Twelve Years of a Soldier's Life in India / Being Extracts from the Letters of the Late Major W. S. R. Hodson, B. A.

Subathoo, June 16th, 1846.

When I wrote to you last from Sireenuggur, I hoped to have been able to reach this place by way of the hills and Simla; but, before I got to Mussoorie, the early setting in of the rains made it so difficult and unpleasant (and likely to be dangerous) to get on, that, after spending two days there, I rode down to Deyra Dhoon, and came dâk through Saharunpoor and Umbâla to Kalka, at the foot of these hills, where I found my beast awaiting my arrival, and mounted the seventeen miles of hill at once. Here I am, at last, with my own regiment, and with the prospect of being quiet for four months. I am eighth Second Lieutenant; a distinguished position (is it not?) at the age of five-and-twenty. The campaign, I am sorry to say, did me no good in the way of promotion, owing to my not having been "posted" permanently before it commenced.

Subathoo, July 3d, 1846.

I hope you will congratulate me on getting into my present splendid corps, the 1st Fusileers, now, alas, a mere shadow of what it was six months ago. We could only muster 256 men under arms when we were inspected by Sir R. Gilbert on the 1st; but, then, there was a most picturesque body of convalescents present with their empty sleeves, pale faces, and crutches, but looking proudly conscious of their good conduct, and ready "to do it again." We are under much stricter discipline in this corps, both officers and men, and obliged to be orderly and submissive. No bad thing for us either. I hold there is more real liberty in being under a decent restraint than in absolute freedom from any check. I have been much more reconciled to India since I joined this regiment. It is pleasant to have white faces about one, and hear one's own tongue spoken; and then, besides, there is a home-loving feeling in this corps which I have never met with in India. I believe we would each and all migrate to England, if we had our own way.

Simla, Sept. 2d, 1846.

I came here on the 31st for a week, to stay with Major Lawrence (now a Colonel and C. B.), who dined and slept with me at Subathoo last week, and pressed me to come here. I am nothing loth, as I like him amazingly, and value his friendship very much, and pick up a great deal of information as to India, and Indians black and white. He has kindly offered to take me with him for a tour through Jullunder Doâb, and up to Jummoo, Rajah Gholab Singh's camp and court. He says he can give or get me leave to accompany him. My colonel says he won't give any one leave after the 14th of this month. Which is right remains to be seen, but I think you may calculate that the "Agent to the Governor-General" will prevail, and I shall see Jummoo.

I am now writing in his room with the incessant entrances and exits of natives,—rajahs, princes, vakeels, &c. &c., and officers civil and military; and the buzz of business and confusion of tongues, black and white, learned and unlearned, on all subjects, political, religious (at this minute they are disputing what "the Church" means), and military, so that I am tolerably puzzled. I have been taking a tremendously long walk this morning about the hills and valleys, with Mr. and Mrs. Currie, and enjoying the beauties of Simla.

Simla, Sept. 14th, 1846.

My original week at Simla has grown into a month, thanks to Colonel Lawrence's pressing, and Colonel Orchard's (my colonel's) kindness. I should hardly like staying so long with Colonel Lawrence, (especially as I live day and night in the same room with him and his papers, regularly camp fashion,) but that he wishes it, and I manage to give him a slight helping hand by making précis of his letters, and copying confidential papers. He is amazingly kind, and tells me all that is going on, initiating me into the mysteries of "political" business, and thus giving me more knowledge of things and persons Indian than I should learn in a year of ordinary life, aye! or in three years either. This is a great advantage to my ultimate prospects, of course independently of the power he possesses of giving me a lift in the world when I am of sufficient standing to hold any appointment.

He makes me work at Hindostanee, and has given me a lesson or two in the use of the theodolite, and other surveying instruments, to the end that I may get employed in the Surveying Department, after two years of which he says "I shall be fit for a Political."

