Fotheringham John Knight
The Political History of England – Vol XI
The Persian court was already in diplomatic relations with the Indian government. Colonel Malcolm, afterwards Sir John Malcolm, had been sent by Wellesley as envoy to the sháh at the end of 1800, and in January, 1801, a treaty had been signed, establishing free trade between India and Persia, and binding the sháh to exclude the French from his dominions, while the company undertook to provide ships, troops, and stores, in case of French invasion. This treaty, however, neither was nor could have been actively carried out on either side. Early in 1806 the sháh, who had become embroiled with Russia, appealed to Calcutta for aid, regardless of the fact that hostilities with Russia were not a casus fœderis. Failing to obtain it, he appealed to France. Napoleon despatched General Gardane, who arrived in December, 1807. He obtained a treaty under which the sháh engaged to banish all Englishmen on demand of the French emperor. Thereupon Malcolm was entrusted by Minto with a fresh mission, but never reached the Persian capital, where French influence was still paramount, and the peremptory tone of Malcolm's letters was resented. Meanwhile, Sir Harford Jones had been sent out by the British foreign office, and was received at Tihran in February, 1809, the peace of Tilsit having destroyed the Persian hope of French support against Russia. For a while, the right of negotiating with the sháh was in dispute between the Indian government and the foreign office, and Sir John Malcolm reappeared at Tihran in the spring of 1810, as the representative of the former. In the end, however, he co-operated loyally with Jones, and a fresh treaty was signed, though both these rival emissaries were soon afterwards superseded by Sir Gore Ouseley as permanent ambassador.
ELPHINSTONE IN AFGHÁNISTÁN.
Two other envoys selected by Minto left names which are famous in Anglo-Indian history, and one achieved an important success. Charles Metcalfe, Minto's envoy to Lahore, succeeded with the advantage of an armed force within easy reach of the Sikh frontier, in converting into an ally the redoubtable Ranjít Singh (not to be confounded with Ranjít Singh of Bhartpur), who had gathered into his own hands the Sikh confederacy and acquired sovereignty over the whole Punjab. He was now induced not only to accept the Sutlej river as the boundary line of his dominion, but to conclude a treaty of perpetual amity with the British government. This treaty remained unbroken until his death, and stood us in good stead during the perilous crisis of the first Afghán war. The embassy of Mountstuart Elphinstone to Afghánistán was comparatively fruitless, chiefly owing to the unsettled state of that mysterious country. Sháh Shujá, its titular amír, so far from being in a condition to resist French invasion, had lost possession of Kábul and Kandahár, and was only anxious to obtain British aid against his elder brother Mahmúd. Elphinstone, of course, had no authority to entangle the Company in a civil war far beyond the Indian frontier and was obliged to content himself with a worthless treaty empowering Great Britain to defend Afghánistán against France. This treaty had scarcely been ratified when Sháh Shujá himself was driven into exile, to play an ignoble part thirty years later in the great tragedy of the first Afghán war.
However pacific Minto's policy was, he did not shut his eyes to the necessity of guarding the coasts and commerce of India against the enemy who still dominated Europe, and had not wholly abandoned his visions of eastern conquest. We have seen already that the "half way" naval station at the Cape of Good Hope had been retaken from the Dutch in 1806, the year in which the Berlin decree was issued. In 1810 the French were expelled from Java by an expedition despatched under Minto's orders, though it was soon to be restored to Holland. In the same year the islands of Mauritius and Bourbon were captured from the French and the sea route to India was finally secured. Lord Minto, who was recalled in 1813 and raised to the dignity of an earl, left India after six years of peaceful government in a state of tranquillity such as it had never before enjoyed, and the settlement of the country under British suzerainty appeared to have been assured. Yet the seeds of fresh trouble were already working, and his successor was to prove himself a second Wellesley, and add new territories of great extent to British India.
