Page:Sir Henry Lawrence, the Pacificator.djvu/189

180 'I am much indebted to your Lordship for your two kind letters of the 22nd and 24th.

'I have refrained from writing, as I had nothing pleasant to say, and, indeed, little more than a detail of daily alarms and hourly reports. Our three positions are now strong. In the cantonment where I reside the 270 or so men of H.M.'s 32nd, with eight guns, could at any time knock to pieces the four native regiments; and both the city Residency and the Mutchi Bhown positions are safe against all probable comers — the latter quite so. But the work is harassing for all, and now that we have no tidings from Delhi my outside perplexities are hourly increasing. This day (29th) I had tidings of the murder of a tahsíldár in one direction, and of the cry of Islam and the raising of the green standard in another. I have also had reports of disaffection in three several irregular corps. Hitherto the country has been quiet, and we have played the irregulars against the line regiments; but being constituted of exactly the same materials, the taint is fast pervading them, and in a few weeks, if not days — unless Delhi be in the interim captured — there will be one feeling throughout the army — a feeling that our prestige is gone — and that feeling will be more dangerous than any other. Religion, fear, hatred, one and all have their influences; but there is still a reverence for the Company's Ikbal. When it is gone we shall have few friends, indeed. The tone and talk of many have greatly altered within the last few days, and we are now asked, almost in terms of insolence, whether Delhi is recaptured, or when it will be. It was only just after the Kábul massacre, and when we hesitated to advance through the Kháibar, that, in my memory, such a tone ever before prevailed. Every effort should be made to recover Delhi. The King is a watchword to Muhammadans. The loss of a capital is a stigma on us, and to these are added the fear