I have been very fortunate in many ways, more so than I had any right to expect. If I were only nearer to you all, and had any old friends about me, I should have nothing to regret or wish for. It is there that the shoe especially pinches. All minor annoyances are easily got rid of, but one does find a wonderful lack of one's old friends and old associations. Society is very different here from ours at home, and different as it is I have seen very little of it. Nor am I, with my previous habits, age, and education, the person to feel this an indifferent matter; but on the contrary, all the drawbacks of Indian existence come with redoubled force from the greatness of the contrast. Still I do not let these things annoy me, or weigh down my spirits, but strive, by keeping up English habits, tastes, and feelings, and looking forward to a run home, (thus having a motive always in view,) to make the best of everything as it occurs, and to act upon the principle, that mere outward circumstances don't make a man's happiness. If I have one feeling stronger than another, it is contempt for a "regular Indian," a man who thinks it fine to adopt a totally different set of habits and morals and fashions, until, in forgetting that he is an Englishman, he usually forgets also that he is a Christian and a gentleman. Such characters are happily rare now, but there are many fragments of it on a small scale, and always must be so, so long as the men who are to support the name and power of England in Asia are sent out here at an age when neither by education nor reflection can they have learnt all or even a fraction of what those words imply. It would be a happy thing for India and for themselves if all came out here at a more advanced age than now, but one alone breaking through the custom in that respect made and provided, must not expect to escape the usual fate, or at least the usual annoyances, of innovators.

I have enjoyed my visit here very much, and though I have not sought them, have made one or two very pleasant acquaintances, or improved them. I have been very little out, and passed my time almost entirely with Colonel Lawrence and his family, i.e., his brother and the two sisters-in-law. Things are not looking well on the frontier. Cashmere and the hill country wont submit to Gholab Singh, to whom we gave them over, and have been thrashing his troops and killing his ministers; and I expect October will see an army assembled to frighten them into submission, or interfere with a strong arm, as the case may be.

We seem bound to see him established on the throne we carved out for him, and it is our only chance of keeping peace and order; though at the best he is such a villain, and so detested, that I imagine it will be but a sorry state of quietness:—

Lahore, October 14th, 1846.

As I hoped when I wrote last, I am again writing from the capital of the "Singhs," but, alas for the "lions," their tails are very much down in the world since this time last year, when the "fierce and formidable army" assembled to invade our tempting provinces. Nearly half the garrison has marched across the Ravee, and not more than 5,000 or 6,000 British troops now hold the far-famed capital of Runjeet Singh.

You must not be alarmed by the accounts you will see in the papers by this mail of the advance of two forces from Lahore and Jullunder towards Jummoo. They are not to take any active part in the operations of Gholab Singh for the recovery of Cashmere from the rebellious Sheikh Imaumoodeen; our troops are to hold the Maharaja's country for him while he advances with his whole disposable force, augmented by a Sikh auxiliary army.

It is probable that the Sheikh will give in without fighting as soon as he hears the preparations made by both powers for his coercion. Indeed, a letter has arrived from Cashmere to say he has given in; but he is a wily fellow, and I mightily distrust him. I only know if I was in Cashmere with my army at my back, I would not give in as long as a man was left to pull a trigger! The Agent (Colonel Lawrence) and I start to-morrow evening, going seventy miles the first day, and hope to reach Bhimbur, at the foot of the hills, on the 17th, thence to go up and join the Maharaja, and accompany his army to Cashmere. If he fights we shall see the fun; if not, we are to accompany him and keep him from excesses and injustice in the valley, and return here, I fancy, in about a month or six weeks. Of course, in event of the two armies coming to blows, it will probably be some time longer ere we return. I am delighted at the thoughts of seeing Cashmere, and am gaining great advantage from being with these "politicals" in the way of learning the languages, and method of governing the natives. I have been hard at work day and night for some time now, writing for Colonel Lawrence. I left Subathoo on the 1st, and after a ride of some twenty miles through the hills, joined Colonel Lawrence and Mr. Christian, and after a shake-down in a little mud bungalow, and an amusing dinner, (served up in two brass basins, standing on a bed,) and a breakfast to match, we rode down to Roopur, on the Sutlej. Here we took boat, and floated down the river to Ferozepoor, and came across to Lahore during the night in a capital barouche belonging to the Ranee, with relays of horses and an escort of cavalry.

Thanna, at the foot of the pass into Cashmere,
Oct. 26th, 1846.

