CHAPTER XIX.
THE SIEGE AND STORMING OF DEHLÍ.
At the close of the ninth chapter we left General Barnard, and the British force under his orders, taking possession, on the 8th of June, of the ridge, whence he was to direct his operations against the rebellious city. He was joined, as I have also pointed out, the day following by the splendid corps of Guides. The experience he had had of the temper of the garrison had been but short, yet it had been sufficient to show him how futile were the anticipations of Lord Canning and Sir John Lawrence that the city would surrender without a struggle.
I propose, before describing the operations of the siege, to set before the reader a bird's-eye view of the relative positions of the combatants.
The city of Dehlí lies on a plain on the right bank of the river Jamnah, and is surrounded on three sides by a lofty stone wall, five and a half miles long. The fourth side, nearly two miles in length, runs parallel to and is covered by the river. On this face, the eastern, it is well protected. To the north-east it was defended by the fort of Salímgarh, the circuit of the high and massive walls of which covered three-quarters of a mile. In this were two gates, called respectively the Calcutta and the North gate. Adjoining the Salímgarh, to the south, was the Citadel or King's palace, built by Sháh Jahán, having walls of red sandstone, very high, and with a circumference
Plan to illustrate the operations of the British Army before Dehli in the year 1857.
The fort had been strengthened by English engineers and provided with perfect flanking defences. Round the walls, twenty-four feet in height, ran a dry ditch, some twenty-five feet in breadth and somewhat less than twenty in depth, the counterscarp being an earthen slope of very easy descent, much water and weather worn. There was a kind of glacis, but it scarcely merited the name, being but a short slope, seventy or eighty feet in breadth, springing from the crest of the counterscarp, and provided with no special means of obstruction. The place was garrisoned by some 40,000 sipáhís, armed and disciplined by the British. Its walls were mounted with 114 pieces of heavy artillery, capable of being supplied with ammunition from the largest magazine established by the British in the upper provinces. The garrison had, in addition, some sixty pieces of field-artillery, and were well supplied with gunners, drilled and disciplined by the British.
To take this strongly defended city the English general had under his orders some 3000 British soldiers, a battalion of Gurkhás, the corps of Guides, some remnants of native infantry sipáhís, whose fidelity was not assured, and twenty-two field-guns. He had, as we have seen, taken his position on the ridge, an elevation of from fifty to sixty feet above the general level of the city, extending along a line of rather more than two miles, its left resting upon the Jamnah some three or four miles above Dehlí, its right extremity approaching the Kábul gate at a distance of about a thousand yards. The ridge intersected the old cantonment towards its left centre. Following its front towards its right was a road which joined the grand trunk road from Karnál, beyond its extremity, and led down, through a mass of suburban gardens and ancient edifices, to the Kábul gate. Two other roads, also leading from Karnál, diverged through the old cantonment to different gates of the city. The position was open to the rear, and commanded a splendid supply of water from the Najafgarh canal. The English tents, pitched on the left and centre of the ridge, obliquely to the front of attack, were concealed from the view of the enemy by the houses very recently occupied by the officers of the Dehlí brigade, still left standing. The weakest point of the position, that nearest the enemy, was the right. Here a strong body of troops were posted. There was an extensive building known as Hindu Ráo's house. This house had been left empty by its owner, and was promptly occupied. Nearly in the centre of the position was a round tower called the Flagstaff Tower, double storied, and offering a good point for observation. Between that tower and Hindu Ráo's house was an old mosque, with good masonry walls, admirably adapted as an outpost. This, too, was occupied. Further along the ridge road, at a distance of some 200 yards from the position on the extreme right, was the Observatory, also capable of being utilised. Beyond Hindu Ráo's house again, to the rear of the position, was the suburb of Sabzímandí, a cluster of houses and walled gardens, which an active enemy might occupy. Beyond this the plain was covered with gardens, groves, houses, and walled enclosures, bordering upon the grand canal. Stretching from the Sabzímandí to the Kábul gate of the city were the villages of Kishanganj, Trevelyanganj, Pahárípur, and Tálíwárí, too far off to be occupied in force by the besiegers, and therefore affording a convenient shelter to a daring foe. Somewhat to the south of the Flagstaff, but more to the east, was Metcalfe House, on the Jamnah, with substantial outbuildings, and a mound in its rear. Between that house and the city was an old summer palace of the Mughal sovereigns, called Kudsiyá Bágh, with lofty gateways and spacious courtyards; whilst more remote from the river, and almost in a line with the Kashmír gate of the city, was Ludlow Castle, on the crest of a ridge sloping down towards the city walls, with the dry bed of a drainage canal at its base. Further, on the line of the Jamnah, between the Kudsiyá Bágh and the water-gate of the city, was a spacious house surrounded by trees and shrubs but so close to the city walls that they seemed almost to overhang it.
Such was the position, or, rather, such were the relative positions. We cannot wonder that, as Barnard surveyed the city and the country between it and his camp, on the morning of the 9th of June, he recognised that he had done rightly not to follow the rebels into the city two days previously. But he knew what was expected from him. He had in his hand the written opinions of Lord Canning and Sir John Lawrence that, with proper action on the part of the British leader, the place must fall. He ordered, then, an assault for the 12th. The scheme had been drawn up by Greathed, Maunsell, and Chesney of the engineers, and by Hodson, afterwards known as 'Hodson of Hodson's Horse,' an officer of great intrepidity. It had been arranged that the troops told off for the attack should assemble between one and two in the morning, and then, undercover of the darkness, should proceed noiselessly to the gates, blow them open, and effect an entrance. At the appointed time and place all the troops were assembled, with the exception of 300 of the 1st Europeans, to be commanded by Brigadier Graves. These never came, and in consequence the enterprise was abandoned. Graves had received no written orders, and as the verbal notice he received would have involved leaving the Flagstaff picket in the hands of natives, he declined to act upon it. It was fortunate he did so, for after events proved that, even had the gates been carried, the force was not nearly strong enough to hold Dehlí. A repulse would possibly have involved the destruction of the besieging force, and the evil consequences of this to British authority in India it is difficult to over-estimate.
On the 14th June General Reed, the senior divisional commander, arrived on the ridge to assume command. For the moment, however, on account of his health, he did not supersede Barnard. That officer continued to direct the operations till his death. In Reed's tent the question of a coup-de-main was discussed for several days. The civilian who was consulted, Mr Hervey Greathed, brother of the engineer of the same name, was in favour of adopting a revised plan drawn up by his brother, to be put into execution without delay. But all the senior soldiers, Barnard, Archdale Wilson, and Reed were against it. It is fair to add that they did not object to the plan itself so much as to the moment of executing it. They believed that in the course of fifteen days the force would be so strengthened in numbers as to render it possible to hold all that might be gained. There can be no doubt but that their decision was a wise one.
