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THE OUTBREAK
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levies. It was well said in a general order by Lord Canning that there could not be found in the annals of war an achievement more heroic than this defence, which had exhibited in the highest degree a noble and sustained courage, which against enormous odds and fearful disadvantages, against hope deferred and through unceasing toil and wear of body and mind, still held on day after day and triumphed.

Having thus glanced at the more prominent features and centres of the Mutiny, between May and August, 1857, some reference must be made to Brigadier Havelock's first campaign of June and July of that eventful year. At the outbreak of the revolt few soldiers in India had seen more active service than Henry Havelock. 'He was the man of greatest military culture then in India. He was a veteran of war, very few of whose contemporaries had seen so much fighting. In Burma he had been in the field from Rangoon to Pagan. He had taken part in hill warfare in the passes of Khurd Kábul, and Jugdulluk. He had graduated in sortie-leading and defence work as a prominent member of the illustrious garrison of Jalálábád. At Mahárájpur he had helped to beat a Maráthá army; at Múdki, Firozsháh, and Sobráon he had fought against the old battalions of the Khalsa in the full flush of warlike pride. The dust of his Persian campaign was still in the crevices of his sword hilt[1].' His religious enthusiasm was bound-

  1. Havelock, by Archibald Forbes.