Our tent is pitched on the top of a little spur from the mountain side, and beneath us lie, in quaint picturesque confusion, scattered over the valley and the little staircase-like rice-fields, the mingled hosts of Lahore and Jummoo. The spare stalwart Sikh, with his grizzled beard and blue turban of the scantest dimensions, side by side with the huge-limbed Affghan, with voluminous headgear and many-colored garments. The proud Brahmin in the same ranks with the fierce "Children of the Faithful;" the little active Hillman; the diminutive, sturdy, platter-faced Ghoorka, and the slight-made Hindostanee, collected in the same tents, and all alike clothed in a caricature of the British uniform. I have been very much interested and amused by this march with a native army, so different from our own proceedings and our own military power,—albeit the British army will soon be as varied in its composition.

I have seen a great deal of the native Sirdars or chiefs, especially Tej Singh who commanded the Sikh forces in the war, and of the Maharaja. The former a small, spare little man, marked with the smallpox, and with a thin and scanty beard, but sharp and intelligent, and by his own account a hero. The Maharaja is a fine, tall, portly man, with a splendid expressive face, and most gentlemanly, pleasing manner, and fine-toned voice,—altogether the most pleasing Asiatic I have seen,—to all appearance the gentlest of the gentle, and the most sincere and truthful character in the world; and in his habits he is certainly exemplary; but he is the cleverest hypocrite in the world; as sharp and acute as possible, devoured by avarice and ambition, and when roused, horribly cruel. This latter accusation he rebuts, by alleging the necessity of the case and the ferocity of those he has to deal with. To us, however, his fondness for flaying men alive, cutting off their noses and ears and hands, &c., savors rather of the inexcusable. He was accused of having flayed 12,000 men, which he indignantly asserted was a monstrous calumny, as he only skinned three; afterwards he confessed to three hundred! Yet he is not a bit worse, and in many ways infinitely better, than most native princes. Lawrence doubts whether one could be found with fewer faults, if placed in similar circumstances. Avitabile, to the disgrace of his European blood, was far more cruel. The stories current in the Punjaub of his abominations are horrible. The costumes of these chiefs would delight you: they never make a mistake in colors, and the effect is always good, however bright they may be. This force is (as I told you) moving up to turn the Sheikh Imaumoodeen, the rebellious vassal of the Lahore Government, out of Cashmere, in virtue of the treaty ceding it to Gholab Singh. Up to yesterday, I expected it would be a fight, but yesterday the Sheikh sent letters to say he was sorry and repentful, and was on his way to tender his submission. So we wait here to receive him. This will not, however, prevent my visit to the valley, as Colonel Lawrence intends to accompany the Maharaja to pacify and take possession.

It is very cold here, though not much above 5,000 feet above the sea.

Shupyen, in Cashmere, Nov. 6th, 1846.

I write a hurried line to announce my safe arrival in the valley. On the 1st instant we got hold of the rebellious Sheikh, and sent him down to the plains; and yesterday, Colonel Lawrence, Captain Browne, and myself, rode into the valley, amid the acclamations of an admiring population—of beggars! I am writing at sunrise in a little tent, and in spite of two coats and waistcoats, I am nearly "friz." We crossed the Pir Punjal Pass on the 4th, 12,000 feet above the sea, with snow all around us, and slept on this side in an old serai; I say slept, because we went to bed; but sleeping was out of the question, from the cold and uproar of all our followers and their horses, crowded into a court-yard thirty feet square, horses and men quarrelling and yelling all night long. The view from the top of the Pass was very fine, but the wind far too high to take more than a peep of it without losing one's eyes; but the road from Thanna to the summit was most lovely the whole way, winding up a glen wooded magnificently, and the rocks towering above us on all sides; the trees were all in their varied autumn dress, surmounted by forests of pine; altogether, I never saw so grand a scene. As the Sheikh's submission has cut the Gordian knot of politics here, we shall only stay a few days to see the valley, and install the Maharaja, (who is following us with his force by slow stages,) and then rush back to Lahore and Subathoo.