Lord Moira, better known by his later title as Marquis of Hastings, displayed qualities as governor-general of which his previous career had given no indication. He had already proved himself a good soldier, but he was a court favourite as well as a somewhat impracticable politician, and owed his appointment to other influences than his own merit. His arrival in India nearly coincided with the charter of 1813, which threw open the India trade, and virtually ushered in a new social era. He was at once confronted with an empty treasury, on the one hand, and, on the other, with alarming reports both from the northern frontier and from the central provinces, still under independent princes of doubtful fidelity. The earlier part of his nine years' residence in India was engrossed by most harassing operations against the Nepálís and the Pindárís, but these operations resulted in perfect success, and Hastings was able to show before he left India that he was eminent alike in civil and in military administration.
The mountainous region of Nepál, lying on the slopes of the Himálayas north of Bengal and Oudh, had been occupied by the warlike nation, still known as the Gúrkhas, whose capital was at Khátmándu. Like the Maráthás, they had been in the habit of pillaging British territory as well as Oudh, and when part of Oudh was annexed by Wellesley, frontier disputes were added to former grounds of hostility. Minto remonstrated with them sharply but in vain, and Moira lost no time in declaring war against them. The first campaign of 1814, which followed, though skilfully conceived by Moira, who held the office of commander-in-chief, was carried out with little generalship, and was marked by disasters highly damaging to British prestige. Three out of four armies launched against the hill-tribes met with serious reverses, chiefly due to a contempt for the enemy, and a persistence in making frontal assaults on strong positions without practicable breaches, which have proved so fatal in many a later conflict between British troops and undisciplined foes. During the cold season, however, on the extreme north-west, the cautious but irresistible advance of General Ochterlony penetrated the hill ranges which had baffled all the other commanders, and retrieved the fortunes of the war. The Gúrkhas were far, indeed, from being subdued, but Ochterlony's success among their strongest fastnesses, aided by that of Colonels Gardner and Nicholls in the district of Kumáun, induced them to sue for peace, and offer territorial cessions. The loss of the Tarái, or belt of forest interspersed with pastures at the foot of the Himálayas, was the most onerous of the conditions imposed upon them by the treaty of Almora, signed in 1815. Rather than submit to it, the Gúrkha chiefs refused to ratify the treaty, and resumed their arms. After two defeats, however, in February, 1816, they abandoned further resistance, and Moira afterwards wisely consented to a modification of the frontier-line. Retaining but a remnant of their dominions in the lowlands, the Gúrkhas have ever since preserved their independence with their military training in the highlands, and have contributed some of the best fighting material to the British army in India.
THE PINDÁRÍS.
While the war in Nepál was still undecided, fresh troubles broke out in Central India, where Wellesley's settlement had left no permanent security for peace. The very submission of the great Maráthá powers had set free large bands of irregular troops, with no livelihood but pillage, and ever ready, like the Italian condottieri of the later middle ages, to enlist in the service of any aggressive state. These mounted freebooters, now called the Pindárís, were secretly encouraged by the Maráthá chiefs, who looked upon them as useful auxiliaries in the future, either against the government of India or against other native princes. Several of these still remained in a more or less dependent but restless condition, and the great leaders of the Maráthá confederacy, Sindhia, Malhár Ráo Holkar, son and successor of Jaswant Ráo, the Peshwá, and the Rájá of Nágpur, retained a large share of their former sovereignty. Of these subject-allies, the one most directly under British guidance and protection was the Peshwá, but even he took advantage of hostile movements among his neighbours to join in a combination against British rule, supported by the predatory raids of the Pindárís. He had long been discontented with the subordinate position which he had occupied since the treaty of Bassein. The assassination in 1815 of an envoy of the Gáekwár of Baroda, who had been sent to Poona on a special mission under British guarantees, nearly provoked hostilities. But in June, 1817, a treaty was concluded, by which the Peshwá accepted an increased subsidiary force, ceded part of his territory, renounced his suzerainty over the Gáekwár and undertook to submit all further disputes to the decision of the British government. In November, however, chafing under the restrictions imposed by this treaty, he broke out into hostility, burnt the British residency, and after vainly attacking the British troops, fled from Poona. Almost simultaneously Holkar and the Rájá of Nágpur rose. Holkar was defeated in a pitched battle at Mehidpur in Málwá, while the sepoys successfully held their own against the Rájá's troops at Nágpur. The fugitive Peshwá was energetically pursued, and captured, and was stripped of his dominions. The greater part of these was annexed by the East India Company, but a portion was reserved for the heir of the old Maráthá kings who was established at Sátára. The Rájá of Nágpur was also compelled to cede a large portion of his dominions, and at the same time the Company acquired the overlordship of Rájputána. Henceforth, the British government claimed a control over all the foreign relations of native Indian states, whose internal government was to be carefully watched by a British resident, and whose military forces were to be practically under the supreme command of the paramount power.
