Chapter IX: Part II (2)

Then as to the magic capitals M.P., which provincial people look upon as embodying in the wearer the concentrated essence of wisdom, eloquence, personal distinction, and social eminence. Who, in a country town, on a market day, has not seen tradesmen cocking their eye, apprentices glowering through the shop front, and ladies subdolously peeping behind the window-shutter to catch a glimpse of the "member for our town," and, having seen him, think they are rather happier then they were before? The greatest fun in the world is to go to a _cul-de-sac_ off a dirty lane near Palace Yard, called Manchester Buildings, a sort of senatorial pigeon-house, where the meaner fry of houseless M.P.'s live, each in his one pair, two pair, three pair, as the case may be, and give a postman's knock at every door in rapid succession. In a twinkling, the "collective wisdom" of Manchester Buildings and the Midland Counties poke out their heads. Cobden appears on the balcony; Muntz glares out of a second floor, like a live bear in a barber's window; Wallace of Greenock comes to the door in a red nightcap; and a long "tail" of the other immortals of a session. You may enjoy the scene as much as you please; but when you hear one or two of the young Irish patriotic "mimbers" floundering from the attics, the wisest course you can take will be incontinently to "mizzle." These men, however, have one redeeming quality--that they live in Manchester Buildings, and don't care who knows it; they are out of fashion, and don't care who are in; they are minding their business, and not hanging at the skirts of people ever ready and willing to kick them off.

Then there are the "dandy" M.P.'s, who ride hack-horses, associate with fashionable actresses, and hang about the clubs. Then there is the chance or accidental M.P., who has been elected he hardly knows how or when, and wonders to find himself in Parliament. Then there is the desperate, adventuring, ear-wigging M.P., whose hope of political existence, and whose very livelihood, depend upon getting or continuing in place. Then there is the legal M.P., with one eye fixed on the Queen's, the other squinting at the Treasury Bench. Then there is the lounging M.P., who is usually the scion of a noble family, and who comes now and then into the House, to stare vacantly about, and go out again. Then there is the military M.P., who finds the House an agreeable lounge, and does not care to join his regiment on foreign service. Then there is the bustling M.P. of business, the M.P. of business without bustle, and the independent country gentleman M.P., who wants nothing for himself or any body else, and who does not care a turnip-top for the whole lot of them.

The aggregate distinction, as a member of Parliament, is totally sunk in London. It is the man, and not the two letters after his name, that any body whose regard is worth the having in the least regard. There are M.P.s never seen beyond the exclusive set, except on a committee of the House, and then they know and speak to nobody save one of themselves. There are other M.P.s that you will find in no society except Tom Spring's or Owen Swift's, at the Horse-shoe in Litchborne Street.

These observations upon baronets and M.P.s may be extended upwards to the peerage, and downwards to the professional, commercial, and all other the better classes. Every man hangs, like a herring, by his own tail; and every class would be distinct and separate, but that the pretenders to fashion, like some equivocal animals in the chain of animated nature, connect these different classes by copying pertinaciously the manners, and studying to adopt the tastes and habits of the class immediately above them.

Of pretenders to fashion, perhaps the most successful in their imitative art are the

SHEENIES.--By this term, as used by men of undoubted _ton_ with reference to the class we are about to consider, you are to understand runagate Jews rolling in riches, who profess to love roast pork above all things, who always eat their turkey with sausages, and who have _cut_ their religion for the sake of dangling at the heels of fashionable Christians. These people are "swelling" upon the profits of the last generation in St Mary Axe or Petticoat Lane. The founders of their families have been loan-manufacturers, crimps, receivers of stolen goods, wholesale nigger-dealers, clippers and sweaters, rag-merchants, and the like, and conscientious Israelites; but their children, not having fortitude to abide by their condition, nor right principle to adhere to their sect, come to the west end of the town, and, by right of their money, make unremitting assaults upon the loose fish of fashionable society, who laugh at, and heartily despise them, while they are as ashes in the mouths of the respectable members of the persuasion to which they originally belonged.

HEAVY SWELLS are another very important class of pretenders to fashion, and are divided into civil and military. Professional men, we say it to their honour, seldom affect the heavy swell, because the feeblest glimmerings of that rationality of thinking which results from among the lowest education, preserves them from the folly of the attempt, and, in preserving from folly, saves them from the self-reproaching misery that attends it. Men of education or of common sense, look upon pretension to birth, rank, or any thing else to which they have no legitimate claim, as little more than moral forgery; it is with them an uttering base coin upon false pretences. It is generally the wives and families of professional men who are afflicted with pretension to fashion, of which we shall give abundant examples when we come to treat of gentility-mongers. But the heavy swell, who is of all classes, from the son and heir of an opulent blacking-maker down to the lieutenant of a marching regiment on half-pay, is utterly destitute of brains, deplorably illiterate, and therefore incapable, by nature and bringing-up, of respecting himself by a modest contented demeanour. He is never so unhappy as when he appears the thing he is--never so completely in his element as when acting the thing he is not, nor can ever be. He spends his life in jumping, like a cat, at shadows on the wall. He has day and night dreams of people, who have not the least idea that such a man is in existence, and he comes in time, by mere dint of thinking of nobody else, to think that he is one of them. He acquaints himself with the titles of lords, as other men do those of books, and then boasts largely of the extent of his acquaintance.

