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Rh CHAPTER XXXIII.

Retrospective Glance at Sinde – Our Commercial and Political Relations with that Country – Imputed Treachery of the Ameers – A British Army assembles at Sukkur under Sir Charles Napier – He advances on Hyderabad – The Beloochees attack the British Residency – Escape of the Commissioner – Battle of Meeanee – Surrender of the Ameers – Treasure taken at Hyderabad – Battle of Dubba – Final Defeat of the Beloochees, and Annexation of Sinde – Affairs of Gwalior – Dreadful State of that Country – Intervention of the Governor-General – British Troops advance from Agra – Battles of Maharajpoor and Punnear – Submission of the Refractory, and Settlement of the Country.

The Sindian war followed so immediately after that which we have just narrated, that it has been justly characterised by its eloquent historian, as "the tail of the Affghan storm."

Much controversy has sprung out of our annexation of Sinde to our empire in the East, with which, of course, we have nothing to do; but a very brief retrospect of its history will be necessary to give the general reader a correct idea of the origin of the war.

The kingdom of Sinde, which occupies both banks of the Great Delta of the Indus, immediately to the south of Affghanistan, differs altogether in climate and natural features from that rugged, hilly country. It possesses a fertile soil, and a most unwarlike population, who have always been under foreign subjection, either Affghan or Beloochee. In 1786 a chief of the former race, named Meer Futteh Ali, having gained the ascendancy over another tribe, assigned distinct portions of the conquered country to two of his relations, and thus arose the states of Khyrpoor and Meerpoor. But the larger division of territory was retained by Futteh Ali himself, in connexion with his three brothers, whom he associated in the