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Rh had been arrested, and now insurrection was approaching daily nearer to their doors.

For the state of the three armed native regiments, within fifteen miles of Calcutta, was such as to cause great alarm. The followers of the ex-King of Oudh, considerable in number and hostile in feeling, swarmed in a very near suburb of the capital. Lord Canning could not but feel, under these circumstances, that he had been somewhat hasty in rudely repulsing the offers made to volunteer on the 25th of May. On the 11th of June, then, he sent for the Town-Major, Major Cavenagh, a man possessing a singularly practical mind and quick perceptions, and consulted with him as to the advisability of conceding the prayer which he had previously rejected. The advice of Cavenagh was in entire accordance with his character. On the following day, then, the necessary orders were issued. The enrolment began immediately, and in an incredibly short space of time the Government had at its disposal a serviceable body of gentlemen, horse, foot, and artillery — men devoted, unselfish, desirous only to serve their country, and serving it with all their might, and whose enrolment permitted Lord Canning to despatch to the threatened districts the troops which, but for the volunteers, he would have been forced to retain at the capital.

The order for the enrolment of the volunteers had been issued on the 12th of June. On the 13th the Governor-General and his councillors passed an Act to gag the press. That some restraint was requisite for the native press may be admitted, for it was preaching sedition all over the country. But to include in the gagging measure the loyal English press, which, whilst it had supported the English interests, had not shrunk from indicating, in no measured language, the mistakes and shortcomings of the