Let us suppose that he is an officer of a hard-fighting, foreign-service, neglected infantry regiment. This, which to a soldier would be an honest pride, is the shame of the Heavy Military Swell. His chief business in life, next to knowing the names and faces of lords, is concealing from you the corps to which he has the dishonour, he thinks, to belong. He talks mightily of the service, of hussars and light dragoons; but when he knows that you know better, when you poke him hard about the young or old buffs, or the dirty half-hundred, he whispers in your ear that "my fellows," as he calls them, are very "fast," and that they are "all known in town, very well known indeed"--a piece of information you will construe in the case of the heavy swell to mean, better known than trusted.

When he is on full pay, the heavy swell is known to the three old women and five desperate daughters who compose good society in country quarters. He affects a patronizing air at small tea-parties, and is wonderfully run after by wretched un-idea'd girls, that is, by ten girls in twelve; he is eternally striving to get upon the "staff," or anyhow to shirk his regimental duty; he is a whelp towards the men under his command, and has a grand idea of spurs, steel scabbards, and flogging; to his superiors he is a spaniel, to his brother officers an intolerable ass; he makes the mess-room a perfect hell with his vanity, puppyism, and senseless bibble-babble.

On leave, or half-pay, he "mounts mustaches," to help the hussar and light-dragoon idea, or to delude the ignorant into a belief that he may possibly belong to the household cavalry. He hangs about doors of military clubs, with a whip in his hand; talks very loud at the "Tiger" or the "Rag and famish," and never has done shouting to the waiter to bring him a "Peerage;" carries the "Red Book" and "Book of Heraldry" in his pocket; sees whence people come, and where they go, and makes them out somehow; in short, he is regarded with a thrill of horror by people of fashion, fast or slow, civil or military.

The Civil Heavy Swell affects fashionable curricles, and enjoys all the consideration a pair of good horses can give. He rides a blood bay in Rotten Row, but rides badly, and is detected by galloping, or some other solecism; his dress and liveries are always overdone, the money shows on every thing about him. He has familiar abbreviations for the names of all the fast men about town; calls this Lord "Jimmy," 'tother Chess, a third Dolly, and thinks he knows them; keeps an expensive mistress, because "Jimmy" and Chess are supposed to do the same, and when he is out of the way, his mistress has some of the fast fellows to supper, at the heavy swell's expense. He settles the point whether claret is to be drank from a jug or black bottle, and retails the merits of a _plateau_ or _epergne_ he saw, when last he dined with a "fellow" in Belgrave Square.

The _Foreigneering_ Heavy Swell has much more spirit, talent, and manner, than the home-grown article; but he is poor in a like ratio, and is therefore obliged to feather his nest by denuding the pigeon tribe of their metallic plumage. He is familiarly known to all the fast fellows, who _cut_ him, however, as soon as they marry, but is not accounted good _ton_ by heads of families. He is liked at the Hells and Clubs, where he has a knack of distinguishing himself without presumption or affectation. He is a dresser by right divine, and dresses ridiculously. The fashionable fellows affect loudly to applaud his taste, and laugh to see the vulgar imitate the foreigneering swell. He is the idol of equivocal women, and condescends to patronize unpresentable gentility-mongers. He is not unhappy at heart, like the indigenous heavy swell, but enjoys his intimacy with the fast fellows, and uses it.

There is an infallible test we should advise you to apply, whenever you are bored to desperation by any of these heavy swells. When he talks of "my friend, the Duke of Bayswater," ask him, in a quiet tone, where he last met the _Duchess_. If he says Hyde-Park (meaning the Earl of) is an honest good fellow, enquire whether he prefers Lady Mary or Lady Seraphina Serpentine. This drops him like a shot--he can't get over it.

It is a rule in good society that you know the set only when you know the women of that set; however you may work your way among the men, whatever you may do at the Hells and Clubs, goes for nothing--the _women_ stamp you counterfeit or current, and--

"Not to know _them_, argues yourself unknown."

* * * * *

EYRE'S CABUL.

The Military Operations at Cabul, which ended in the Retreat
and Destruction of the British Army, January 1842; with a
Journal of Imprisonment in Affghanistan. By Lieutenant Vincent
Eyre, Bengal Artillery, late Deputy-Commissary of Ordnance at
Cabul. London: John Murray.

This is the first connected account that has appeared of the military disasters that befell the British army at Cabul--by far the most signal reverse our arms have ever sustained in Asia. The narrative is full of a deep and painful interest, which becomes more and more intense as we approach the closing catastrophe. The simple detail of the daily occurrences stirs up our strongest feelings of indignation, pity; scorn, admiration, horror, and grief. The tale is told without art, or any attempt at artificial ornament, and in a spirit of manly and gentlemanlike forbearance from angry comment or invective, that is highly creditable to the author, and gives us a very favourable opinion both of his head and of his heart.

That a British army of nearly six thousand fighting men--occupying a position chosen and fortified by our own officers, and having possession, within two miles of this fortified cantonment, of a strong citadel commanding the greater part of the town of Cabul, a small portion only of whose population rose against us at the commencement of the revolt--should not only have made no vigorous effort to crush the insurrection; but that it should ultimately have been driven by an undisciplined Asiatic mob, destitute of artillery, and which never appears to have collected in one place above 10,000 men, to seek safety in a humiliating capitulation, by which it surrendered the greater part of its artillery, military stores, and treasure, and undertook to evacuate the whole country on condition of receiving a safe conduct from the rebel chiefs, on whose faith they placed, and could place, no reliance; and finally, that, of about 4500 armed soldiers and twelve thousand camp-followers, many of whom were also armed, who set out from Cabul, only one man, and he wounded, should have arrived at Jellalabad; is an amount of misfortune so far exceeding every rational anticipation of evil, that we should have been entitled to assume that these unparalleled military disasters arose from a series of unparalleled errors, even if we had not had, as we now have, the authority of Lord Ellenborough for asserting the fact.