This is said to be the largest town but three in the valley. It is a poverty-stricken, scattered hamlet of mud houses with wooden roofs, the upper half being generally rough open lattice-work or railing, with alternate supports of unbaked bricks; low mud inclosures, and open waste spaces between, dedicated to dogs and dunghills. The whole is thickly grown over with fine apple and walnut trees, the staple fruits (with the grape) of the valley, and the food of the people. They are a poor wretched set, only good for beasts of burden,—and certainly they can carry a vast load,—their dress, both men and women, being a loose, wide-sleeved smock-frock of dirty sackcloth-looking woollen. The men wear a dirty skullcap on their shaven "nobs," and the women a crimson machine, like a flower-pot saucer inverted, from which depends a veil or cloth of the same texture as the frock; legs and feet clothed in their native dirt. The women are atrociously ugly, and screech like the witches in Macbeth,—so much so, that when the Agent asked me to give them a rupee or two, I felt it my duty to refuse, firmly but respectfully, on the ground that it would be encouraging ugliness! I fancy the climate and the soil are unrivalled, but years of poverty and oppression have reduced to a nation of beggars what ought to be a Paradise. We go hence after breakfast to Islumabad, at the eastern end of the valley; and spend a day or two in looking about us, and floating down the river to Cashmere itself, by which time our "prince" will have arrived. I am the luckiest dog unhung to have actually got into Cashmere. I fancy I am the first officer of our army who has been here, save the few who have come officially. These delightful breezes are most invigorating. I only wish you could all enjoy these travels with me. I expect to be back at Subathoo by the 1st of December.

Subathoo, April 1st, 1847.

I am wonderfully well and flourishing, and have lots to do. Lawrence has made me undertake the secretaryship of the new Asylum for European Children, building some ten miles hence, which will give me volumes of correspondence, and leagues, nay latitudes of riding. Nevertheless, it is well, and it is a good work. The responsibility will be great, as a committee of management, on an average three hundred miles apart, are rather nominal in their supervision of things.

Subathoo, April 1st, 1847.

If my locomotive instinct has been brought into play in India, as you suggest, my constructive organs are likely to have their share of exercise. I have the entire direction and arrangement of the new Hill Asylum on my hands just now. It is seven miles hence, of mountain roads, and what with going and coming, planning, instructing, and supervising, my time is pretty well occupied, to say nothing of my regiment, and private affairs. Building a house in India is a different affair from one's previous experiences. You begin from the forest and the quarry, have to get lime burnt, trees cut down, bricks made, planks sawn up, the ground got ready, and then watch the work foot by foot,—showing this "nigger" how to lay his bricks, another the proper proportions of a beam, another the construction of a door, and to the several artisans the mysteries of a screw, a nail, and a hinge. You cannot say to a man, "Make me a wall or a door," but you must with your own hands measure out his work, teach him to saw away here, to plane there, or drive such a nail, or insinuate such another suspicion of glue. And when it comes to be considered that this is altogether new work to me, and has to be excuded by cogitation on the spot, so as to give an answer to every inquirer, you may understand the amount of personal exertion and attention required for the work.

I have the sole direction and control of nearly four hundred and fifty workmen, including paying them, keeping accounts, drawing plans, and everything. I have to get earth dug for bricks, see the moulds made and watch the progress of them till the kiln is full, get wood for the kiln, and direct the lighting of the same, and finally provide a goat to sacrifice to the demon who is supposed to turn the bricks red! Then I must get bamboos and grass cut for thatching, and string made for the purpose; send about the hills for sand for mortar, and limestone to burn, see it mixed and prepared, and then show the niggers how to use it. Then the whole of the wood-work must be set out and made under one's own eye, and a lump of iron brought from the mine to be wrought (also under one's direction) into nails and screws, before a single door can be set up; and when to all this is added the difficulty of getting hands (I mean in the hills), and the bother of watching the idlest and most cunning race on earth, you may suppose my "unpaid magistracy" is no sinecure. I am not exaggerating or indeed telling half the difficulty, for fear you should think the whole a romance. You will naturally ask how I learnt all these trades. I can only say that you can't be more astonished than I am myself, and can only satisfy you by the theory that "necessity is the mother of invention." I am seldom able to sit down from sunrise to sunset, when I get a hasty dinner, and am then only too glad to sleep off the effects of the day. How I have escaped fever during the last month I cannot think, as it has been terribly hot in the sun, even in the hills, and I have lived in the blaze of it pretty constantly. Colonel Lawrence seems determined I shall have nothing to stop me, for his invariable reply to every question is, "Act on your own judgment;" "Do what you think right;" "I give you carte blanche to act in my name, and draw on my funds," and so forth.

