Chapter VIII: Willy's Tale

THE ROBBER TRIBE.

"ABOUT thirty years ago, in the mountains of Candeish dwelt a terrible race of robbers, called Bheels. They lived by plunder, thought nothing of murder, and by their cruelty, their wickedness, and their numbers they were the terror of the whole country round. Sometimes when every one had quietly gone to rest in a poor Indian village, there would be a cry of 'The Bheels! The Bheels!' and soon by the light of their blazing huts, wives would see their husbands killed at their doors, and their children running shrieking from the murderers!"

"The Governor of Bombay, * whose care it was to see that all that country was kept quiet and in order, always looked grave and stern when he thought of the Bheels, and determined to punish and subdue them."

"So he sent his brave troops into the mountains of Candeish, to hunt out the robber tribes. Sometimes they killed a few Bheels, but the rest kept out of their way, for it was as hard to catch them as monkeys. Then the place was so hot, and so very unhealthy, that the soldiers began to droop. One man fell ill and another fell ill, till ever so many fell sick, and the doctors were worked from morning till night, and grave after grave was dug for the dead; and the pale, sickly officers reviewing their troops thought, 'We never shall subdue the Bheels!'"

* Bombay is one of the great divisions of India, and is ruled by a
Governor sent out from England.

"Then the Governor of Bombay was more angry than ever, and it seemed to his mind that there was no better way than to kill every one of this murderous tribe!"

"Another governor * succeeded him, mild and gentle, who loved better to save than to destroy. He thought of a plan to subdue the Bheels; but whom could he find to carry it out?"

* Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone.

"The Bheels hated the soldiers, and hated the English, and hated the Governor of Bombay. They looked at their own wild hills, and they shook their own sharp swords, and resolved that they never would yield!"

"There was one young officer among the English, named James Outram, distinguished for his dauntless courage. He had fought the Bheels and gained successes over them; and if they had taken him in fight, oh! How they would have exulted to have cut him in pieces, or to have hurled him down one of their precipices!"

"How astonished were they when, one sultry day, they saw Outram himself mounting a hill, and fearlessly coming towards them! Do you think that he came at the head of his men, on a fiery steed, with a gun in his hand, and pistols at his saddle-bow? No, he came alone, not a soldier near him, alone in the midst of his bloody foes. He placed himself in the hands of the Bheels, the fierce robbers whom our troops were hunting down, with no defence but his own calm spirit, and God's Providence watching over him!"

"Even savage hearts are touched by a proof of generous and undeserved confidence. Outram lived among the Bheels, and they harmed him not; they began by admiring, they ended in loving him. He hunted with them, and they wondered to see a courage yet more daring than their own. He cared for their wounds, he told them tales, he won the hearts of the robber tribe. Then he asked them if they would enlist as troops, and earn their bread in an honest way. Under such a leader they gladly enlisted, they became as faithful as they were brave—they defended the country they had loved to attack, and shed their blood freely in the cause of order and peace!"

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"What a fine fellow that Outram must have been!" exclaimed Louis. "I wonder if he is living still?"

"Oh yes! He is living—and long may he live! I used often to see him when he was in England."

"Did he tell you of his adventures with the Bheels?" asked little Julia.

"Oh no! I never could get him to speak of his adventures, though I longed to hear about them, especially of one famous hunting story, of his rolling upon the ground with a panther."

"Is it not he who is called the modern Bayard," said Percy, "the Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche?"

"What does that mean?" whispered Julia.

"Without fear and without reproach," replied Percy.

"Without fear for his enemies, or reproach for the way in which he treats them!" said the little girl, glancing archly at Louis.

"I am thinking," observed Willy, "that your way with the Jacobins was not much like Colonel Outram's way with the Bheels. There may be a better mode of subduing our enemies than riding them down or cutting them to pieces."

Louis coloured and looked at Mr. Presgrave, who smiled. "How much better to win one foe by kindness, than to slay ten thousand with the sword! How different would the feelings of Outram have been, had he stood as a conqueror on the hills of Candeish, with his victorious sword red with blood, and his enemies dead and dying around him, to what they must have been when he glanced along their ranks, and thought from what he had raised them by his courage and his mercy!"

"And I have heard mamma say that he narrowly escaped a death by poison," said Tom.

"How was that? How was that?" cried the rest.

"An injured, helpless widow had been falsely accused and thrown into prison, that her cruel enemy might take possession of the property that was her right. There was but one thing in the way of the bad man's success—the justice and generous spirit of a Briton, and that Briton was Colonel Outram! The widow's oppressor hated the man who stood between him and his prey; twice was the life of her protector attempted, but—"

"God watched over the safety of the brave and just man," said Mrs. Gore.

"Well, I do not wish to be a conqueror," observed little Willy, "but I should like to feel, when I left the earth, that some one was the happier for my having been in it!"