But every nation, and more particularly the British nation, is little inclined to pardon the men under whose command any portion of its army or of its navy may have been beaten. Great Britain, reposing entire confidence in the courage of her men, and little accustomed to see them overthrown, is keenly jealous of the reputation of her forces; and, as she is ever prompt to reward military excellence and success, she heaps unmeasured obloquy on those who may have subjected her to the degradation of defeat. When our forces have encountered a reverse, or even when the success has not been commensurate with the hopes that had been indulged; the public mind has ever been prone to condemn the commanders; and wherever there has been reason to believe that errors have been committed which have led to disaster, there has been little disposition to make any allowances for the circumstances of the case, or for the fallibility of man; but, on the contrary, the nation has too often evinced a fierce desire to punish the leaders for the mortification the country has been made to endure.

This feeling may tend to elevate the standard of military character, but it must at the same time preclude the probability of calm or impartial examination, so far as the great body of the nation is concerned; and it is therefore the more obviously incumbent on those who, from a more intimate knowledge of the facts, or from habits of more deliberate investigation, are not carried away by the tide of popular indignation and invective, to weigh the circumstances with conscientious caution, and to await the result of judicial enquiry before they venture to apportion the blame or even to estimate its amount.

"The following notes," says Lieutenant Eyre in his preface,
"were penned to relieve the monotony of an Affghan prison,
while yet the events which they record continued fresh in my
memory. I now give them publicity, in the belief that the
information which they contain on the dreadful scenes lately
enacted in Affghanistan, though clothed in a homely garb, will
scarcely fail to be acceptable to many of my countrymen, both
in India and England, who may be ignorant of the chief
particulars. The time, from the 2d November 1841, on which day
the sudden popular outbreak at Cabul took place, to the 13th
January 1842, which witnessed the annihilation of the last
small remnant of our unhappy force at Gundamuk, was one
continued tragedy. The massacre of Sir Alexander Burnes and his
associates,--the loss of our commissariat fort--the defeat of
our troops under Brigadier Shelton at Beymaroo--the treacherous
assassination of Sir William Macnaghten, our envoy and
minister--and lastly, the disastrous retreat and utter
destruction of a force consisting of 5000 fighting men and
upwards of 12,000 camp-followers,--are events which will
assuredly rouse the British Lion from his repose, and excite an
indignant spirit of enquiry in every breast. Men will not be
satisfied, in this case, with a bare statement of the facts,
but they will doubtless require to be made acquainted with the
causes which brought about such awful effects. We have lost six
entire regiments of infantry, three companies of sappers, a
troop of European horse-artillery, half the mountain-train
battery, nearly a whole regiment of regular cavalry, and four
squadrons of irregular horse, besides a well-stocked magazine,
which _alone_, taking into consideration the cost of transport
up to Cabul, may be estimated at nearly a million sterling.
From first to last, not less than 104 British officers have
fallen: their names will be found in the Appendix. I glance but
slightly at the _political_ events of this period, not having
been one of the initiated; and I do not pretend to enter into
_minute_ particulars with regard to even our _military_
transactions, more especially those not immediately connected
with the sad catastrophe which it has been my ill fortune to
witness, and whereof I now endeavour to portray the leading
features. In these notes I have been careful to state only what
I know to be undeniable facts. I have set down nothing on mere
hearsay evidence, nor any thing which cannot be attested by
living witnesses or by existing documentary evidence. In
treating of matters which occurred under my personal
observation, it has been difficult to avoid _altogether_ the
occasional expression of my own individual opinion: but I hope
it will be found that I have made no observations bearing hard
on men or measures, that are either uncalled for, or will not
stand the test of future investigation."

After the surrender of Dost Mahomed Khan, there remained in Affghanistan no chief who possessed a dominant power or influence that made him formidable to the government of Shah Shoojah, or to his English allies; and the kingdom of Cabul seemed to be gradually, though slowly, subsiding into comparative tranquillity. In the summer of the year 1841, the authority of the sovereign appears to have been acknowledged in almost every part of his dominions. A partial revolt of the Giljyes was speedily suppressed by our troops. The Kohistan, or more correctly, Koohdaman of Cabul, a mountainous tract, inhabited by a warlike people, over whom the authority of the governments of the country had long been imperfect and precarious, had submitted, or had ceased to resist. A detachment from the British force at Kandahar, after defeating Akter Khan, who had been instigated by the Vezeer of Herat to rebel, swept the country of Zemindawer, drove Akter Khan a fugitive to Herat, received the submission of all the chiefs in that part of the kingdom, and secured the persons of such as it was not thought prudent to leave at large in those districts.

The Shah's authority was not believed to be so firmly established, that both Sir William Macnaghten, the British envoy at Cabul, who had recently been appointed governor of Bombay, and Sir Alexander Burnes, on whom the duties of the envoy would have devolved on Sir W. Macnaghten's departure, thought that the time had arrived when the amount of the British force in Affghanistan, which was so heavy a charge upon the revenues of India, might with safety be reduced, and General Sale's brigade was ordered to hold itself in readiness to march to Jellalabad, on its route to India.