THE END OF THE PINDÁRÍS.
Lord Moira, created Marquis of Hastings in 1816, was at last free to hunt down the Pindárís, with the sullen acquiescence of the Maráthá governments, and he executed his task with extraordinary vigour. He would have undertaken it, at the instigation of Metcalfe, then resident at Delhi, a year earlier, but for the peremptory orders of Canning, at that time president of the board of control, who positively forbade him to embark on a new war. These orders were greatly relaxed after the bloodthirsty raid of Chítu, the famous Pindárí leader, who in 1816 desolated vast tracts of Central India. Still no effective action against the Pindárís was possible until the Maráthá lords who harboured and encouraged them had been crippled and overawed. With their connivance, a second Pindárí raid, accompanied by shocking cruelties, was made in the same year, but in 1817, when Holkar's followers were severely defeated at Mehidpur, the secret coalition between these bandits and our nominal allies was thoroughly broken up. Even then it proved a most difficult enterprise to root out the Pindárís, who were not a race, or a tribe, or a sect, but bands of lawless men of all faiths; for they met and vanished like birds of the air, outstripping regular cavalry by the length and rapidity of their marches, and carrying off their booty almost under the eyes of their pursuers. But the resolute tactics of Hastings prevailed in the end. Amír Khán, their most powerful leader, disbanded his troops; and hemmed in on all sides, cut off from every place of shelter, and chased by successive detachments of horsemen almost as fleet as his own, Chítu became a hopeless fugitive, with a handful of faithful adherents, who shared his desperate efforts to escape, but advised him to surrender. He could not bring himself to do so, possessed, it is said, with an unspeakable horror of being transported across "the black sea," and he actually remained at large or in hiding for a year after his lair was discovered. Nor was he ever captured, for, by a strange fate, this ruthless scourge of the Deccan, after baffling human vengeance, found his last refuge in a jungle and died, a tiger's prey. By this time, all the wild bands which sprung into existence out of the Maráthá war had been extirpated or dispersed, and after the year 1818 the dreaded name of Pindárí was heard no more in history.
The suppression of civil war and anarchy in Central India, which completed the work of Wellesley, was the greatest achievement of Hastings. One remarkable incident of it was a portentous outbreak of cholera in 1817, during a campaign in Gwalior conducted by Hastings in person. There had been several minor visitations of this disease in India. But it now first established itself as an endemic disease, and it has ever since infested the valley of the Ganges. So virulent was its onslaught, and so fearful the mortality in Hastings' army, that it was only saved by shifting its quarters, and the governor-general himself made preparations for his own secret burial, in case he should be among the victims. As we have seen already,140 it was propagated from this centre through other regions of Asia, until it spread to Western Europe, and the "Asiatic cholera" of 1831-32 may be lineally traced back to the last Maráthá war.
The position of Hastings in Indian history closely resembles that of Wellesley. Disregarding the instructions of the board of control, as well as of the board of directors, he forced upon them, like Wellesley, a large extension of their empire. But it cannot be doubted that his policy, dictated by exigencies beyond the ken of authorities sitting in London, was eminently successful and beneficent in its results. It went far to establish a "Pax Britannica" in the Indian Peninsula, and, if it took little account of dynastic rights, it broke the rod of oppression, and relieved millions upon millions from tyranny and intimidation which overshadowed their whole lives. He retired in 1823, after seven years' tenure of office, and died in 1826 as governor of Malta. Canning had been designated as his successor, and, having accepted the post, was on the eve of starting for Calcutta, when the tragical death of Castlereagh recalled him to the foreign office, and opened to him the most brilliant stage in his career. Thereupon Lord Amherst was appointed governor-general, with every prospect of a pacific vice-royalty, whereas it is now chiefly remembered for the annexation of new provinces on the south-east of Bengal, and the capture of Bhartpur.
THE FIRST BURMESE WAR.