The decision was arrived at on the 18th, and though Greathed (of the engineers) again subsequently urged a reconsideration, the generals were not to be tempted. In the interval there had been a great deal of fighting. On the 12th the rebels had attacked the British camp in front and rear, and had almost penetrated to its very heart. They were, however, ultimately driven back, and pursued through the grounds of Metcalfe House to the very walls of the city. From that date a strong picket was posted at that house, the communications being maintained from the Flagstaff Tower. The same day attacks made upon Hindu Ráo's house and the Sabzímandí were repulsed with great loss to the rebels. A regiment of irregular cavalry, however, seized the opportunity to go over to them. It was perhaps fortunate, as, under the circumstances in which the British were, it was better to have an open than a secret foe. The day following the rebels made another attack, the 60th Regiment N. I., which had joined them the previous day; taking a leading part in it. They were, however, repulsed On the 17th the besiegers took the initiative, their attack being led most gallantly by Reid of the Gurkhás, from Hindu Ráo's house, and by Tombs of the horse-artillery, from the camp. The assailants destroyed a battery the rebels were erecting, and drove them back headlong into the city. But the fire from the heavy guns of the rebels prevented a complete following up of the success.
On the 18th, the day on which the decision not to attempt a coup-de-main was arrived at, the rebels were reinforced by the mutinied sipáhí brigade from Nasirábád They brought six guns with them. To celebrate the event, the rebels came out in force, and attacked the British camp in the rear. The contest was most desperate, and the loss on both sides was heavy. Yule of the 9th Lancers was killed; Daly of the Guides and Becher, the Quartermaster-General, were wounded. Night fell upon a drawn battle, the rebels maintaining their position till the early morning. On the 23d, the anniversary of Plassey, the day foretold as that which would witness the downfall of British rule, they made a supreme effort to verify the prophecy. Fortunately the English had received that day a reinforcement of a company of the 75th Foot, four companies of the 2d Fusiliers, four H. A. guns, and part of a native troop, with some Panjábí infantry and cavalry, in all 850 men. The right bore the brunt of the attack, which was conducted with great courage and a coolness worthy of English troops. Reid and his Gurkhás, however, maintained their position, the 60th Rifles added to the imperishable glory they had previously acquired, and the Guides vied with them in cool courage. But for the steadiness displayed by Reid and the officers and men generally, it would have been impossible to hold the position. They did hold it, however, but it was only as the night fell, and after most desperate fighting, that the rebels fell back.
On the 24th Neville Chamberlain came from the Panjáb to assume the post of Adjutant-General. Reinforcements, too, sufficient to raise the effective strength of the British force to 6600 men, poured in from the Panjáb. But the rebels likewise had their share of fortune. On the 1st and 2d of July the Barélí brigade, consisting of four sipáhí regiments of infantry, one of cavalry, a horse-battery, and two post-guns, and commanded by a Subahdár of artillery, Bakht Khán by name, who was almost at once nominated Commander-in-Chief of the rebel forces in the city, marched in. Meanwhile, the arrival of reinforcements within the camp had revived the question of assault. Once more the plans had been arranged, the regiments told off, the date, the 3d of July, had been fixed, when, suddenly, the information that the rebels contemplated a serious attack on the weakest part of the British position that very day caused its postponement.
To partake in the contemplated assault on the city, the rumour of which had reached him, there had hurried on, from the small detachment he was leading from Rúrkí, a man destined to take a leading part in the eventual storming of the place. This was Baird-Smith of the engineers. Summoned from Rúrkí to take his place as senior officer of his scientific regiment, he arrived, by hard riding, at three o'clock on the morning of the 3d, to find that the assault had been postponed.
Baird-Smith found that, as far as ordnance was concerned, the British force was in a very unenviable position. The heavy guns consisted of two twenty-four-pounders, nine eighteen-pounders, six eight-inch mortars, and three eight-inch howitzers. The rebels, on the other hand, could bring to bear on any point thirty guns and twelve mortars. What was still worse, the English had in store only sufficient shot for heavy guns for one day, whilst the rebels had the almost inexhaustible supplies of the Dehlí magazine in their midst. To add to the gravity of the position, the day after his arrival in camp, Barnard was seized with cholera. The fell disease carried him off on the 5th. He was a conscientious man and a brave soldier, and his death was universally lamented. General Reed, who had remained in camp since we last saw him there, succeeded to the command.
Before Barnard had been attacked by cholera, Baird-Smith, keenly alive to the difficulty of carrying on a regular siege with resources in guns and material so obviously inadequate, had written to that officer to suggest the advisability of an assault. 'The probabilities of success,' he wrote, 'are far greater than those of failure, and the reasons justifying an assault stronger than those which justified inaction.' Barnard died before the proposal could be considered, and it devolved upon Reed to give the necessary decision. Reed neither rejected nor accepted the plan;[1] but he kept it so long 'in contemplation' that the opportunity passed away.
On the 9th the rebels made another grand attack in force. They despatched the 8th Irregulars, the regiment which had mutinied at Barélí, through the right of the British camp, by the rear, and as their uniform was the same as that of the loyal irregular regiment in the camp, they were allowed to pass unchallenged. The consequences of this mistake were alike deplorable and glorious. They were deplorable in that the cavalry picket at the Mound, half-way between the Ridge and the canal, on discovering their error, turned and fled. Not so the artillery, commanded by James Hills, one of the most gallant and daring soldiers in the world. Hills promptly ordered out his two guns for action. But the rebels were upon him, and he had not time to fire. Then, with the cool courage of a man determined at all cost to stop the foe, he dashed into the midst of the advancing troopers, cutting right and left at them with splendid effect. At last two of them charged him and rolled over his horse. Hills speedily regained his feet, just in time to renew the combat with three troopers — two mounted, the third on foot. The two first he cut down; with the third the conflict was desperate. Hills had been shaken by his fall, and was encumbered by his cloak. Twice did his pistol miss fire. Then he missed a blow at his opponent's shoulder, and the latter wrested his sword from his tired hand. But Hills was equal to the occasion. Closing with his enemy, he smote him several times with his clenched fist in the face until he fell. Just at the moment Tombs, who had found his way through the enemy, seeing Hills's danger, shot the trooper dead. It was a splendid pistol shot, fired at a distance of thirty paces. To reach that point Tombs had cut his way through the enemy, whose advance Hills had checked, but not completely stopped. The danger to them was not over then. It required the sacrifice of another native trooper to insure perfect safety. But this was only accomplished at the cost to Hills of a sword-cut, which clave his skull to the brain.[2]
By this time the whole British camp was roused, and after a while the rebel troopers were driven back towards Dehlí. A fierce battle had been going on, meanwhile, in the Sabzímandí. This likewise ended in the repulse of the rebels, but not until 233 men had been killed or wounded on the British side.