Even at this time, however, Major Pottinger, the political agent in Kohistan, including, we presume, the Koohdaman, thought the force at his disposal too small to maintain the tranquillity of the district; and the chiefs of the valley of Nijrow, or Nijrab, a valley of Kohistan Proper, had not only refused to submit, but had harboured the restless and disaffected who had made themselves obnoxious to the Shah's government. But although Major Pottinger had no confidence in the good feelings of the people of his own district to the government, and even seems to have anticipated insurrection, no movement of that description had yet taken place.

Early in September, however, Captain Hay, who was with a small force in the Zoormut valley, situated nearly west from Ghuznee and south from Cabul, having been induced by the representations of Moollah Momin--the collector of the revenues, who was a Barikzye, and a near relation of one of the leaders of the insurrection, in which he afterwards himself took an active part--to move against a fort in which the murderers of Colonel Herring were said to have taken shelter, the inhabitants resisted his demands, and fired upon the troops. His force was found insufficient to reduce it, and he was obliged to retire; a stronger force was therefore sent, on the approach of which the people fled to the hills, and the forts they had evacuated were blown up. This occurrence was not calculated seriously to disturb the confident hopes that were entertained of the permanent tranquillity of the country; but before the force employed upon that expedition had returned to Cabul, a formidable insurrection had broken out in another quarter.

"Early in October," says Lieutenant Eyre, "three Giljye chiefs
of note suddenly quitted Cabul, after plundering a rich cafila
at Tezeen, and took up a strong position in the difficult
defile of Khoord-Cabul, about ten miles from the capital, thus
blocking up the pass, and cutting off our communication with
Hindostan. Intelligence had not very long previously been
received that Mahomed Akber Khan, second son of the ex-ruler
Dost Mahomed Khan, had arrived at Bameean from Khooloom, for
the supposed purpose of carrying on intrigues against the
Government. It is remarkable that he is nearly connected by
marriage with Mahomed Shah Khan and Dost Mahomed Khan, also
Giljyes, who almost immediately joined the above-mentioned
chiefs. Mahomed Akber had, since the deposition of his father,
never ceased to foster feelings of intense hatred towards the
English nation; and, though often urged by the fallen ruler to
deliver himself up, had resolutely preferred the life of a
houseless exile to one of mean dependence on the bounty of his
enemies. It seems, therefore, in the highest degree probable
that this hostile movement on the part of the Eastern Giljyes
was the result of his influence over them, combined with other
causes which will be hereafter mentioned."

The other causes here alluded to, appear to be "the deep offence given to the Giljyes by the ill-advised reduction of their annual stipends, a measure which had been forced upon Sir William Macnaghten by Lord Auckland. This they considered, and with some show of justice, as a breach of faith on the part of our Government."

We presume that it is not Mr Eyre's intention to assert that this particular measure was ordered by Lord Auckland, but merely that the rigid economy enforced by his lordship, led the Envoy to have recourse to this measure as one of the means by which the general expenditure might be diminished.

Formidable as this revolt of the Giljyes was found to be, we are led to suspect that both Sir W. Macnaghten and Sir A. Burnes were misled, probably by the Shah's government, very greatly to underrate its importance and its danger. The force under Colonel Monteath,[16] which in the first instance was sent to suppress it, was so small that it was not only unable to penetrate into the country it was intended to overawe or to subdue, but it was immediately attacked in its camp, within ten miles of Cabul, and lost thirty-five sepoys killed and wounded.

[16] 35th Reg. N.I.; 100 sappers; 1 squadron 5th Cav.; 2 guns.

Two days afterwards, the 11th October, General Sale marched from Cabul with H.M.'s 13th light infantry, to join Colonel Monteath's camp at Bootkhak; and the following morning the whole proceeded to force the pass of Khoord-Cabul, which was effected with some loss. The 13th returned through the pass to Bootkhak, suffering from the fire of parties which still lurked among the rocks. The remainder of the brigade encamped at Khoord-Cabul, at the further extremity of the defile. In this divided position the brigade remained for some days, and both camps had to sustain night attacks from the Affghans--"that on the 35th native infantry being peculiarly disastrous, from the treachery of the Affghan horse, who admitted the enemy within their lines, by which our troops were exposed to a fire from the least suspected quarter. Many of our gallant sepoys, and Lieutenant Jenkins, thus met their death."

On the 20th October, General Sale, having been reinforced, marched to Khoord-Cabul; "and about the 22d, the whole force there assembled, with Captain Macgregor, political agent, marched to Tezeen, encountering much determined opposition on the road."

"By this time it was too evident that the whole of the Eastern Giljyes had risen in one common league against us." The treacherous proceedings of their chief or viceroy, Humza Khan, which had for some time been suspected, were now discovered, and he was arrested by order of Shah Shoojah.

"It must be remarked," says Lieutenant Eyre, "that for some
time previous to these overt acts of rebellion, the always
strong and ill-repressed personal dislike of the Affghans
towards Europeans, had been manifested in a more than usually
open manner in and about Cabul. Officers had been insulted and
attempts made to assassinate them. Two Europeans had been
murdered, as also several camp-followers; but these and other
signs of the approaching storm had unfortunately been passed
over as mere ebullitions of private angry feeling. This
incredulity and apathy is the more to be lamented, as it was
pretty well known that on the occasion of the _shub-khoon_, or
first night attack on the 35th native infantry at Bootkhak, a
large portion of our assailants consisted of the armed
retainers of the different men of consequence in Cabul itself,
large parties of whom had been seen proceeding from the city to
the scene of action on the evening of the attack, and
afterwards returning. Although these men had to pass either
through the heart or round the skirts of our camp at Seeah
Sung, it was not deemed expedient even to question them, far
less to detain them.

