Part 11 (2/2)
Having made these arrangements, Thomas consented to join Vaman Rao, the son of his former patron, in a foray upon the Raja of Jaipur; and in this was nearly slain, only escaping with the loss of his lieutenant, John Morris, and some hundreds of his best men. He then renewed his alliance with Ambaji Sindhia's favourite general, who was about to renew the war against Lakwa Dada in the Udaipur country.
This new campaign was the consequence of Lakwa having connived at the escape of the Bais, a trait of conduct creditable to his regard for the memory of Madhoji Sindhia, his old master, but ruinous to his own interests. For the moment, however, the Dada was completely successful, routing all the detachments sent against him, and taking possession of a considerable portion of Rajputana.
Thomas did not join this campaign without undergoing a fresh danger from the mutiny of his own men. This is a species of peril to which persons in his position seem to have been peculiarly open; and it is related that the infamous Sumroo was sometimes seized by his soldiers, and seated astride upon a heated cannon, in order to extort money from him. In the gallant Irishman the troops had a different subject for their experiments; and the disaffection was soon set at rest by Thomas seizing the ringleaders with his own hands, and having them blown from guns on the spot. This is a concrete exhibition of justice which always commands the respect of Asiatics; and we hear of no more mutinies in Thomas's army.
1800. - In 1800 the sailor-Raja led his men once more against their neighbours to the north and northwest of his territories, and gathered fresh laurels. He was now occupied in no less a scheme than the conquest of the entire Panjab, from which enterprise he records that he had intended to return, like another Nearchus, by way of the Indus, to lay his conquests at the feet of George the Third of England. But the national foes of that monarch were soon to abridge the career of his enterprising subject, the Irish Raja of Hansi. For the present, Perron marched into the country of the Dattia Raja, in Bandelkhand, and entirely defeated Lakwa Dada, who soon after cried of his wounds. His success was at first balanced by Holkar, who routed a detachment of the Imperial army, under Colonel Hessing, at Ujain. Hessing's four battalions were completely cut up; and of eleven European officers, seven were slain and three made prisoners. This event occurred in June, 1801. But it was not long before the disaster was retrieved at Indor (the present seat of the Holkar family), by a fresh force under Colonel Sutherland. Holkar lost ninety-eight guns, and his capital was seized and sacked by the victors, about four months after the former battle.
The French commander of the regular troops was indeed now master of the situation. Victorious in the field, in undisturbed possession of the Upper Doab, and with a subordinate of his own nation in charge of the metropolis and person of the sovereign, General Perron was not disposed to brook the presence of a rival - and that a Briton - in an independent position of sovereignty within a few miles of Dehli. The French sailor and the English sailor having surmounted their respective difficulties, were now, in fact, face to face, each the only rival that the other had to encounter in the Empire of Hindustan.
NOTE. - Thomas describes the Begam as small and plump; her complexion fair, her eyes large and animated. She wore the Hindustani costume, made of the most costly materials. She spoke Persian and Urdu fluently, and attended personally to business, giving audience to her native employee behind a screen. At darbars she appeared veiled; but in European society she took her place at table, waited on exclusively by maid-servants. Her statue, surmounting a group in white marble by Tadolini, stands over her tomb in the Church at Sardhana.
CHAPTER III.
A.D. 1801-3.
Feuds of the Mahrattas - Perron attacks Thomas - End of Thomas - Treaty of Ba.s.sein - Lord Wellesley - Treaty of Lucknow - Wellesley supported - Fear of the French - Sindhia threatened - Influence of Perron - Plans of the French - The First Consul - Wellesley's Views - War declared - Lake's Force - Sindhia's European Officers, English and French - Anti-English Feelings and Fall of Perron - Battle of Dehli - Lake enters the Capital - Emperor's Pet.i.tion - No Treaty made.
1801. - THE end was now indeed approaching. Had the Mahrattas been united, it is possible that their confederacy might have retrieved the disasters of 1760-1, and attained a position in Hindustan similar to that which was soon after achieved by the Sikhs in the Panjab. But this could not be. The Peshwa still a.s.sumed to be Vicegerent of the Empire, as well as head of the Mahrattas, under the t.i.tular supremacy of Satara, and Sindhia affected to rule in Hindustan as the Peshwa's Deputy. But the new Peshwa, Baji Rao - having dislodged the usurping minister Nana Farnavis - had proceeded to provoke the Holkars. Jeswant Rao, the present head of that clan, took up arms against the Peshwa, whose side was espoused by Sindhia; and Sindhia consequently found himself constrained to leave the provinces north of the Narbadda to the charge of subordinates. Of these the most powerful and the most arrogant was the promoted Quarter-Master Sergeant, now General Perron.
As long as the last-named officer was in a subordinate position, he evinced much honourable manhood. But the extremes of prosperity and adversity proved alike the innate vulgarity of the man's nature.
When every hereditary prince, from the Satlaj to the Narbadda, acknowledged him as master, and he enjoyed an income equal to that of the present Viceroy and the Commander-in-Chief of India combined; at this climacteric of his fortunes, when he was actually believed to have sent an emba.s.sy to the First Consul of the French Republic, instead of seriously and soberly seeking to consolidate his position, or resign it with honour, his insolence prepared the downfall which he underwent with disgrace.
Not content with openly flouting his Mahratta colleagues, and estranging such of the Europeans as were not his connections or his creatures, he now summoned George Thomas to Dehli, and called upon him to enter Sindhia's service - in other words, to own his (Perron's) supremacy. The British tar repudiated this invitation with national and professional disdain; upon which a strong Franco-Mahratta army invaded his territories under Louis Bourquin, one of Perron's lieutenants. Judgment formed no part of Thomas's character; but he acted with his wonted decision.