Five days later there was another hard-fought encounter. This time the rebels attacked Hindu Ráo's house. After a battle which lasted from eight o'clock in the morning till close upon sunset, Neville Chamberlain, with the 75th, Coke's Rifles (Panjábís), and Hodson's Horse, drove back the rebels to the gates of Dehlí. But again was the loss severe, amounting to seventeen men killed and 193 wounded, of whom sixteen were officers, among them Chamberlain, whose left arm was broken. In the week the besiegers had lost, in killed and wounded, twenty-five officers and 400 men.
Meanwhile, General Reed's health had completely broken down. On the 17th, then, he made over command to Archdale Wilson. The day following the rebels made another sortie, but they were repulsed by Colonel Jones of the 60th Rifles. The attack had been made, as often before, on the Sabzímandí. To prevent future attacks in that quarter, the engineers cleared away the houses and walls, which had afforded cover to the rebels, and connected the advanced posts with the main pickets on the Ridge. The effect of this was most salutary. There were no more attacks on the Sabzímandí.
It was the day before this attack, the day, in fact, on which Wilson assumed command, that a report reached the Chief Engineer, Baird-Smith, that the question whether circumstances did not require the raising of the siege, in consideration of the great losses incurred, and the impossibility of taking the place without further reinforcements, would be mooted at the next meeting of the General and his staff. Impressed with the absolute necessity of retaining the 'grip we now have on Dehlí,' Baird-Smith took the very earliest opportunity of speaking to Wilson on the subject, and of pointing out the enormous calamities which the raising of the siege would entail. The result of the conversation was to confirm Wilson in his resolution to prosecute the siege, and to render its success certain, by ordering up a siege-train from Fírúzpur.
On the 23d the enemy made a final attack before the arrival of Nicholson. This time it was directed against Ludlow Castle. The attack was repulsed, but the British, pursuing the rebels too closely to the city walls, suffered very severely.
On the 7th of August Nicholson arrived, as stated in the last chapter, in advance of his troops. On the 12th Showers expelled the rebels from Ludlow Castle, which meanwhile they had managed to occupy. On the 14th Nicholson's column arrived. On the 25th he marched, with a strong force, to attack the rebels, who had moved from Dehlí in great strength to intercept the siege-train. The march took him through marshy ground, intersected with swamps, and lasted a good twelve hours. At length, close upon sunset, the weary soldiers espied the rebels, composed of the Nímach brigade, occupying two villages and a caravansarai, protected by guns and covered by deep water, fordable only in one place. The British, however, waded through the ford, which was breast high, under a fire from the guns at the caravansarai. Against this Nicholson directed his own attack, whilst he sent his other troops against the villages. Addressing his men a few cheering words, he ordered them to lie down. Then the batteries of Tombs and Remmington opened fire. After a few rounds he ordered the men to rise, and he led them through the still marshy ground, they cheering loudly. Needless to say, they carried the position. At the same time the other troops had driven the rebels from the two villages. The sipáhís fought well, but only the Nímach brigade was there, that from Barélí, which had been ordered to support it, not having come up in time. When they found that they were beaten, the sipáhís limbered up their guns and made for the bridge crossing the Najafgarh canal. But Nicholson pursued and caught them, killed about 800 of them, and captured thirteen guns. He then blew up the bridge, and the troops returned next day to Dehlí, taking their spoils with them. Ten days later, the 4th of September, the siege-guns arrived, the remainder of the 60th Rifles on the 6th, and the Jammú contingent, led by Richard Lawrence, one of the four famous brothers, on the 8th.
The arrival of reinforcements had increased the number of troops at the disposal of General Wilson to 8748 men, of whom 3317 were British. Barnard had directed the coup-de-main of the 12th of June, when his entire force scarcely exceeded half that number. Yet, up to the 20th August, Wilson could with difficulty make up his mind to hazard the assault, which, if successful, would break the back of the Mutiny. On that date he wrote to Baird-Smith a letter, to be subsequently forwarded to the Governor-General, in which he freely stated the reasons on which his hesitation was based, and asked that officer to return the letter, 'with such remarks and emendations as your experience as Chief Engineer suggests.' The answer given by Baird-Smith was empathic, clear, and decided. He gave his voice for prompt and immediate action. True, he argued, the rebels are more numerous than the assailants; true that their position is formidable, their resources are unlimited, their defences strong. But in war something must be risked. In his opinion, the risk of a repulse, in an attack well contrived and well organised, was less than the risk of further delay. The Panjáb, he argued, on the authority of Sir John Lawrence, denuded of its European troops, was quivering in the balance. To wait for reinforcements would involve inaction, at a time when action alone, in all human probability, could secure the continued acquiescence of the Sikhs. And if the Sikhs were to rise the danger would extend to the very camp in which Wilson commanded.
These reasons, clear, pointed, logical, decided Wilson. Though he still believed that the results of the proposed operations would 'be thrown on a hazard of a die,' he was willing, on the advice of the Chief Engineer, to try that hazard. For the decision to assault the rebellious city Baird-Smith, then, was responsible. He at once, in conjunction with his second in command, Alexander Taylor, drew up the plan of assault.
To understand the plan the Chief Engineer worked out it is necessary that I should lay before the reader a short and concise description of the defences to be assailed. I cannot do this better than in the very words of Baird-Smith.