"On the 26th October, General Sale started in the direction of
Gundamuk, Captain Macgregor having half-frightened,
half-cajoled the refractory Giljye chiefs into what proved to
have been a most hollow truce."

On the same day, the 37th native infantry, three companies of the Shah's sappers under Captain Walsh, and three guns of the mountain train under Lieutenant Green, retraced their steps towards Cabul, where the sappers, pushing on, arrived unopposed; but the rest of the detachment was attacked on the 2d November--on the afternoon of which day, Major Griffiths, who commanded it, received orders to force his way to Cabul, where the insurrection had that morning broken out. His march through the pass, and from Bootkhak to Cabul, was one continued conflict; but the gallantry of his troops, and the excellence of his own dispositions, enabled him to carry the whole of his wounded and baggage safe to the cantonments at Cabul, where he arrived about three o'clock on the morning of the 3d November, followed almost to the gates by about 3000 Giljyes.

The causes of the insurrection in the capital are not yet fully ascertained, or, if ascertained, they have not been made public. Lieutenant Eyre does not attempt to account for it; but he gives us the following memorandum of Sir W. Macnaghten's, found, we presume, amongst his papers after his death:--

"The immediate cause of the outbreak in the capital was a
seditious letter addressed by Abdoollah Khan to several chiefs
of influence at Cabul, stating that it was the design of the
Envoy to seize and send them all to London! The principal
rebels met on the previous night, and, relying on the
inflammable feelings of the people of Cabul, they pretended
that the King had issued an order to put all infidels to death;
having previously forged an order from him for our destruction,
by the common process of washing out the contents of a genuine
paper, with the exception of the seal, and substituting their
own wicked inventions."

But this invention, though it was probably one of the means employed by the conspirators to increase the number of their associates, can hardly be admitted to account for the insurrection. The arrival of Akber Khan at Bameean, the revolt of the Giljyes, the previous flight of their chiefs from Cabul, and the almost simultaneous attack of our posts in the Koohdaman, (called by Lieutenant Eyre, Kohistan,) on the 3d November--the attack of a party conducting prisoners from Candahar to Ghuznee--the immediate interruption of every line of communication with Cabul--and the selection of the season of the year the most favourable to the success of the insurrection, with many other less important circumstances, combine to force upon us the opinion, that the intention to attack the Cabul force, so soon as it should have become isolated by the approach of winter, had been entertained, and the plan of operations concerted, for some considerable time before the insurrection broke out. That many who wished for its success may have been slow to commit themselves, is to be presumed, and that vigorous measures might, if resorted to on the first day, have suppressed the revolt, is probable; but it can hardly be doubted that we must look far deeper, and further back, for the causes which united the Affghan nation against us.

The will of their chiefs and spiritual leaders--fanatical zeal, and hatred of the domination of a race whom they regarded as infidels--may have been sufficient to incite the lower orders to any acts of violence, or even to the persevering efforts they made to extirpate the English. In their eyes the contest would assume the character of a religious war--of a crusade; and every man who took up arms in that cause, would go to battle with the conviction that, if he should be slain, his soul would go at once to paradise, and that, if he slew an enemy of the faith, he thereby also secured to himself eternal happiness. But the chiefs are not so full of faith; and although we would not altogether exclude religious antipathy as an incentive, we may safely assume that something more immediately affecting their temporal and personal concerns must with them, or at least with the large majority, have been the true motives of the conspiracy--of their desire to expel the English from their country. Nor is it difficult to conceive what some of these motives may have been. The former sovereigns of Affghanistan, even the most firmly-established and the most vigorous, had no other means of enforcing their commands, than by employing the forces of one part of the nation to make their authority respected in another; but men who were jealous of their own independence as chiefs, were not likely to aid the sovereign in any attempt to destroy the substantial power, the importance, or the independence of their class; and although a refractory chief might occasionally, by the aid of his feudal enemies, be taken or destroyed, and his property plundered, his place was filled by a relation, and the order remained unbroken. The Affghan chiefs had thus enjoyed, under their native governments, an amount of independence which was incompatible with the system we introduced--supported as that system was by our military means. These men must have seen that their own power and importance, and even their security against the caprices of their sovereign, could not long be preserved--that they were about to be subjected as well as governed--to be deprived of all power to resist the oppressions of their own government, because its will was enforced by an army which had no sympathy with the nation, and which was therefore ready to use its formidable strength to compel unqualified submission to the sovereign's commands.

The British army may not have been employed to enforce any unjust command--its movements may have been less, far less, injurious to the countries through which it passed than those of an Affghan army would have been, and its power in the moment of success may have been far less abused; but still it gave a strength to the arm of the sovereign, which was incompatible with the maintenance of the pre-existing civil and social institutions or condition of the country, and especially of the relative positions of the sovereign and the noble. In the measures we adopted to establish the authority of Shah Shoojah, we attempted to carry out a system of government which could only have been made successful by a total revolution in the social condition of the people, and in the relative positions of classes; and as these revolutions are not effected in a few years, the attempt failed.[17]

[17] The system, unpalatable as it was to the nation, might, no
doubt, have been carried through by an overwhelming military
force, if the country had been worth the cost; but if it was
not intended to retain permanent possession of Affghanistan, it
appears to us that the native government was far too much
interfered with--that the British envoy, the British officers
employed in the districts and provinces, and the British army,
stood too much between the Shah and his subjects--that we were
forming a government which it would be impossible to work in
our absence, and creating a state of things which, the longer
it might endure, would have made more remote the time at which
our interference could be dispensed with.

