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166 body of Sikh troops who had been so lately fighting against us, was the transfer effected. Lal Singh was proved guilty by the production of his own letters; not a voice was raised for him, and he was banished to his native land in Hindostan.

A Council of Regency of the principal chiefs was now formed under the direction of the British Resident; but at the Lahore Court the witches' caldron, brimful with intrigue, again began to bubble. The queen-regent had hoped that everything except the dread Khalsa would have been restored to her as before the war. She bitterly resented the expulsion of her favourite minister, the arch-traitor Lal Singh, and after a short time the sardars also came to repent of the treaty they had made. Faithlessness to the tee merciful British Government was encouraged; an army and guns still remained to them; disaffection was excited among the soldiery and the disbanded Khalsa, who swarmed, discontented, in the villages. The new wine,