Page:History of India Vol 8.djvu/483

Rh that violent conflagration fused all the elements of further disaffection and welded together the different parts of the empire into compact unity. Its extinction terminated the long series of wars within India, and has been followed by fifty years of internal tranquillity.

SIR JOHN LAWRENCE.

The Queen's Proclamation, announcing that the administration of India had passed from the East India Company to the Crown, confirmed all the treaties and engagements made with the native princes, strictly prohibited interference with the religious beliefs of her Majesty's Indian subjects, and desired that, so far as might be, all her subjects should be freely and impartially admitted to offices in her service. Under such auspices the work of pacification and reform went on rapidly. Oudh, annexed in 1856, quieted down after two years of agitation; the great landholders were disarmed and conciliated by a favourable revenue settlement. In the Panjab, where the Sikhs in large numbers had taken service in the British army and had fought with great spirit against the mutineers, Sir John Lawrence's energetic and sagacious administration had reconciled all classes to the new rulership. The last titular representative of the old dynasty had scarcely disappeared