Page:Lord Amherst and the British Advance Eastwards to Burma.djvu/85

 beset these expeditions when they have passed from the jurisdiction of the English magistrate into the hilly wilds is a measure—though an imperfect measure—of the conditions with which the leaders of our first advance had to contend, while they were still in the cultivable but neglected lowlands. The gigantic system of navigable rivers in India did, to some extent, facilitate the transport from the Presidencies to the distant frontiers—even in the days before railways had revolutionized the art of campaigning. But the absence of roads and bridges was the grave impediment.

On January 17, 1824, the first serious collision took place. A body of 4,000 Burmese and Assamese had crossed the mountains from Assam and taken up an entrenched position at Bikrampur, a place forty-five miles east of Sylhet, while another force, flushed with victory over native foes, was advancing from Manipur. To prevent the junction of these two, a detachment of Sepoys and local levies, which had been posted to observe events a little beyond our frontier, marched to the attack of the Burmese entrenchments at Bikrampur. The enemy were put to flight, but managed to join the host from Manipur. Some further successes were obtained by the Company's troops, but a gallant attack made on the stockade constructed by the Burmese on the Surma failed. Since 1824 we have had wars in so many quarters of the globe that hardly any fresh modification remains to be discovered. The 'laager,' the 'zareeba' have become