'The eastern face,' he wrote, 'rests on the Jamnah, and during the season of the year when our operations were carried on the stream may be described as washing the base of the walls. All access to a besieger on the river front is therefore impracticable. The defences here consists of an irregular wall, with occasional bastions and towers, and about one-half the river face is occupied by the palace of the King of Dehlí and its outwork, the old Mughal fort of Salímgarh. The river may be described as the chord of a rough arc formed by the remaining defences of the place. These consist of a succession of bastioned fronts, the connection being very long, and the outworks limited to one crown work at the Ajmír gate, and martello towers, mounting a single gun, at such points as require additional flanking fire to that given by the bastion themselves. The bastions are small, generally mounting three guns in each face, two in each flank, and one in the embrasure at the salient. They are provided with masonry parapets, about twelve feet in thickness, and have a relief of about sixteen feet above the plane of site. The curtain consists of a simple masonry wall or rampart, sixteen feet in height, eleven feet thick at top, and fourteen or fifteen at bottom. The main wall carries a parapet, loopholed for musketry, eight feet in height and eight feet in thickness. The whole of the land front is covered by a berme of variable width, ranging from sixteen to thirty feet, and having a scarp wall eight feet high. Exterior to this was a dry ditch, of about twenty-five feet in width, and from sixteen to twenty in depth. The counterscarp is simply an earthen slope, easy to descend. The glacis is a very short one, extending only fifty or sixty yards from the counterscarp. Using general terms, it covers from the besiegers' view from one-half to one-third of the walls of the place.'
Such being the defences, the plan of assault traced out may be thus stated.
It was necessary that the attack should be directed against the northern face — the face represented by the Morí, Kashmír, and Water bastions, and the curtain wall connecting them. Fortunately the carelessness of the rebels allowed the besiegers to concentrate on the curtain wall a fire sufficient to crush that of the defence, and thus to effect breaches through which the infantry could be launched. The plan of the Chief Engineer, then, was to crush the fire of the Morí bastion. That fire silenced, the advance on the British left, which was covered by the river, would be secure, and there the assault would be delivered. The evening of the 7th was fixed for the commencement of the tracing of the assailing batteries.
That day Wilson issued a stirring order to the troops, telling them that the hour was at hand when, as he trusted, they would be rewarded for their past exertions by the capture of the city. That evening the engineers began their work. For No. 1 battery a site had been selected below the Ridge, in the open plain, within 700 yards of the Morí bastion. This battery was divided into two sections, the right one to be commanded by Major Brind, a real hero of the siege, intended to silence the Morí bastion; the left one by Major Kaye, designed to keep down the fire from the Kashmír bastion until the order for the delivering of the assault should be given.
The engineers worked with so much energy at these sections that, on the morning of the 8th, whilst still unfinished, and mounting but one gun, the enemy discovered Brind's section, and opened upon it a fire so concentrated and so incessant that to venture from its protection was to invite almost certain death. A little later the rebels tried to improve the opportunity by despatching a body of infantry and cavalry from the Láhor gate. This diversion really favoured the English. For, whilst it lasted, the men in the new battery worked with such a will that they succeeded in completing five platforms. As each platform was completed the gun mounted on it opened against the enemy. It is needless to add that the sortie, which had thus given badly-wanted time to the defenders, was beaten back with loss. The first section of No. 1 battery had no sooner been completed than its fire, well directed by the energetic Brind, rendered the Morí bastion harmless. Nor had the gallant Kaye done his work with less zeal. The fire directed from the left section had done good work against the Kashmír bastion, when, at noon of the 10th, the half-battery caught fire from the constant discharge of the guns. For a moment or two it seemed that the hard work of the three previous days would be thrown away, for the rebels at once directed on the burning battery every gun they could command.
But from such a catastrophe the battery was saved by the gallantry of Lieutenant Lockhart, on duty on the spot, with two companies of the 2d Gurkhás. As soon as he saw the fire, Lockhart, apprehending its fatal consequences, suggested to Kaye whether it might not be possible to save it by working from the outside, and on the top of the parapet. Kaye replied that something might be done if a party were to take sandbags to the top, cut them, and smother the fire with the sand. But the attempt, under the concentrated fire of the rebels, involved almost certain death. Lockhart nobly thought that the occasion was one to justify the risk. Calling for volunteers, he jumped on the parapet, followed by six or seven Gurkhás, and set himself to the task. The enemy's fire immediately redoubled. Two of the Gurkhás were shot dead. Lockhart rolled over the parapet, with a shot through his jaw, but the survivors persevered, and by incredible exertions succeeded in extinguishing the fire.
Meanwhile No. 2 battery had been traced, also on the evening of the 7th, in front of Ludlow Castle, 500 yards from the Kashmír gate. This, too, was divided into two sections, at a distance from each other of 200 yards. They were both directed against the Kashmír bastion, and intended to silence its fire, to knock away the parapet to the right and the left that gave cover to its defenders, and to open a breach for the stormers. Before dawn of the 11th it had been completed and armed, and was then unmasked. Major Campbell commanded the left section, the right was first entrusted to Major Kaye, transferred to it from the ignited left section of No 1; but on that officer being wounded, on the 11th, it was placed in the capable hands of Major Edwin Johnson.
The third battery required in its construction a large amount of skill and daring. It was traced, under the directions of Captain Medley of the engineers, within 160 yards of the Water bastion. This battery was finished and armed by the night of the 11th.
A fourth battery, commanded by the gallant Tombs for four heavy mortars, was traced in the Kudsiyá Bágh. It was completed on the 11th, ready to open fire when its fire might be required.
The rebels had been neither blind nor indifferent to the active movements in the camp of the besiegers. Recognising at last that the meditated attack would be directed against their left, they adopted measures which, if carried out sooner, would have added enormously to the difficulties of the attack, if, indeed, they had not rendered it impossible. They at once set to work to mount heavy guns along the curtain between the bastions on the northern face. In other convenient nooks they mounted light guns. Taking advantage, too, of the broken ground, they made in one night an advanced trench parallel to the left attack, and 350 yards from it, covering their entire front. This trench they lined with infantry.
A tremendous fire from both sides continued from the opening of the new batteries till the afternoon of the 13th, the damage done to assailants and defenders being tremendous. Never was there displayed in the British army greater energy, more splendid determination. Men fearlessly exposed themselves to repair damages. Each man felt that on his own personal exertions the issue greatly depended. At length, on the afternoon of the 13th, Wilson and Baird-Smith came to the conclusion that two sufficient breaches had been made. Wilson directed, accordingly, that they should be examined.
This dangerous duty was performed by four young engineer officers — Medley and Lang for the Kashmír bastion, Greathed and Home for the Water. The two first named reached the edge of the ditch undiscovered, descended into it, and although they saw the enemy was on the alert, carefully examined the breach. They returned, pursued by a volley, to report it practicable. A similar report reached Baird-Smith from Greathed and Home. He therefore advised Wilson not to delay a single day, but to assault the coming morning. Wilson, agreeing with him, issued forthwith the necessary orders.