But if the predominance of our influence and of our military power, and the effects of the system we introduced, tended to depress the chiefs, it must have still more injuriously affected or threatened the power of the priesthood.

This we believe to have been one of the primary and most essential causes of the revolt--this it was that made the insurrection spread with such rapidity, and that finally united the whole nation against us. With the aristocracy and the hierarchy of the country, it must have been but a question of courage and of means--a calculation of the probability of success; and as that probability was greatly increased by the results of the first movement at Cabul, and by the inertness of our army after the first outbreak, all acquired courage enough to aid in doing what all had previously desired to see done.

But if there be any justice in this view of the state of feeling in Affghanistan, even in the moments of its greatest tranquillity, it is difficult to account for the confidence with which the political authorities charged with the management of our affairs in that country looked to the future, and the indifference with which they appear to have regarded what now must appear to every one else to have been very significant, and even alarming, intimations of dissaffection in Cabul, and hostility in the neighbouring districts.

But it is time we should return to Lieutenant Eyre, whose narrative of facts is infinitely more attractive than any speculations we could offer.

"At an early hour this morning, (2d November 1841,) the
startling intelligence was brought from the city, that a
popular outbreak had taken place; that the shops were all
closed; and that a general attack had been made on the houses
of all British officers residing in Cabul. About 8 A.M., a
hurried note was received by the Envoy in cantonments from Sir
Alexander Burnes, stating that the minds of the people had been
strongly excited by some mischievous reports, but expressing a
hope that he should succeed in quelling the commotion. About 9
A.M., however, a rumour was circulated, which afterwards proved
but too well founded, that Sir Alexander had been murdered, and
Captain Johnson's treasury plundered. Flames were now seen to
issue from that part of the city where they dwelt, and it was
too apparent that the endeavour to appease the people by quiet
means had failed, and that it would be necessary to have
recourse to stronger measures. The report of firearms was
incessant, and seemed to extend through the town from end to
end.

"Sir William Macnaghten now called upon General Elphinstone to
act. An order was accordingly sent to Brigadier Shelton, then
encamped at Seeah Sung, about a mile and a half distant from
cantonments, to march forthwith to the _Bala Hissar_, or _royal
citadel_, where his Majesty Shah Shoojah resided, commanding a
large portion of the city, with the following troops:--viz. one
company of H.M. 44th foot; a wing of the 54th regiment native
infantry, under Major Ewart; the 6th regiment Shah's infantry,
under Captain Hopkins; and four horse-artillery guns, under
Captain Nicholl; and on arrival there, to act according to his
own judgment, after consulting with the King.

"The remainder of the troops encamped at Seeah Sung were at the
same time ordered into cantonments: viz. H.M. 44th foot, under
Lieutenant-Colonel Mackerell; two horse-artillery guns, under
Lieutenant Waller; and Anderson's irregular horse. A messenger
was likewise dispatched to recall the 37th native infantry from
Khoord-Cabul without delay. The troops at this time in
cantonments were as follows: viz. 5th regiment native infantry,
under Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver; a wing of 54th native
infantry; five six-pounder field guns, with a detachment of the
Shah's artillery, under Lieutenant Warburton; the Envoy's
body-guard; a troop of Skinner's horse, and another of local
horse, under Lieutenant Walker; three companies of the Shah's
sappers, under Captain Walsh; and about twenty men of the
Company's sappers, attached to Captain Paton,
assistant-quartermaster-general.

"Widely spread and formidable as this insurrection proved to be
afterwards, it was at first a mere insignificant ebullition of
discontent on the part of a few desperate and restless men,
which military energy and promptitude ought to have crushed in
the bud. Its commencement was an attack by certainly not 300
men on the dwellings of Sir Alexander Burnes and Captain
Johnson, paymaster to the Shah's force; and so little did Sir
Alexander himself apprehend serious consequences, that he not
only refused, on its first breaking out, to comply with the
earnest entreaties of the wuzeer to accompany him to the Bala
Hissar, but actually forbade his guard to fire on the
assailants, attempting to check what he supposed to be a mere
riot, by haranguing the attacking party from the gallery of his
house. The result was fatal to himself; for in spite of the
devoted gallantry of the sepoys, who composed his guard, and
that of the paymaster's office and treasury on the opposite
side of the street, who yielded their trust only with their
latest breath, the latter were plundered, and his two
companions, Lieutenant William Broadfoot of the Bengal European
regiment, and his brother, Lieutenant Burnes of the Bombay
army, were massacred, in common with every man, woman, and
child found on the premises, by these bloodthirsty miscreants.
Lieutenant Broadfoot killed five or six men with his own hand,
before he was shot down.

"The King, who was in the Bala Hissar, being somewhat startled
by the increasing number of the rioters, although not at the
time aware, so far as we can judge, of the assassination of Sir
A. Burnes, dispatched one of his sons with a number of his
immediate Affghan retainers, and that corps of Hindoostanees
commonly called Campbell's regiment, with two guns, to restore
order: no support, however, was rendered to these by our
troops, whose leaders appeared so thunderstruck by the
intelligence of the outbreak, as to be incapable of adopting
more than the most puerile defensive measures. Even Sir William
Macnaghten seemed, from a note received at this time from him
by Captain Trevor, to apprehend little danger, as he therein
expressed his perfect confidence as to the speedy and complete
success of Campbell's Hindoostanees in putting an end to the
disturbance. Such, however, was not the case; for the enemy,
encouraged by our inaction, increased rapidly in spirit and
numbers, and drove back the King's guard with great slaughter,
the guns being with difficulty saved.