Are you aware of the nature of the institution? It was started, in idea, by Colonel Lawrence some two or three years ago, and a sufficient sum of money for a commencement having been raised, he charged me with the erection of the necessary buildings, and the organization and setting in motion of the great machine which is to regenerate and save from moral and physical degradation, sickness, and death, the children of the British soldiers serving in India. The object is to teach them all things useful, while you give them the advantage of a healthy climate, removed from the evil influence of a barrack-room. The children are to remain in the Asylum until their parents return to England, or till old enough to join the ranks, or be otherwise provided for.

Another drag upon my hands is the care of a small European boy, who was lately found up in Cabul, and is supposed to be the son of some soldier of the destroyed army. He has been brought up as a Mussulman, and made to believe his father was such, and is a very bigot. Colonel Lawrence sent him to me from Lahore, but forgot to write about him, so I know no more of him than I have seen in the newspapers, and have no idea what to do with him, or where he is to go. He is rather a nuisance, and I shall be glad when he goes, as there is little but his odd fate to interest one in him; and I have considerable doubts as to his genuine origin. He is more like a half-caste than an "European." Our communication is brief, as he speaks but little Hindostanee, and I less Persian. The Asylum is a much more interesting occupation, as, independently of its object, there is a pleasure in covering a fine mountain with buildings of one's own designing.

My last few days at the Asylum were enlivened by the arrival of Mrs. George Lawrence, whose tent was pitched close to mine, on the hill-top. She is a great acquisition in a forest life, and a very nice person,—the wife of the Captain Lawrence who was one of the Cabul prisoners. She is to be superintendress until the arrival of the future man from England. I have fourteen little girls to take care of, by the same token, and listen to the grumblings of their nurses. In short, I don't know myself, and that is the long and short of it. I am going to Simla for a day or two, to see Mr. Thomason.

The state of things is so provokingly quiet and placid, that there seems but small chance of our being called upon for another rush across country (called a "forced march"), like the one of December, 1845; and one is obliged to take to anything that offers, to avoid the "tædium vitæ" which the want of employment engenders in this "lovely country," in those, at least, who have not learnt to exist in the philosophical medium of brandy and cheroots. Did I tell you, by-the-bye, that I abjured tobacco when I left England, and that I have never been tempted, by even a night "al fresco," to resume the delusive habit? Nor have I told you (because I despaired of your believing it) that I have declined from the paths of virtue in respect to beer also, these two years past, seldom or never even tasting that once idolized stimulant!! It has not been caused alone by a love of eccentricity, but by the very sensitive state of my inner man, (achieved in India,) which obliges me to live by rule. This is all very edifying, no doubt, to you; to me it is especially so, for I believe if I get on well in India, it will be owing, physically speaking, to my digestion.

Subathoo, June 18th, 1847.

I am getting on famously at the Asylum just now, and have succeeded in getting the children under cover before the rains. I have narrowly escaped a bad fever through overwork in the sun, but, by taking it in time, I got right again. The weather has since taken a turn, and become much cooler, besides which my principal anxiety is over for the season. I have certainly had a benefit of work, both civil and literary, for the Institution, and since Colonel Lawrence put an advertisement in the papers, desiring all anxious persons to apply to me, I have had enough on my hands. It is all very well, but interferes with my reading no little; and I am sure to get more kicks than thanks for my pains from an ungrateful and undiscerning public. However, as long as Colonel Lawrence leaves everything so completely in my hands, and trusts so implicitly to my skill and honesty, it would be a shame not to work "un-like a nigger."

It is intended that the children should remain in the Institution until they are eighteen years of age, if their fathers be alive, and until somehow or other provided for, should they be orphans. The majority of the boys will, of course, become soldiers; but my belief is, that having been brought up in the delightful climate of the Himalaya, they will, after ten or fifteen years, settle down in the various stations and slightly elevated valleys in these hills, as traders and cultivators, and form the nucleus of the first British colony in India. My object is to give them English habits from the first, which they have in most cases to learn, from being brought up by native nurses from infancy. Part of the scheme is to make the Institution support itself, and I am very shortly going to start a farm-yard. I have already got a fine large garden in full swing; and here you may see French beans, cabbages, strawberry plants, and fine potatoes (free from disease). I steadfastly refuse the slightest dash of color in admitting children. People may call this illiberal, if they please; the answer is obvious. Half-castes stand the climate of the plains too well to need a hill sanitorium, and by mixing them with English children you corrupt those whom you wish to benefit. The little boy who was lately redeemed from Cabul, and whom Colonel Lawrence consigned to my care, is the plague of my existence. He has the thoroughly lying, deceitful habits, and all the dirt, of the Affghan races, and not a single point of interest to counterbalance them.

