New-York tribune., 1874-10-23
4 TROUBLESOME PRISONER.

If it is true, as a cable dispatch reports, that
the famous HindOO chieftain Nena Sahib has
been captured after his sixteen years hiding,
the British Government may find itself quite
as much embarrassed by the zeal of its servants
in India as our own Administration was by
the notorious prisoner whom the gallant Gen.
James H. Wilson overlook in Georgia at the
close of the war. The execution of the Nena
Sahib, if he had been caught while his crimes
were fresh, would have been a wholesome
example to the uneasy Indian Empire and a
subject of qualification to the whole civilized
world. But it will not be easy perhaps at
this remote day, to exact the just penalty for
his atrocities without lifting him from the
shame and poverty of hunted Outcast to the
pOsthumous honOrs of political martyr. For
after all, this blOOdthirsty savage was the rep
resentative of a political idea. He was the
adopted son of Bajee RaO, the deDOsed Peishwa
of the Mahrattas, and under the HindOO laws
and customs he would have been that rulers
legitimate heir. But the British East India
Company had made it a rule not to recognize
inheritance by adoption, and on the death of
Baiee Rao an estate which he had held during
the pleasure of the Company was declared
lapsed and the large pension paid him by the
British was discontinued. The claims of the
Nenawere urged before Parliament, but in vain.
Thus he became the representative of the
native principle of inheritance as distinguished
from that of the conquerOrs, of home rule as
opposed to foreign domination, and indirectly
of the independence of the great Mahratta
nation, whose power had been broken by the
victories of Lake and Wellesley After the
occupation of GwaliOr by the rebels in 1858,
he was regularly chosen by his people as
Peishwa or chief of the Mahratta princes, and
for some time he kept the field against the
British with considerable military force.
But in the gradual breakup of the mutiny he
was lost to sight. For q few years rumors
about him filed the public prints, and he was
captured, in fancy, over and over again. His
adherents strenuOusly asserted that he died
of fever in 1859, but this statement was not
believed.
1t is impossible, however, to feel any COM
passion for the real or fancied wrongs of a
cheftain who will be memorable in history
only as a monster of cruelty and deceit. At
the beginning of the revolt he lived in afflu-
ence near Cawnpore, cultivating the society of
the English, copying their manners, and pro-
Tossing for them such devoted friendship that
on the first outbreak they threw themselves
upon his protection. He soon placed himself
at the head of the mutineers of the district,
massacred all the parties of fugitives that fell
into his hands, and then laid siege to Gavin
pore, where the English maintained gallant
defense for three weeks After losing nearly
half their plumber tho starved survivors sur
rendered on promise of safe passage to ALA
habad. With q refinement of cruelty the Nena
allowed them to embark upon the Ganges be-
fore he disclosed his real purpose. They had
hardly got under way before he opened fire.
Some were killed at once; three or four es-
caped; the rest, about four hundred in num-
Der, were brought ashore,-the men to
be instantly massacred, the women and
children to be spared awhile for the
most awful Outrages and tOrtures. They
were kept alive for eighteen days, and
then, when Havelock, hurrying to their res
cue, was within few hours march, they
were butchered with every conceivable indig-
nifty, aud we'll was filed with their mutt
lated bodies. The subsequent siege of Luck
now, where Outram and HayelOck with a
handful of men held the city against the
Nena's army of $4,000 until relieved by Sir
Colin Campbell, is one Of the most stirring
incidents of the great mutiny.
Ii the Nepa has al last been takcp, ~ tho