Page:Viscount Hardinge and the Advance of the British Dominions into the Punjab.djvu/145

Rh of. Shooting parties were organised for us, and everything was done by the Shaikh to render our stay as pleasant as possible.

Here our party separated. I proceeded to join the Governor-General at Simla, accompanied only by our surgeon, Dr. Walker. On our way we had to pass Kot Kángra, and there heard for the first time of the surrender of the Sikh garrison. Kángra is so well described in the Life of Lord Lawrence by Mr. Bosworth Smith that I can add nothing to his picture. Imagine Edinburgh Castle, on a rock much more precipitous, encircled by a rushing torrent and completely commanded from the hills above, and you can form an idea of that Eastern Gibraltar. Without siege guns the place was impregnable. The Sikh garrison had refused to surrender, and simply laughed at us, till Wheeler and John Lawrence, who was then at the head of affairs in the Jálandhar Doáb, brought up the elephant battery. Roads were immediately cut in the rock: and these sagacious animals, when they were in single file, actually pushed up with their foreheads the ammunition waggons immediately in their front. Not a shot was fired. The white flag was immediately hoisted on the citadel, and the garrison laid down their arms.

Let us now follow the Governor-General to his retreat at Simla. The small bungalow overlooking the snowy range was modest enough compared with the Government House which has since been erected. I can see him now, pacing up and down the verandah,