Subathoo, August, 1847.

I have some hopes, though but faint ones, of being relieved from the necessity of a move to Cawnpore, [whither his regiment had been ordered,] by obtaining a berth under Colonel Lawrence. I know that he has asked for me, and, I believe, for an appointment which would please me more than any other he could find, as being one of the most confidential nature, and involving constant locomotion, and plenty of work both for head, nerve, and body. But I must not be sanguine, as we have already a large proportion of officers away from the regiment, and I am a young soldier, though, alas! growing grievously old in years.

"Simla, Sept. 11th.

"My dear Hodson,—I have spoken to the Governor-General about you, who at once replied, 'Let him take the adjutancy.' He wishes you well, but is puzzled by the absentee question. We are all, moreover, agreed on the usefulness to yourself of being employed for a time as adjutant to a regiment. There are always slips, but I know of no man of double or treble your standing who has so good a prospect before him. Favor and partiality do occasionally give a man a lift, but depend upon it that his is the best chance in the long run who helps himself. So far you have done this manfully, and you have reason to be proud of being selected at one time for three different appointments by three different men.[4] Don't however, be too proud. Learn your duties thoroughly. Continue to study two or three hours a day; not to pass in a hurry, but that you may do so two or three years hence with éclat. Take advantage of Becher's being at Kussowlee to learn something of surveying. All knowledge is useful; but to a soldier, or official of any sort in India, I know no branch of knowledge which so well repays the student.

"In Oriental phrase, pray consider that much is said in this hurried scrawl, and believe that I shall watch your career with warm interest.

"I am, very sincerely yours,

"H. M. Lawrence."

I have every reason to expect that before many days I shall be gazetted as attached to the Guide Corps. The immediate result of my appointment will be a speedy departure to Lahore with Colonel Lawrence, who returns there to arrange matters before going home.

You will, I am sure, rejoice with me at my unprecedented good fortune in being appointed to a responsible and honorable post, almost before, by the rules of the service, I am entitled to take charge of a company of Sepoys. I shall even be better off than I thought; instead of merely "doing duty" with the Guide Corps, I am to be the second in command.

Camp, Kussoor, Nov. 15th, 1847.

I almost forget the many events that have happened since I wrote last. I believe I was "at home" in my snug little cottage in Subathoo, and now I am in a high queer-looking native house among the ruins of this old stronghold of the Pathàns; with orders "to make a good road from Lahore to the Sutlej, distance forty miles," in as brief a space as possible. On the willing-to-be-generally-useful principle this is all very well, and one gets used to turning one's hand to everything, but certainly (but for "circumstances over which I had no control") I always labored under the impression that I knew nothing at all about the matter. However, Colonel Lawrence walked into my room promiscuously one morning, and said, "Oh, Hodson, we have agreed that you must take in hand the road to Ferozepoor,—you can start in a day or two;" and here I am. Well, I have galloped across the country hither and thither, and peered into distances with telescopes, and inquired curiously into abstruse (and obtuse) angles, rattled Gunter's chains, and consulted compasses and theodolites, till I have an idea of a road that will astonish the natives not a little. Last night I was up half the night, looking out for fires which I had ordered to be lighted in sundry places along the line of the Sutlej at a fixed hour, that I might find the nearest point. This morning, I had a grand assembly of village "punches," to discuss with them the propriety of furnishing able-bodied men for the work. By a little artful persuasion, I succeeded in raising 700 from a small district, and am going onwards to hold another such "county meeting" to-morrow. The mode and fashion that has always obtained in public works under native governments, has been to give an order to seize all the inhabitants, and make them work,—and not pay them then. These gentry, therefore, have been so bullied by their Sikh masters, that they hardly believe my offers of ready-money payments. My predecessor, an artillery officer, who came here on the same errand, was turned off for resorting to violent measures in his anxiety to get hold of workmen, having hung some of the head men up by the heels to trees till they were convinced. He got no good (nor hands either) by his dodge. So I was sent here on the other persuasion, and you will be glad to hear, for the credit of the family, that I am gammoning the dear old punches most deliciously. They'd give me anything, bless their innocent hearts! when I get under the village tree with them, or by the village well, and discourse eloquently on the blessing to society of having destroyed the Sikhs, and on the lightness of their land-tax. I hope to be relieved in a month, and go up to Peshawur to join "the Guides," for this is cruelly hard work, and I have had enough for one year of native work-people. Besides, I am not strong yet, and have a horrid cold. I would give anything to be able to sit down and read a book quietly, a luxury I have not enjoyed for many a long day. Colonel Lawrence starts for England on the 30th for two years. I hope you will contrive to see him, and make his acquaintance. Sir F. Currie is to be his successor during his absence.

