' On making the land both mates got
drunk, and such a night-scene of confusion I never saw.
We were nearly as possible on a reef of rocks; we fired
guns and rockets, but no help came. Had we struck, all
must have perished; at least, all the sick, eighty in num-
ber: at last we cast anchor, and luckily on good holding
ground.'

" His first care was to provide comforts for the sur-
vivors of this dreadful voyage, which he affected by the
10th, but further mishap awaited himself. On the 13th,
while observing the practice of a rocket train, one of the
fiery missiles burst, rocket and shell together, and tore
the calf of his right leg open to the bone, but neither
the bone itself nor the great artery was injured; the
wound was instantly stitched and dressed, and then a
life of temperance, aided by a patient spirit of endurance,
was repaid with a surprising cure. The hurt, jagged as
it was, healed by the first intention, and in four days he
was out of his tent: the fifth saw him free from fever,
on horseback, travelling with an escort of wild troopers
towards Hyderabad.

" Some superstition the human mind, whether strong
or weak, seems always to lean towards, and several of
the greatest have rested thereon; those who deal in war
seldom reject predestination, and Sir Charles Napier's
life, one justifying Lord Byron's remark that truth is
more strange than fiction, encourages this sentiment
though reason should recoil. In infancy he was snatched
while at the last stage of starvation from a vile nurse;
while a young boy, attempting a dangerous leap, he
tore the flesh from his leg in a frightful manner; a few
years later he fractured the other leg. At the battle of
Corunna, struggling with several French soldiers, he
received five terrible wounds, and but for the aid of a
generous French drummer would there have been killed;
he was made a prisoner, and his fate being long un-
known, he was mourned for as dead by his family. In
the battle of Busaco, a bullet struck his face and lodged
behind the ear, splintering the articulation of the jaw-
bone, and with this dreadful hurt he made his way under
a fierce sun to Lisbon, more than one hundred miles! Re-
turning from France after the battle of 'Waterloo, the
ship sunk off Flushing, and he only saved his life by
swimming to a pile, on which he clung, until a boat
carried him off, half drowned, for the pile was too large
to climb up, and he having caught it during the reces-
sion of a wave, was overwhelmed by each recurring
surge. Now, escaping cholera, and a second shipwreck
off the Indus, and marvellously recovering from the
stroke of that unlucky rocket at Kurrachee, he was
again on horseback, and hastening to conduct with
matchless energy a dangerous war—and he did conduct
it to a glorious termination; for neither age, nor acci-
dent, nor wounds, had quenched his fiery spirit; but
how the spare body, shattered in battle and worn by
nearly fifty years' service in every variety of climate,
could still suffice to place him amongst the famous cap-
tains of the world, is a mystery. His star was in the
East !

We have been favoured, from highly respectable
quarters, with the perusal of some correspondence
addressed to them, by influential parties in the north
of Scotland, on the extreme hardship likely to be in-
flicted by the enactments of the 7 and 8 Vic., c. 112,
for amending and consolidating " the laws relating
to merchant seamen; and for keeping a register of
seamen," on the brave and hardy race of seamen who
inhabit the north and north-west shores of Caithness,
Sutherland, and Inverness-shire, the remote districts
of Tobermory, and the yet further isles and western
highlands. Under what circumstances this hardship
is likely to be experienced is well set forth in the
following extracts :

(From the Scottish Guardian, Dec. 3, 1844.)
" MERCHANT SEAMEN.—We understand that the
issue of the tickets commenced yesterday, at the various
custom-houses in the United Kingdom, and, to avoid
any misconstruction in the intention of the new law, it
is declared that the persons requiring to be ticketed,
comprise all mole persons (subjects of her Majesty)
forming part of the crews of vessels, whatever may be
their capacity, whether as mates, or other officers ;
engineers, firemen, &c. ; stewards, servants, 85c. ; boys,
or apprentices ; the only persons exempt being pas-
sengers, masters of vessels, and surgeons. All open or
decked boats are, for the purposes of the Act, considered
vessels,' whether employed in trading, fishing, or in
pleasuring, if as regards the Clyde, they pass Dumbarton
Castle. Masters of vessels (whatever the size may be)
carrying any male person as part of the crew, except as
aforesaid, after Ist of January next, without obtaining
his register ticket, incurs a penalty of 101. for each
person."

(Extract of a Letter.)
"If such a Bill has really been passed, with regard to
the registration of sailors, as was represented in the para-
graph I sent you by last post, it would be good to repre-
sent to the proper authorities the great hardship of
carrying it into execution on the west coast of Suther-
land, Ross-shire, Inverness-shire, &c., &c., as the agri-
cultural population are generally obliged to use boats to
get their manure, often to carry their fuel, and even
their potatoes, from one part of their farm to another.
It should be observed that the arms of the sea along
these coasts are so land-locked as often to be as smooth
or smoother than fresh-water lakes, so that no skill is
necessary in navigating them, and that the people em-
ployed on them and between them and the Isle of Skye,
in our neighbourhood, are not to be considered as sailors,
but landsmen. The sails of poor fishermen are often
formed of a patched blanket from their beds, which goes
in this country by the name of Kintail rig. Almost all
the poor people possess a boat, or a share in a boat, and
it is their carriage to go to church in, to which there is
often no other easy access. The application of the Bill
ought to have been confined to persons navigating boats
ten or fifteen miles from land, at least in this country."
(Extract from another Letter.)
"It will be a most dreadful hardship for the poor
people of this country, and I fear there is another grie-
vance still greater than any mentioned in the paragraph, i
that s, that the tickets can only be obtained from a
eustonl-house. Now one of the nearest custom-houses
t i
o as s at Tobermory, the others aro at Stornoway and