Page:The Mutiny of the Bengal Army.djvu/31

Rh a mutiny; and that Sir Charles Napier, by a similar measure in 1849, had effected the same end; quite oblivious of the fact, that the entire circumstances were dissimilar, and that both those statesmen had followed up their disbanding orders by others. But the Indian statesmen who were at this time in power affected to sneer both at Lord Ellenborough and at Sir Charles: their pattern statesman was Lord Dalhousie (the real author of the mutiny), and they chuckled at the ease with which they had (to their own satisfaction) disproved the vaticinations of that nobleman's rival. Colonel Birch, in particular, was especially gleeful on this occasion. He—the man of whom Sir Charles had made a laughing-stock!—had he not by a single movement effected all that Sir Charles Napier had been able to bring about by twenty general orders? So at least he thought, or professed to think. All was confidence, superciliousness, and self-congratulation on the part of the Government officials! But although the Government was satisfied, the public was ill at ease. Symptoms were showing themselves throughout India, which the oldest Indian officers had never witnessed before. It was evident to them that some great movement was in progress, although they were not in a position either to fathom its causes or to avert its consequences. The bare hint of such an idea to Colonel Birch was sufficient to expose one to an outpouring of ridicule. That official's pluck at this epoch could not be questioned.

In the meantime, in April, the Sepoy, Mungul Pandy, had been brought to trial, and condemned to death. He made no confession, but stoically accepted his fate in the presence of all the troops at the station. The jemadar who commanded the guard of the 34th on the 29th March, and who had prevented that guard from assisting Lieutenant Baugh, had also been tried and condemned to death. The sentence, however, owing to some red-tape informalities originating with Colonel Birch, was deferred, most prejudicially to the public interests, to the 21st April. On that day the jemadar was brought to execution, and was hanged. Immediately before his death he harangued those around him, confessing the justice of his sentence, and warning others from following his example.

With this execution the Government appeared to rest satisfied. The atrocious conduct of the men composing the guard on the 29th March, evinced by their not only conniving at the attack upon their officer, but by themselves assaulting him and the Sergeant-major as they lay wounded on the ground, was quite overlooked. The Government appeared "satisfied of the loyalty of the 34th Regiment." Indeed, so convinced did they seem to be of the loyalty of every regiment in the Bengal Army, that at the end of the month of April they determined to send the 84th Foot back to Rangoon, and actually engaged transports for that purpose!

The Government came to this conclusion when in possession of reports from the commanding-officers of the different stations in India, which would have convinced any unprejudiced man that the whole army was ripe for revolt. At Agra the incendiarisms had been frequent, and the Sepoys had refused their aid to subdue the