Another complaint was, that during the whole siege of Cawnpur, i.e. from June 4th to July 15th, no attempt was made to relieve it; that the Government might, by enrolling Volunteers, have set free the Calcutta garrison for this purpose, as well as, if necessary, the 2000 or 3000 British sailors in the port. To this the Government replied that every possible exertion had been made to relieve Cawnpur — that troops had been pushed 500 miles up the country at the hottest season of the year by means before unused — that 100 soldiers had been thus conveyed to Cawnpur before the outbreak, and that, even supposing the whole Calcutta garrison to have been at the Government's disposal, the absence of transport rendered it physically impossible to send forward a single soldier in addition to the numbers actually sent.
The delay in disarming the three native regiments at Dinápur was another grievance on which the petitioners relied. The answer was: — First, that, as there was at this station but a single weak European regiment, confronted by three native regiments, and as the mutinous temper of the Sepoys was by no means certain, the Government had not thought it expedient to prematurely risk so hazardous an experiment: second, that the delay of an English regiment on its way to reinforce Havelock, who was waiting fast-bound at Cawnpur, unable for want of strength to advance to the relief of Lucknow, was a certain evil; the necessity of disarming the Dinápur