The order of the attack was as follows. Nicholson, with 300 men of the 75th, under Lieutenant-Colonel Herbert; 250 men of the 1st Fusiliers, under Major Jacob; 450 men of the 2d Panjáb Infantry, under Captain Green, was to storm the breach near the Kashmír bastion, and escalade the face of the bastion. The engineers attached to this column were Medley, Lang, and Bingham.
At the same time Brigadier William Jones of the 61st, commanding the second column, composed of 250 men of the 8th Foot, under Lieutenant-Colonel Greathed; 250 men of the 2d Fusiliers, under Captain Boyd; 350 men of the 4th Sikh Infantry, under Captain Rothney, was to storm the breach in the Water bastion. The engineers with this column were Greathed, Hovenden, and Pemberton.
Similarly, Colonel Campbell of the 52d Light Infantry, commanding the third column, composed of 250 men of the 52d, under Major Vigors; 250 Gurkhás of the Kumáon battalion, under Captain Ramsay; 500 men of the 1st Panjáb Infantry, under Lieutenant Nicholson, was to assault by the Kashmír gate after it should have been blown open. The engineers were Home, Salkeld, and Tandy.
Major Reid of the Sirmúr battalion commanded the fourth column, composed of the Sirmúr battalion (2d Gurkhás), the Guide corps, such of the pickets, European and native, as could be spared from Hindu Ráo's house, and 1200 men of the Kashmír (Jammú) contingent, led by Captain Richard Lawrence, was to attack the suburb of Kishanganj, and enter by the Láhor gate. The engineers attached to this column were Maunsell and Tennant.
The fifth, or reserve column, was commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Longfield of the 8th Foot. It consisted of 250 men of the 61st, under Lieutenant-Colonel Deacon; 450 men of the 4th Panjáb Infantry, under Captain Wilde; 300 men, Balúch battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Farquhar; 300 men of the Jhínd auxiliary force, under Lieutenant-Colonel Dunsford. To these were subsequently added 200 men of the 60th Rifles, under Lieutenant-Colonel John Jones of that regiment. This column was to support the first column. Its engineers were Ward and Thackeray.
In a work which professes to give merely a compendium of the story of the great Indian Mutiny space will not allow me to follow the several columns step by step. I must content myself with giving a summary of the tremendous conflict that followed. At three o'clock in the morning the columns of assault were drawn up. There was not a man amongst those who composed them who did not feel that upon the exertions of himself and his comrades depended the fate of India. There was a slight but inevitable delay; then, as day was dawning the columns advanced, and quietly took up the positions assigned them until signal to advance should be given. Meanwhile, an explosion party, consisting of Lieutenants Home and Salkeld, Sergeants Smith and Carmichael, Corporal Burgess, Bugler Hawthorne, and eight native sappers, covered by 100 men of the 60th Rifles, sped their way to the front to attach kegs of powder to, and blow up, the Kashmír gate. The bugle-sound from this point was to be the signal of success, and for the advance of the third column.
Nicholson, after one glance to see that the first and second columns were in position, gave the order just after daybreak to advance. The first column moved steadily forward at a walk, until it reached the further edge of the jungle; then the engineers and storming party rushed to the breach near the Kashmír bastion, and in a few seconds gained the crest of the glacis. Upon them there the whole fire of the rebels seemed to be concentrated. So fierce was it that for ten minutes it was impossible to let down the ladders. At last they let down two, and down these the officers led their men. Once in the ditch, to mount the escarp and scramble up the breach was the work of a few seconds. There the rebels, who had been so bold up to that point, did not await them. They could not stand the hand-to-hand encounter, but fell back on the second line. The breach at this point was won.
Simultaneously the second column, its engineers in front, pressed forward towards the breach in the Water bastion, whilst the storming party, carrying the ladders, moved to the appointed spot, and though exposed to a tremendous fire, which made great execution in their ranks, let down their ladders and carried the breach; their supports, by mistake, rushed to the counterscarp of the curtain, slid into the ditch, climbed the breach, and won the rampart. The mistake was a fortunate one, for although the actual storming party had been reduced by the fire concentrated upon it in its advance to twenty-five, the supports entering into a vital point of the defences, where an attack had not been anticipated, paralysed the rebels. Jones promptly seized the situation to clear the ramparts as far as the Kábul gate, on the summit of which he planted the column flag, carried that day by Private Andrew Laughnan of the 61st.[3]
Meanwhile, the forlorn hope, composed of the two officers and their following, whose names are given in a preceding page, had advanced straight on to the Kashmír gate, in the face of a very heavy fire. Arrived in front of it, Home and Salkeld, and their followers, each carrying a bag containing twenty-five pounds of gunpowder, crossed the ditch by a barrier gate, which they fortunately found open, to the foot of the great double gate. The enemy seemed completely paralysed by the audacity of the proceeding, and for a moment suspended their fire. Home and Salkeld used the opportunity to attach the bags to the gateway, then to fall back as fast as they could. The bags were laid when the rebels, recovering their senses, reopened their deadly fire. Home had time to jump into the ditch unhurt. Salkeld was not so fortunate. He had laid his bags, when he was shot through the arm and leg, and fell back disabled on the bridge. He handed the port-fire to Burgess, bidding him to light the fusee. Burgess, in trying to obey, was shot dead. Carmichael then seized the port-fire, lighted the fusee, and fell back mortally wounded. Then Smith, thinking Carmichael had failed, rushed forward to seize the port-fire, but noticing the fusee burning, threw himself into the ditch.[4] The next moment a tremendous explosion shattered the massive gate. Home then told the bugler, Hawthorne, to sound the advance. The bugle-call, repeated three times, was not heard in the din. But the gallant commander of the third column, Campbell, noticing the explosion, at once ordered the advance of the column. It dashed forward, crossed the bridge, and entered the city just as the first and second columns had won the breaches. Campbell at once pressed on to the main-guard, cleared the Water bastion, forced his way through the Kashmír gate bazaar, reached the gate opening on the Chandni Chauk, forced it, and pressed on till a sudden turn brought him within sight of the great mosque, the Jamí Masjíd, its arches and gates bricked up, and impossible to be forced without powder bags or guns He waited in front of it for half-an-hour, in the expectation of the successful advance of the other columns. But as there were no signs of such approach, he fell back on the Begam Bágh, a large enclosure. There I must leave him to relate the progress of the fourth column.
