Page:A General Biography of Bengal Celebrities Vol 1.djvu/79

 70 IIFE OF HUBISH GHUNDER KUKHERJKE. urgency of the case. If every native soldier who has had a hand in that appalling outrage, and who was not compelled, to join it by the intimidation of his comrades, were to pay with his life the forfeit of violated duty, offence would be done neither to justice nor to sound policy." Thus it would appear that from the very begin- ning of this national calamity, he took a sober, statesman-like view of the whole affair, counselled sobriety and patience to the Government, and played the part of a peace-maker between the enraged Native soldiers and the Government The hurricane of the Mutiny increased in velocity and strength among the ignorant up-country men, partly drawn to the rank and file of the Mutineers by temptation of plunder, and partly by religious and other consi- derations. The official and non-official Anglo-Indians* the Eurasians, and the Native Christians natur- ally took alarm and confounded the Mutiny to be a general rebellion assisted by the entire native popula- tions and Princes of India. With the gradual swell of the surging tide of the Mutiny, a deep panic arose in their mind. Hurish Chunder in his serio-comic and slashing style thus described it : — "Never since the day on which Serajodowlah sent his Pathans into Caloutta to wrest the factory from the East India Company and put every white man to the sword or in cordis, was Calcutta so beside itself with terror as at the present moment The English have always been noted for looking danger steadily in the face. But at times- an excess of caution assumes a rather ridiculous turn. The state of feeling now exhibited by the notabilities of Chowringhee and their number of satellites in Casitolah is very much akin to that which drew the laughter of the world on the aldermen of London, and there militia when Boney was a stalking horse in the imagination of the British people. Within the last fortnight