Page:The Earl of Auckland.djvu/78

72 Ranjít himself 'had no jewels on whatever, nothing but the commonest red silk dress.' The old man was highly pleased with his presents, especially with a portrait of the Queen, painted by Miss Eden, which he promised to hang up before his tent with all the honours of a royal salute. 'He ran out in the sun,' says Miss Eden, 'to feel the legs of one of the horses sent for his acceptance.' Next day the Governor-General crossed the river to return the Mahárájá's visit. Amidst a scene of rare Oriental splendour, in which the Sikhs, according to an eye-witness, 'shone down the English,' Ranjít received his guest to the music of our national anthem as played by a Sikh band. After some friendly talk through interpreters, Lord Auckland and his Staff were entertained with a frolicsome nautch and the capers of male buffoons. At the evening banquet, Ranjít Singh got royally drunk on his favourite liquor, whose undiluted strength might have been too much for Quilp himself, and a very few drops of which burned Miss Eden's lips.

These state-pageants were followed up in the first days of December by a round of military parades, and festive amenities of all kinds. One day Sir Henry Fane manœuvred the whole of his force in a style which delighted the old Sikh warrior, who seemed to grow young again as he rode his horse on the scene of mimic war. His own Khálsa troops were paraded in their turn under some of his best Sirdárs, and the English officers were surprised to find how smartly