An unfortunate incident, a failure on the part of the department concerned to carry out the General's instructions, interfered greatly with the success of the fourth column. It was formed up, composed as already detailed, at 4.30 A.M., in front of the Sabzímandí picket. But the four H. A. guns which had been ordered to accompany it had not arrived. When at last they did come they brought with them only sufficient gunners to man one gun. Reid was waiting until gunners could be procured when he heard the explosion at the Kashmír gate. He discovered immediately afterwards that 500 of the Jammú troops, despatched two hours earlier for the purpose of effecting a diversion by occupying the Idgar, had become engaged. No time was to be lost, so he pushed on without any guns at all.
On this point it must suffice to state that the assault failed. Reid, who was greatly embarrassed by the want of guns, facing, as he had to face, the unbroken wall of Kishanganj, eighteen feet high, lined with guns and marksmen, had gained the canal bridge with the head of his column, and. was meditating a diversion to draw off the attention of the rebels from the main attack when a musket ball, coming from a slanting direction, struck him on the head, and knocked him into the ditch, insensible. How long he remained so he never knew. Those about him thought he had been killed. When he returned to his senses, he found himself on the back of one of his Gurkhás. He was very weak, but he had still strength enough to send for Captain Lawrence, and to direct him to take command, and to support the right. The delay, however, had been very injurious, and the disorder was increased by the fact that Captain Muter, seeing Reid fall, and regarding Lawrence in the light of a political officer, had assumed command of the portion of the column with which he was serving. By the time that Lawrence had asserted his authority success had become impossible. He withdrew his men, therefore, leisurely and in good order, on the batteries behind Hindu Ráo's house. The attack on the Idgar, made by the Jammú troops alone, was still more unfortunate. They were not only repulsed, but lost four guns.
The repulse of the fourth column added greatly to the difficulties of the other three. To these I must return.
I left the first and second columns victorious inside the breach. Nicholson at once massed his men on the square of the main-guard, and turning to the right, pushed on along the foot of the walls towards the Láhor gate, whence a galling fire was being kept up on his men. Beyond the Kábul gate, which, as we have seen, had been occupied by the second column, he hoped to feel the support of the fourth column. But, as just related, the attack of that column had failed, and it was this failure which rendered his advance difficult and dangerous.
To reach the Láhor gate Nicholson had to push on under the fire of the Burn bastion, then to force his way through a long lane, every building in which was manned by sharpshooters — the further end of it commanded by two brass guns, one about 160 yards from its opening, pointed in the direction of the advance, the other about 100 yards in rear of and commanding it. Behind both was a bullet-proof screen, whilst projecting, as it were, from the wall was the bastion commanding the Láhor gate, armed with heavy pieces, and capable of holding a thousand men.
In his advance Nicholson had been exposed to a continuous fire, but he had 'a position at the Kábul gate which was strong enough for him to maintain until the movements of the other columns should facilitate his advance. But Nicholson, though urged to halt there, was so fully impressed with the necessity of taking the fullest advantage of the so far successful assault that he resolved at all costs to push on to the Láhor gate. He felt this the more because he was convinced that the repulse of the fourth column had renewed the hopes of an enemy peculiarly liable to be affected by success or its opposite. He directed, then, his men to storm the narrow lane of which I have spoken.
Gallantly did his men respond. With a rush not to be withstood they cleared the space up to the first brass gun, and captured it. Then they dashed on the second. But within ten yards of this they were assailed by a fire of grape and musketry, by volleys of stones and round-shot, thrown by hand, so severe that they recoiled under the terrible and ceaseless shower. Not quite all, indeed. Lieutenant Butler, who many a time on the field of battle earned the Victoria Cross, which could be bestowed only once, penetrated beyond the second gun, up to the bullet-proof screen. How he escaped with his life was a miracle, but he rejoined his men.
The men had recoiled only to form again, and once more rush forward. Again did they capture the first gun, which this time Greville (1st Fusiliers) spiked, and again did they dash at the second. Never has there been a greater display of heroism, of contempt for death. The leader of the assault, Jacobs, of the 1st Fusiliers, was mortally wounded. Wemyss, Greville, Caulfield, Speke (the brother of the African traveller). Woodcock, Butler, all attached to the same regiment, were in turn struck down. The men, greatly discouraged by the fall of their officers, were falling back a second time, when an inspiring voice called upon them to follow where their general led. It was the clear-sounding voice of Nicholson. But the broken order could not be restored in a moment, and before a sufficient number of men could respond to the inspiring cry, a bullet pierced the body of the illustrious leader.
The wound was mortal, and Nicholson knew it to be so. But neither the pain he suffered, nor the consciousness of approaching death, could quench the ardour of his gallant spirit. He still called upon his men to go on. But he was asking that which had now become impossible. He had no guns, and already eight officers and fifty men had fallen in the attempt. There was nothing for it but to retire on the Kábul gate. This was done, and Jones assumed the command of the two columns.
We have left the third column in front of the Jamí Masjíd, without artillery to beat down its defences. Campbell maintained this position for an hour and a half, exposed to a heavy fire of grape, musketry, and canister. The failure of the attack of the fourth column was fatal to a longer maintenance of that position. The Láhor gate being in the hands of the rebels, he was liable to be cut off. He fell back, then, in a soldierly manner, on the Begam Bágh, resolved to hold it till he could communicate with headquarters. An hour and a half later, however learning that the fourth column had failed, and that the first and second had been unable to advance beyond the Kábul gate, he fell back on the church, and disposed his men for the night in it and in the houses in the vicinity.
Scott's field-battery which had entered the city by the Kashmír gate, had during all this time rendered splendid service to the several columns, but at a large expenditure of life.
Meanwhile, the failure of the fourth column had become known to the English leaders outside the city, and Wilson had directed Hope Grant to move down, with 200 of the 9th Lancers and 400 Sikh cavalry, to cover the Sabzímandí defences and Hindu Ráo's house, laid open to attack. At the same time Tombs's battery, under Grant's order, opened fire on the advancing rebels. In so far as related to the checking of the rebels' advance these measures were successful, but Tombs's fire provoked a reply from the heavy guns on the Burn bastion, and this fire, at a distance of 500 yards, made terrible openings in the ranks of the cavalry. Six officers and forty-two men were struck down. Rosser of the Carabineers fell with a bullet through his forehead. Nine officers of the Lancers had their horses shot under them. But for two long hours they stood to receive fire. They felt that by drawing upon themselves the attention of the rebels they were serving the common cause. In vain did the battery of the gallant Bourchier come up to aid them with its fire. The blazing from the Burn bastion still continued. Nor did they move until information came that the stormers had established their positions for the night. They then fell back on Ludlow Castle, conscious that they had not only prevented the disastrous results which the defeat of the fourth column might have entailed, but that they had occupied the rebels' attention with very considerable advantage to the main operations.
