Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/65

Rh influence which swayed them, cannot be certainly known The fact remains that before midnight the regiment rose as one man, the sipáhís loading their muskets, and shouting violently.

There were at Barhámpur a detachment of native cavalry and a battery of native artillery. It was presumable, at that early stage of the great revolt, that to these the contagion had not extended. Mitchell then, as soon as he reached his quarters, ordered these to turn out The order had been given but a few moments, when information reached him that his men had risen. Resolved to stop the mischief, he gathered his officers around him, and proceeded, accompanied by the guns, to the parade ground. The cavalry had preceded him thither.

There he met his men, excited but not violent, and there he harangued them. He spoke well and to the point, and finally wrung from them a promise that they would return to their duty, provided the artillery and cavalry were first ordered back to their lines. Mitchell's hands were tied. With the 200 men behind him he could not, even if they had been loyal, have coerced his 800 sipáhís. After events proved that, had he resorted to force, the men behind him would have joined the revolted regiment, and a catastrophe would have been precipitated which might, for the moment, have reduced the English in India to the greatest extremities. With admirable prudence, then, Mitchell sent back the cavalry and artillery. The men of the 19th then submitted, and returned to their lines.

The following morning the excitement was apparently forgotten by the sipáhís. They fell in for parade, and obeyed the orders given as in their palmiest days. But their suspicions were not lulled. Every night they slept