"It must be understood that Captain Trevor lived at this time
with his family in a strong _bourge_ or tower, situated by the
river side, near the Kuzzilbash quarter, which, on the west, is
wholly distinct from the remainder of the city. Within
musket-shot, on the opposite side of the river, in the
direction of the strong and populous village of Deh Affghan, is
a fort of some size, then used as a godown, or storehouse, by
the Shah's commissariat, part of it being occupied by Brigadier
Anquetil, commanding the Shah's force. Close to this fort,
divided by a narrow watercourse, was the house of Captain
Troup, brigade-major of the Shah's force, perfectly defensible
against musketry. Both Brigadier Anquetil and Captain Troup had
gone out on horseback early in the morning towards cantonments,
and were unable to return; but the above fort and house
contained the usual guard of sepoys; and in a garden close at
hand, called the _Yaboo-Khaneh_, or lines of the
baggage-cattle, was a small detachment of the Shah's sappers
and miners, and a party of Captain Ferris's juzailchees.
Captain Trevor's tower was capable of being made good against a
much stronger force than the rebels at this present time could
have collected, had it been properly garrisoned.

"As it was, the Hazirbash,[18] or King's lifeguards, were,
under Captain Trevor, congregated round their leader, to
protect him and his family; which duty, it will be seen, they
well performed under very trying circumstances. For what took
place in this quarter I beg to refer to a communication made to
me at my request by Captain Colin Mackenzie,[19] assistant
political agent at Peshawur, who then occupied the godown
portion of the fort above mentioned, which will be found
hereafter.[20]

"I have already stated that Brigadier Shelton was, early in the
day, directed to proceed with part of the Seeah Sung force to
occupy the Bala Hissar, and, if requisite, to lead his troops
against the insurgents. Captain Lawrence, military secretary to
the Envoy, was at the same time sent forward to prepare the
King for that officer's reception. Taking with him four
troopers of the body-guard, he was galloping along the main
road, when, shortly after crossing the river, he was suddenly
attacked by an Affghan, who, rushing from behind a wall, made a
desperate cut at him with a large two-handed knife. He
dexterously avoided the blow by spurring his horse on one side;
but, passing onwards, he was fired upon by about fifty men,
who, having seen his approach, ran out from the Lahore gate of
the city to intercept him. He reached the Bala Hissar safe,
where he found the King apparently in a state of great
agitation, he having witnessed the assault from the window of
his palace. His Majesty expressed an eager desire to conform to
the Envoy's wishes in all respects in this emergency.

"Captain Lawrence was still conferring with the King, when
Lieutenant Sturt, our executive engineer, rushed into the
palace, stabbed in three places about the face and neck. He had
been sent by Brigadier Shelton to make arrangements for the
accommodation of the troops, and had reached the gate of the
_Dewan Khaneh_, or hall of audience, when the attempt at his
life was made by some one who had concealed himself there for
that purpose, and who immediately effected his escape. The
wounds were fortunately not dangerous, and Lieutenant Sturt was
conveyed back to cantonments in the King's own palanquin, under
a strong escort. Soon after this Brigadier Shelton's force
arrived; but the day was suffered to pass without any thing
being done demonstrative of British energy and power. The
murder of our countrymen, and the spoliation of public and
private property, was perpetrated with impunity within a mile
of our cantonment, and under the very walls of the Bala Hissar.

"Such an exhibition on our part taught the enemy their
strength--confirmed against us those who, however disposed to
join in the rebellion, had hitherto kept aloof from prudential
motives, and ultimately encouraged the nation to unite as one
man for our destruction.

"It was, in fact, the crisis of all others calculated to test
the qualities of a military commander. Whilst, however, it is
impossible for an unprejudiced person to approve the military
dispositions of this eventful period, it is equally our duty to
discriminate. The most _responsible_ party is not always the
most culpable. It would be the height of injustice to a most
amiable and gallant officer not to notice the long course of
painful and wearing illness, which had materially affected the
nerves, and probably even the intellect, of General
Elphinstone; cruelly incapacitating him, so far as he was
personally concerned, from acting in this sudden emergency with
the promptitude and vigour necessary for our preservation.

"Unhappily, Sir William Macnaghten at first made light of the
insurrection, and, by his representations as to the general
feeling of the people towards us, not only deluded himself, but
misled the General in council. The unwelcome truth was soon
forced upon us, that in the whole Affghan nation we could not
reckon on a single friend.

"But though no active measures of aggression were taken, all
necessary preparations were made to secure the cantonment
against attack. It fell to my own lot to place every available
gun in position round the works. Besides the guns already
mentioned, we had in the magazine 6 nine-pounder iron guns, 3
twenty-four pounder howitzers, 1 twelve-pounder ditto, and 3
5-1/2-inch mortars; but the detail of artillerymen fell very
short of what was required to man all these efficiently,
consisting of only 80 Punjabees belonging to the Shah, under
Lieutenant Warburton, very insufficiently instructed, and of
doubtful fidelity."

[18] Affghan horse.

[19] The detachment under Captain Mackenzie consisted of about
seventy juzailchees or Affghan riflemen, and thirty sappers,
who had been left in the town in charge of the wives and
children of the corps, all of whom were brought safe into the
cantonments by that gallant party, who fought their way from
the heart of the town.