The reserve column, meanwhile, led by Longfield, had followed the third column through the Kashmír gate, and cleared the college gardens. One portion of the column had occupied those gardens, the other held the Water bastion, the Kashmir gate, Skinner's house, and another large building.
Thus ended the first day's operations. The result may thus be briefly summarised. The entire space inside the city, from the Water bastion to the Kábul gate, was held by the first, second, third, and fifth columns. The fourth column, outside the city, held the batteries behind Hindu Ráo's house. It was clear, then, that within the city a solid base had been obtained for further development. But the cost had been enormous. In the day's fight the assailants had lost sixty-six officers and 1104 men in killed and wounded. Four out of the five assaulting columns were within the walls, but the position they held was extended, and their right flank was very open to attack. The rebels were still strong in numbers, in guns, and in position. They, too, had had success as well as reverses, and they had no need to abandon hope of ultimate victory.
To the British general the result of the day's work was discouraging. The plan which had been so urgently pressed upon him had failed to secure success; his columns had been stopped and driven back; instead of the whole city, his troops held simply a short line of rampart. Very doubtful as to whether it was not his duty to withdraw to the ridge, he asked Baird-Smith if he thought he could hold what had been taken. The reply of Baird-Smith was decisive: 'We must do so.' Neville Chamberlain also wrote in the same sense to the General. The opinions of these two strong men sufficed to decide Wilson.
The 15th was employed by the troops within the city in securing the positions gained, in preparing the means to shell the city, in the restoration of order, and in putting a stop to indiscriminate drinking and plundering. The rebels, strange to say, interfered but slightly with this programme. The result showed how thoroughly Baird-Smith and Chamberlain had mastered the nature of Asiatics. The stationary position of the British cowed them. A retreat would have roused them to energetic action.
The 16th gave further evidence of the marked effect on their spirits of the British lodgment. In the early morning of that day they evacuated Kishanganj, whence, on the 14th, they had repulsed the fourth column. The British then stormed the great magazine, the scene of the heroic action of Willoughby and his comrades on the nth of May. It was found to be full of guns, howitzers, and ammunition. Vainly did the rebels, during the afternoon, make a desperate attempt to recover it. They were repulsed with loss.
If the progress made was, in the desponding language of General Wilson, 'dreadfully slow work,' it was sure. Bit by bit the important positions in the city were wrested from the rebels. On the 17th and 18th the bank, Major Abbott's house, and the house of Khán Muhammad Khán, were occupied, and the besiegers' posts were brought close to the Chandni Chauk and the palace. On the evening of the 18th the position occupied by the besiegers was as follows. Their front was marked by the line of the canal, on the banks of which light guns were posted at the main junction of the streets, and sandbag batteries erected. The right and left, indicated respectively by the Kábul gate and the magazine, communicated by a line of posts. The rear was secure against attack. It had been attempted, during that day to extend the right, in the manner contemplated by the gallant Nicholson, to the Láhor gate, but the attack, directed by Greathed of the 8th, had failed.
It had become absolutely necessary to take that gate, now twice attempted. The Burn bastion, which commanded it, was no longer supported, as on the 14th, by rebels in Kishanganj and Tálíwárí. The General then authorised Alexander Taylor of the Engineers to work his way, on the morning of the 19th, to the Burn bastion. Whilst Taylor, with a party of men, was engaged in this somewhat slow process. Brigadier William Jones held himself in readiness to proceed, with 500 men from the 8th, 75th, and Sikh regiments, to attack the Láhor gate. This time success crowned the joint efforts. Taylor worked his way through the buildings to the summit of a house commanding the bastion. Then Jones advanced, and finding it abandoned, took up his post there for the night. Early the following morning he launched his troops from it, and carried the Láhor gate with a rush, then the Garstin bastion. After that success, dividing his force, he detached one portion up the Chandni Chauk to capture the Jamí Masjíd, the other to gain the Ajmír gate. Major Brind arrived opportunely with reinforcements to command in the carrying out of the first of these operations. He entered the mosque without difficulty. Simultaneously Jones occupied the Ajmír gate.
Brind, when he had carried the Jamí Masjíd, had noticed, with the eye of a true soldier, that the one thing wanting to assure complete success was to storm the palace at once. He sent for and obtained permission to attempt it. His success was complete. The famous fort-palace of Sháh Jahán was not even defended. The gates were blown in, and British troops entered. The Salímgarh had been previously seized by the brilliant forethought of a young lieutenant named Aikman. The same afternoon Wilson took up his quarters in the Imperial palace.
Dehlí was now virtually won. But there still remained in the vicinity, even in the city itself, thousands of armed rebels, ready to take advantage of the slightest slackness on the part of the victors. So large had been the casualties that Wilson had fit for service but little over 3000 men. From these the guards of the several posts had to be provided. The King of Dehlí was still at large, a rallying point to the disaffected. It seemed to the General essential that a determined effort should be made to capture his person.
The King and his principal advisers had been painfully affected by the success which had depressed General Wilson. The lodgment effected at so much cost, on the 14th, which had caused Wilson to doubt the advisability of proceeding further, had produced in the mind of the King and his surroundings the conviction that, unless the British should retire, the game of the revolters was up. Fortunately he had no Baird-Smith at his elbow to whisper to him how the small hours of the night might be advantageously employed. And although he felt that as long as the Láhor gate, the magazine, and the fort should hold out there was still hope, yet the success of the British on the 14th, partial though it was, had taken all the fight out of the rebels. The men who, whilst the British were on the ridge, had been so daring in sortie, so unremitting in attack, had been completely demoralised by the display made by the British on the 14th. The reader will notice how lacking in force and energy were the blows they struck after the British troops had displayed their enormous superiority in hand-to-hand fighting on that day. The fact that the lodgment effected on the ramparts on the first day of the assault had cowed them, accounts for the remarkable ease with which the British were able to push forward on the 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th.
