Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 6.djvu/275

Rh mediately placed him at the head of a commission of inquiry which they decided on sending out to India, to remedy those defects and abuses which the evidence now placed before them had brought to light.

Previous to- his returning to India, colonel Munro married, 30th March, 1814, Jane Campbell, daughter of Richard Campbell, Esq. of Craigie House, Ayrshire, a lady remarkable for her beauty and accomplishments. This connexion added greatly to colonel Munro's happiness, and eventually opened up to him a source of domestic felicity which his disposition and temper eminently fitted him to enjoy.

His commission having now been duly made out, and all other preparations for his voyage completed, he embarked, accompanied by his wife and sister-in-law, in the month of May, 1814, at Portsmouth, and after a pleasant passage of eighteen weeks, arrived at Madras on the 16th September.

On his arrival, colonel Munro immediately began to discharge the arduous duties of his new appointment. These embraced a total revision of the internal administration of the Madras territories, and comprehended an amount of labour, in going over reports and decisions, in investigating accounts, in drawing up regulations, and in a thousand other details as numerous as they were complicated, which would have appalled any man of less nerve than him on whose shoulders it had fallen. In this laborious employment he continued till the month of July, 1817, when, a war with the Mahrattas having broken out, he solicited employment in the line of his profession, and was appointed to the command of the reserve of the army under lieutenant-general Sir Thomas Hislop, having been himself previously, 15th June, 1815, promoted to the rank of colonel.

In the campaign which followed the resumption of his military duties, colonel Munro performed a brilliant part His military reputation, formerly amongst the highest, was now universally acknowledged to be unsurpassed. Lord Hastings complimented him in strains of the warmest panegyric., as well in his official communications as in his private correspondence. Mr Canning passed an eloquent eulogium on his merits in the house of commons. Sir John Malcolm contributed his unqualified commendations of his masterly operations, and the public records of Calcutta were filled with his praise. His name was now, in short, become famous throughout Europe, and he was everywhere looked upon not only as one of the first soldiers of the day, hut as a man who possessed talents and abilities which fitted him for attaining eminence equally in a civil as in a military life.

In the campaign which lasted till the beginning of August, 1818, general Munro, (he was promoted to this rank, December 1817,) reduced all the Peishwah's territories between the Toombuddra and Kistna, and from the Kistna northward to Akloos on the Neemah, and eastward to the Nizam's frontier. On the conclusion of the campaign, finding his health greatly impaired by the excessive fatigue which he had undergone, he resolved to resign all his commissions, both civil and military, and to retire into private life. In pursuance of this resolution, he tendered his resignations to the marquis of Hastings, who received them with much reluctance; and returned by way of Bengalore, where he met his family, to Madras. Shortly after this, October 1818, he was made a Companion of the Bath, as a testimony of the opinion which was entertained at home of his merits.

General Munro now again turned his thoughts homewards, and, after devoting two months to the arrangement of his affairs, embarked on board the Warren Hastings, with his family, for England, on the 24th January, 1819. During the passage, Mrs Munro was delivered, 30th May, of a boy, who, being