[20] "I am sorry to say that this document has not reached me
with the rest of the manuscript. I have not struck out the
reference, because there is hope that it still exists, and may
yet be appended to this narrative. The loss of any thing else
from Captain Mackenzie's pen will be regretted by all who read
his other communication, the account of the Envoy's
murder.--EDITOR."

The fortified cantonment occupied by the British troops was a quadrangle of 1000 yards long by 600 broad, with round flanking bastions at each corner, every one of which was commanded by some fort or hill. To one end of this work was attached the Mission compound and enclosure, about half as large as the cantonment, surrounded by a simple wall. This space required to be defended in time of war, and it rendered the whole of one face of the cantonment nugatory for purposes of defence. The profile of the works themselves was weak, being in fact an ordinary field-work. But the most strange and unaccountable circumstance recorded by Lieutenant Eyre respecting these military arrangements, is certainly the fact, that the commissariat stores, containing whatever the army possessed of food or clothing, was not within the circuit of these fortified cantonments, but in a detached and weak fort, the gate of which was commanded by another building at a short distance. Our author thus sums up his observations on these cantonments:--

"In fact, we were so hemmed in on all sides, that, when the
rebellion became general, the troops could not move out a dozen
paces from either gate without being exposed to the fire of
some neighbouring hostile fort, garrisoned, too, by marksmen
who seldom missed their aim. The country around us was likewise
full of impediments to the movements of artillery and cavalry,
being in many places flooded, and every where closely
intersected by deep water-cuts.

"I cannot help adding, in conclusion, that almost all the
calamities that befell our ill-starred force may be traced more
or less to the defects of our position; and that our cantonment
at Cabul, whether we look to its situation or its construction,
must ever be spoken of as a disgrace to our military skill and
judgment."

_Nov_. 3.--The 37th native infantry arrived in cantonments, as previously stated.

"Early in the afternoon, a detachment under Major Swayne,
consisting of two companies 5th native infantry, one of H.M.
44th, and two H.A. guns under Lieutenant Waller, proceeded out
of the western gate towards the city, to effect, if possible, a
junction at the Lahore gate with a part of Brigadier Shelton's
force from the Bala Hissar. They drove back and defeated a
party of the enemy who occupied the road near the Shah Bagh,
but had to encounter a sharp fire from the Kohistan gate of the
city, and from the walls of various enclosures, behind which a
number of marksmen had concealed themselves, as also from the
fort of Mahmood Khan, commanding the road along which they had
to pass. Lieutenant Waller and several sepoys were wounded.
Major Swayne, observing the whole line of road towards the
Lahore gate strongly occupied by some Affghan horse and
juzailchees, and fearing that he would be unable to effect the
object in view with so small a force unsupported by cavalry,
retired into cantonments. Shortly after this, a large body of
the rebels having issued from the fort of Mahmood Khan, 900
yards southeast of cantonments, extended themselves in a line
along the bank of the river, displaying a flag; an iron
nine-pounder was brought to bear on them from our southeast
bastion, and a round or two of shrapnell caused them to seek
shelter behind some neighbouring banks, whence, after some
desultory firing on both sides, they retired.

"Whatever hopes may have been entertained, up to this period,
of a speedy termination to the insurrection, they began now to
wax fainter every hour, and an order was dispatched to the
officer commanding at Candahar to lose no time in sending to
our assistance the 16th and 43d regiments native infantry,
(which were under orders for India,) together with a troop of
horse-artillery and half a regiment of cavalry; an order was
likewise sent off to recall General Sale with his brigade from
Gundamuk. Captain John Conolly, political assistant to the
Envoy, went into the Bala Hissar early this morning, to remain
with the King, and to render every assistance in his power to
Brigadier Shelton."

On this day Lieutenants Maule and Wheeler were murdered at Kahdarrah in Koohdaman; the Kohistan regiment of Affghans which they commanded, offering no resistance to the rebels. The two officers defended themselves resolutely for some time, but fell under the fire of the enemy. Lieutenant Maule had been warned of his danger by a friendly native, but refused to desert his post.

On this day also Lieutenant Rattray, Major Pottinger's assistant, was treacherously murdered at Lughmanee, during a conference to which he had been invited, and within sight of the small fort in which these two gentlemen resided. This act was followed by a general insurrection in Kohistan and Koohdaman, which terminated in the destruction of the Goorkha regiment at Charikar, and the slaughter of all the Europeans in that district except Major Pottinger and Lieutenant Haughton, both severely wounded, who, with one sepoy and one or two followers, succeeded in eluding the vigilance of the Affghan parties, who were patrolling the roads for the purpose of intercepting them, and at length arrived in cantonments, having actually passed at night through the town and bazars of Cabul. For the details of this interesting and afflicting episode in Mr Eyre's narrative, we must refer our readers to the work itself. Major Pottinger appears on this occasion to have exhibited the same high courage and promptitude and vigour in action, and the same resources in difficulty, that made him conspicuous at Herat, and Lieutenant Haughton was no unworthy companion of such a man.

"_November_ 4.--The enemy having taken strong possession of the
_Shah Bagh_, or King's Garden, and thrown a garrison into the
fort of Mahomed Shereef, nearly opposite the bazar, effectually
prevented any communication between the cantonment and
commissariat fort, the gate of which latter was commanded by
the gate of the Shah Bagh on the other side of the road.