When at last, on the 19th, the Burn bastion had been captured, the Commander-in-Chief, the old artillery Subahdár, Bakht Khán, represented to the King that his only way of safety lay in flight; he begged him to accompany the sipáhí army, which still remained intact, and with it to renew the war in the open country. That was the course which the descendant of Bábar, had he been young, would have undoubtedly followed. But the King was old — other influences were at work — and the King was persuaded to reject the bold counsels of his general and to accept those of his Queen and courtiers. He allowed the sipáhí army to depart, whilst he took refuge at the tomb of Humáyún, three miles and a half south from the city, prepared to submit to the conqueror.
Information of this retreat was conveyed to an officer who throughout the siege had made himself conspicuous for his love of adventure and daring, Hodson, of Hodson's Horse. Hodson asked and obtained the General's permission to bring in the old man, on the condition that his life should be spared. Hodson performed his task with tact and discretion. That night, the 20th, the King slept a prisoner in the Begam's palace.
But there were still his sons, the princes, to whom rumour had ascribed an active participation in all the bloody deeds which had characterised the early days of the rebellion. Hodson learned the day following that two of these, and a grandson, lay concealed in Humáyún's tomb, or in the vicinity. Again did he ask and obtain permission to bring them in. This time there was no stipulation for their lives. Hodson rode out with a hundred armed troopers, found them, persuaded them to surrender, disarmed their numerous following, placed the arms on carts, the princes on a native akka (or gig), and led the long cavalcade in the direction of the Láhor gate. They had safely accomplished five-sixths of the journey to that gate when Hodson, on the pretext that the unarmed[5] crowd was pressing too closely on his troopers, halted the carts, made the three princes descend, stripped them, and shot them with his own hand. It was a most unnecessary act of bloodshed, for it would have been as easy to bring in the princes as it had been easy to bring in the King.
Whilst these events were occurring outside the walls, Wilson had commissioned Brind to clear the city of the murderers and incendiaries who, to the number of many thousands, still lurked within it. Brind accomplished this task with the completeness which was necessary.
On the 21st the restoration of regular rule was announced in the appointment of Colonel Burn to be Governor the city. The day following John Nicholson died from the effects of the wounds he had received on the 14th. He had lingered in agony for eight days; but, as fortunate as Wolfe, he had lived long enough to witness the complete success of the plans to the attempting and accomplishing of which he had so much contributed. He died with the reputation of being the most successful administrator, the greatest soldier, and the most perfect master of men in India. The reputation was, I believe, deserved. He was of the age which a great master, whom in face he resembled, the late Lord Beaconsfield, has called 'that fatal thirty-seven.'[6]
'In the history of sieges,' I wrote in a work published at the time,[7] and which correctly recorded all the impressions of the hour, 'that of Dehlí will ever take a prominent place. Its strength, its resources, and the prestige attached to it in the native mind, combined to render formidable that citadel of Hindustán. Reasonably might the Northern Bee or the Invalide Russe question our ability to suppress this rebellion if they drew their conclusions from the numerical strength of the little band that first sat down before Dehlí. But the spirit that animated that handful of soldiers was not simply the emulative bravery of the military proletarian. The cries of helpless women and children, ruthlessly butchered, had gone home to the heart of every individual soldier, and made this cause his own. There was not an Englishman in those ranks, from first to last, who would have consented to turn his back on Dehlí without having assisted in meting out to those bloody rebels the retributive justice awarded them by his own conscience, his country, and his God. It was this spirit that buoyed them up through all the hardships of the siege; that enabled them, for four long months of dreary rain and deadly heat, to face disease, privation, and death without a murmur'
The siege was indeed calculated to bring out all the great qualities which distinguish the British soldier. Vying with him, alike in his endurance of hardships, his contempt of death, his eagerness for enterprise, were the Gurkhás of the Himaláyas, the frontier men of the Guides, the hardy Balúchí's, the daring Sikhs, the resolute Patháns. Nor will English-speaking races soon forget the names of those gallant officers who contributed so much to the success of the undertaking. There were many besides those I am now mentioning. But a careful and impartial examination of correspondence, public and private, has especially brought before me, amongst the most deserving, the names of Baird-Smith, of Nicholson, of Barnard, of Neville Chamberlain, of Charles Reid, of James Brind, of Frederick Roberts, of Hope Grant, of John Jones, of Edwin Johnson, of Alec Taylor, of Tait, of Lockhart, of Turnbull, of Seaton, of Hodson, of Dighton Probyn, of Daly, of Tombs, of Renny, of Jacob, of John Coke, of Speke, of Greville, of Watson, of Medley, of James Hills, of Quintin Battye, of Rosser, of Aikman, of Salkeld, of Home. There are many others, for the list is a long one.
These men have now broken the back of the rebellion. We shall see them display equal energy in the task which supervenes on the morrow of victory — the following of it up.
- ↑ Four months afterwards Baird-Smith wrote that he thought then, with the full experience before him of the actual capture, that if an assault had been attempted between the 4th and 14th of July it would have succeeded.
- ↑ The wound was not mortal. Hills recovered to render splendid service to his country in India, in China, in Abyssinia, in Afghanistan. He is now Sir James Hills-Johns.
- ↑ This flag was subsequently, the 1st of January 1877, presented by Sir William Jones to Her Majesty.
- ↑ Of the six British engaged in this deed of valour two were killed, Burgess and Carmichael. Salkeld died a few days later. Home was killed, during the same month, at the assault of Málagarh. Smith and Hawthorne alone survived. They both received the Victoria Cross. Home and Salkeld were also recommended for it, but they did not survive to get it.
- ↑ The crowd had been disarmed at the tomb. Hodson was not the man to allow armed men to collect with impunity.
- ↑ Arguing that 'genius, when young, is divine,' the author of Coningsby proceeds to illustrate his argument by quoting the names of Alexander the Great, Don John of Austria, Gaston de Foix, Condé, Gustavus Adolphus, Duke Bernhard of Weimar, Banner, Cortez, Maurice of Saxony, Nelson, Clive, John de Medici, Luther, Ignatius Loyola, John Wesley, and Pascal. 'Pascal,' he continues, 'wrote a great work at sixteen, and died at thirty-seven.' Then, 'Ah! that fatal thirty-seven, which reminds me of Byron.' He shows, further, how Raphael died at thirty-seven; and, still supporting his argument that 'genius, when young, is divine,' brings forward the names of Richelieu, Bolingbroke, Pitt, Grotius, and Acquaviva. To this long list, Nicholson, the greatest by far of all the Panjáb school, might most properly be added.
- ↑ The Red Pamphlet, published in 1857.