Sweeping round the invading host, he fell upon the detachment at Georgegarh - one of his forts which was being beleaguered - and having routed the besiegers with great loss, threw himself into the place, and protected his front with strong outworks, resolving to await a.s.sistance from Holkar, or to seize a favourable opportunity to strike another blow.
Events showed the imprudence of this plan. No aid came; the French being reinforced, invested his camp, so as to produce a blockade: corruption from the enemy joined with their own distress to cause many desertions of Thomas's soldiers, till at length their leader saw no alternative but flight. About 9 P.M.
therefore, on the 10th November, 1801, he suddenly darted forth at the head of his personal following, and succeeded in reaching Hansi by a circuitous route, riding the same horse - a fine Persian - upwards of a hundred miles in less than three days. But his capital was soon invested by his relentless foes as strictly as his camp had been; and although the influence of his character was still shown in the brave defence made by the few select troops whom neither hope nor fear could force from his side, he was at last obliged to see the cruelty of taxing their fidelity any farther. M. Bourquin was much incensed against this obstinate antagonist; but the latter obtained terms through the mediation of the other officers, and was allowed to retire to British territory with the wreck of his fortune, on the 1st of January, 1802. He died in August, on his way down to Calcutta, and was interred at Barhampur. He left a family, of whom the Begam Sumroo at first took charge, but their descendants have now become mixed with the ordinary population of the country.
This extraordinary man was largely endowed by Nature, both morally and physically. During the time of his brief authority he settled a turbulent country, and put down some crimes, such as female infanticide, with which all the power of Britain has not always coped successfully. It would have been profitable to the British Government had they supported him in his manful struggles against Mahratta lawlessness, and against French ambition and ill-will.
1802. - The overthrow of Thomas was nearly the last of Sindhia's successes. Having made a final arrangement with the Bais (from whom we here gladly part), he confined his attention to the politics of the Deccan, where he underwent a severe defeat from Holkar, at Punah, in October, 1802. The Peshwa, on whose side Sindhia had been fighting, sought refuge with the British at Ba.s.sein, and Holkar obtained temporary possession of the Mahratta capital. On the 31st of December the celebrated treaty of Ba.s.sein was concluded with the Peshwa. It appears from the Wellington Dispatches, published by Mr. Owen in 1880, that this treaty was certainly not conceived in a spirit of hostility to Daulat Rao.
He was a party directly, to the preceding negotiations and, by the agency of his minister, ”to the whole transaction.” (Owen's Selection, p. 30.) Still, as Mr. Wheeler has pointed out, this instrument tended to subst.i.tute the British as the paramount power in Hindustan (Short History, p. 433), and ”shut Sindhia out from the grand object of his ambition, namely, to rule the Mahratta empire in the name of the Peshwa.” One of the articles of the treaty debarred the Mahrattas from entertaining French officers. Grant Duff had seen a secret letter written shortly after the date of the treaty by the Peshwa in which he summoned Sindhia to Punah. (II. Grant Duff, p. 384.) Then, not only supplanted by the British as Protector of the Mahratta State, but alarmed on the score of his position in Hindustan, Sindhia began to intrigue with the hitherto inactive Mahratta chief, Raghoji, the Bhonsla Raja of Nagpur.
Aided by the British under the already famous Arthur Wellesley, the Peshwa soon regained his metropolis, which Sindhia was preparing to occupy. That chief was still further estranged in consequence of the disappointment.
Holkar now held aloof, wisely resolving to remain neutral, at least until his rival should be either overthrown or irresistible. The Governor- General, Marquis Wellesley, apprised by his brother and other political officers of the intrigues of Sindhia, demanded from the latter a categorical explanation of his intentions. And this not being given, General Wellesley was ordered to open the campaign in the Deccan, while General Lake co-operated in the Doab of Hindustan.
In order to appreciate the grounds of this most important measure, it will be necessary to break through the rule by which I have been hitherto guided of keeping nothing before the reader besides the affairs of Hindustan proper. The motives of Lord Wellesley formed part of a scheme of policy embracing nearly the whole inhabited world; and whether we think him right or wrong, we can hardly avoid the conclusion that the virtual a.s.sumption of the Moghul Empire at this time was due to his personal character and political projects.
As far back as February, 1801, the Governor-General had co-operated in European affairs by sending a contingent to Egypt under General Baird; though the force arrived too late to partic.i.p.ate actively in a campaign by which the French were expelled from that country. A twelvemonth later the Marquis received official intimation of the virtual conclusion of the negotiations on which was based the Peace of Amiens. In the interval he had sent his brother, Mr. Henry Wellesley, to Lucknow, and had concluded through that agency the famous treaty of the 10th November, 1801, by which British rule was introduced into Gorakpur, the Eastern and Central Doab, and a large part of Rohilkand. The immediate result of this will be seen ere long.
Having inaugurated these important changes in the position of British power in the East, Lord Wellesley now notified to the Court of Directors (by whom he had conceived himself thwarted), his intention to resign his office, and to return to Europe in the following December. At the same time he issued to General Lake, the Commander-in-Chief, instructions for a substantial reduction of the forces. He added however the following remarkable words: ”It is indispensable to our safety in India that we should be prepared to meet any future crisis of war with unembarra.s.sed resources;” words whereby he showed that even reduction was undertaken with an eye to future exertions. In a similar spirit he rebuked the naval Commander Admiral Rainier, for refusing to employ against the Mauritius the forces that had been set free by the evacuation of Egypt; laying down in terms as decided as courtesy permitted the principle that, as responsible agent, he had a right to be implicitly obeyed by all His Majesty's servants.
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