December 1st.

I have been at Lahore to receive Colonel Lawrence's parting instructions, and say good-bye to him, poor fellow. He is a genuinely kind-hearted mortal, and has been a brother to me ever since I knew him. I hope to see him back in two years, invigorated and renewed, to carry out the good work which he has so nobly begun.

Camp, Kussoor, Dec. 15th, 1847.

Your letter met me on my road two days ago, and emerged from the folds of a Sikh horseman's turban, to my great delight. I got off my horse, and walked along, driving him before me till I had read the packet. You must not conclude, because I am writing to you a second time from this place, that I have been here ever since I first commenced operations in these parts. I have been twice to Lahore, and several times to various intermediate and more distant places, since then. In short, you may give up all idea of being able to imagine where I may be at any given time. My work has progressed considerably. In three weeks I have collected and got into working order upwards of a thousand most unwilling laborers, surveyed and marked out some twenty miles of road through a desert and forest, and made a very large piece of it. I am happy to say I am to be relieved in a day or two, and sent to survey another district. I have had one or two visitors the last few days, and therefore not been so lonely as usual; but my time has been even more than ever occupied. My duties are nearly as various as there are hours in the day; at one time digging a trench, at another time investigating breaches of the peace. I am a sort of justice of the peace for general purposes, and have to listen to and inquire into complaints, and send cases which I think worthy of it for trial to Lahore. I caught as neat a case of robbing and murder the other day as ever graced Stafford Assizes; to say nothing of endless modes of theft, more or less open, according to the wealth or power of the stealer. This is the most remarkable scene of ruin I have met with for many a long day; erst, a nest of the abodes of wealthy Pathàn nobles, and now a desert tract, of many miles in extent, covered with ruins, with here and there a dome, or cupola, or minaret, to mark what has once been.

I am happy to say that I have succeeded in obtaining a respite on Sundays. Hitherto, all the works I have had in hand have gone on the same every day, and consequently one's annoyance and responsibility continued equally on Sundays. This is happily put an end to, and I shall have one day's rest a week at least, to say nothing of higher considerations. An order on the subject was issued six months ago, but great difficulties were in the way of its execution.

Camp, Deenanuggur, Jan. 15th, 1848.

Here I am off again like a steam-engine, calling at a series of stations, puffing and panting, hither and thither, never resting, ever starting; now in a cutting, now in a tunnel; first in a field, next on a hill: thus passes day after day, week after week, a great deal of work going through one's hands, and yet one can give very little account of one's self at the end of it. At present I am moving rapidly along the banks of a small canal which traverses the Doâb, between the Ravee and Beas rivers, for purposes of irrigation; accompanying Major Napier,[5] to whom the prosecution of all public improvements throughout the Land of the Five Rivers belongs. We (the "Woods and Forests" of the day) have nearly reached the point where the river debouches from the hills, and have put up for the day in a little garden-house of Runjeet Singh's, in the midst of a lovely grove of great extent, through whose dark-green boughs we have a splendid panorama of the snowy range to back our horizon. We have great projects of extending the canal by various branches to feed and fertilize the whole extent of the Doâb, which wants nothing but water to make it a garden, so fertile is the soil. We have come along a strip of beautiful country, richly cultivated, lying along the banks of this life-giving little watercourse, and the weather is perfect, so I am as happy as mere externals can make one. Certainly we whose lot has fallen on this side of India, are much to be envied. Here, all day long, one rides about, clothed as warmly, and even more so, than in England at this season, enjoying the bright clear sunshine, and never troubled with thinking of the sun; whilst at Calcutta they are running into their houses at nine o'clock to avoid the heat of the day! I imagine two years in Calcutta would be more wearing than ten up here; by the same token, I have achieved the respectable weight of eleven stone ten pounds, being an increase of seventeen pounds since July. May my shadow never be less!

I live from the arrival of one mail in expectation of the next. I had meant to have written a long series of despatches for this opportunity, and have asked you to do some commissions for me, but I must postpone it now to another time, as Major Napier has lots of work for me. I want a pair of thick blankets; mine were plundered at Ferozeshah, and I have always mourned over them since, when cold nights and long marches come together. In these far countries it is next to impossible to get anything decent.

Camp, Raja Ke Bágh, Jan. 29th, 1848.

For some days I was staying in, and intend returning again to, a fine picturesque old castle or fort built by the Emperor Shahjehan. Its lofty walls, with their turrets and battlements, inclose a quadrangle of the size of the great court of Trinity, while from the centre rises a dark mass of buildings three stories high, forming the keep; presenting externally four blank walls pierced with loopholes, but within, arches and pillars and galleries, with an open space in the centre, in which they all face. The summit rises sixty-four feet, which, in addition to the great elevation of the mound on which the castle stands, gives a noble view of mountain, river, and plain, covered with the finest timber and green with young corn; the whole backed by range on range, peak after peak, of dazzling snow. Another, nearly similar, lies about ten miles to the north, and I am now "pitched" at the foot of a third to the west; all monuments of the taste and grandeur of the Mogul Emperors. That Goth, Runjeet Singh, and his followers have as much to answer for in their way, as Cromwell and his crop-eared scoundrels in England and Ireland. They seem only to have conquered to destroy,—every public work, every castle, road, serai, or avenue, has been destroyed; the finest mosques turned into powder magazines and stables, the gardens into cantonments, and the fields into deserts. I had a pretty specimen the other day of the way in which things have been managed here. I was desired to examine into, and report on, the accounts of revenue collected hitherto in 180 villages along the "Shah Nahr," or Royal Canal. By a convenient mixture of coaxing and threats, compliment and invective, a return was at last effected, by which it appeared that in ordinary cases about one half the revenue reached the treasury, in some one third, and in one district nothing! To my great amusement, when I came to this point, the gallant collector (a long-bearded old Sikh) quietly remarked,—"Yes, Sahib, this was indeed a great place for us entirely." I said, "Yes, you villain, you gentry grew fat on robbing your master." "Don't call it robbing," he said; "I assure you I wouldn't be dishonest for the world. I never took more than my predecessors did before me." About the most naïve definition of honesty I have had the luck to meet with. I fancy our visit to these nooks and corners of the Punjaub has added some 50,000l. a year to the revenue. My present rôle is to survey a part of the country lying along the left bank of the Ravee and below the hills, and I am daily and all day at work with compasses and chain, pen and pencil, following streams, diving into valleys, burrowing into hills, to complete my work. I need hardly remark, that having never attempted anything of the kind hitherto, it is bothering at first. But one is compelled to be patient under this sort of insult, and I should not be surprised any day to be told to build a ship, compose a code of laws, or hold assizes;—in fact, 'tis the way in India; every one has to teach himself his work, and do it at the same time; if I go on learning new trades as fast during the remainder of my career as I have done at its commencement, I shall have to retire as a Jacksonian professor at least, when "my dog has had his day." Well! I have fairly beaten the cold this time,—I turned back one side of the tent, and had a big fire lighted outside, protected from draughts by a canvas screen, and the whole tent is now in a jolly glow; a gypsy light reflected on the trees around, and on the two tall picturesque Affghans who, seated cross-legged on each side of the fire, either replenish it with sticks, fan it into a flame, or watch my pen with the large, black, inquisitive eye of a dog looking out for a crust.

They make much better servants for wandering folks like myself than the Hindostanee servant-tribe, have fewer or no prejudices, (save against clean water,) and trudge along the livelong day as merrily as if life was a joke to them, instead of the dull heavy reality it is.[6]