The first Burmese war arose out of persistent aggressions by the new kingdom of Ava or Burma on what is now the British province of Assam, but was then an independent, though feeble, state. There had been earlier frontier disputes between the Indian government and Burma about the districts lying eastward of Chittagong along the Bay of Bengal, but it was not until Burma conquered Arakan, invaded Assam, and occupied passes on the north-east overlooking the plains of Bengal, that serious action was felt to be necessary. Indeed, while Hastings was engaged with the war in Nepál and the suppression of the Pindárís, even he was in no mood to embark on a fresh campaign beyond the borders of India. The incursions of the Burmese, however, became more and more threatening both on the coast line and on the mountains above the Brahmaputra river, and in February, 1824, Amherst resolved to check the extension of their dominion. Notwithstanding the experience recently gained in Nepál, the first operations of the Anglo-Indian troops were conducted with little knowledge of the country, and met with very doubtful success. Rangoon was easily captured, but the expedition was disabled from advancing up the river Irawadi by the want of adequate supplies and the deadliness of the climate. Part of the Tenasserim coast was subdued, but a British force was defeated in Arakan. These reverses were retrieved in the following year, 1825, when one army under Sir Archibald Campbell made its way up the river to Prome, while another army conquered Arakan, and a third, moving along the valley of the Brahmaputra, established itself in Assam. The Burmese now abandoned further resistance. Assam, Arakan, and the Tenasserim provinces were ceded to the company, whose protectorate was also recognised over other territories upon the course of the Brahmaputra. It was not until February, 1826, that the King of Ava could be induced to sign the treaty embodying these cessions, and many years were to elapse before the port of Rangoon was opened to British commerce.
The strong fortress of Bhartpur, in the east of Rájputána, and near to Agra, had acquired an unique importance, in the eyes of all India by its successful resistance to Lake's assaults during the Maráthá war of 1805. It was still held until 1825 by its own petty rájá, the son of Ranjít Singh, who remained on terms of respectful amity with the Indian government, though his little principality was a notorious focus of native disaffection. In that year he died, and his child, after being acknowledged by the Indian government as his successor, was forcibly ousted by a usurper. Sir David Ochterlony, the hero of the Nepálese war, then resident in Málwá and Rájputána, undertook to support the legitimate heir, but was overruled by orders from Amherst. On his resignation he was succeeded by Metcalfe, who had become Sir Charles Metcalfe by his brother's death in 1822, and who now obtained authority to carry out Ochterlony's policy, if necessary, by armed intervention. As negotiation failed, Lord Combermere, as commander-in-chief, proceeded to reduce the virgin fortress, not by the slow process of siege, but by a well-organised assault. Having cut off the water supply, and mined the mud walls, he poured in a storming party and overpowered the garrison. The feat was probably not so great, from a military point of view, as many that have left no record, but its effect on the superstitious native mind was prodigious, especially as it nearly coincided with the victorious issue of the Burmese war. Nevertheless, Amherst was shortly afterwards recalled, and left India in 1828. His annexation of Burmese territory and the increase of expenditure under his rule displeased both the Company and the home government, so often foiled in the attempt to enforce a pacific and economical policy. His successor was Lord William Bentinck, who had been compelled to retire from the governorship of Madras after the mutiny of Vellore.
Like Hastings, Bentinck showed a firmness and wisdom in his Indian administration strongly contrasting with the restless self-assertion of his earlier career. His lot was cast in an interval of tranquillity after a long period of warfare, and his name is associated with internal reforms and social progress in India, not unconnected with a like movement in England. The measure upon which his fame chiefly rests was the abolition of "satí," that is, the practice of Hindoo widows sacrificing themselves by being burned alive on the funeral pile of their husbands. This practice, which specially prevailed in Bengal, has been explained by a false interpretation of certain texts in sacred books of the Hindus, by the selfish eagerness of the husband's family to monopolise all his property, and by the utterly desolate condition of a childless widow in native communities. At all events, it was deeply rooted in Hindu traditions, and no previous governor had dared to go beyond issuing regulations to secure that the widow should be a willing victim. Bentinck had the courage to act on the conviction that inhumanity, however consecrated by superstition and priestcraft, has no permanent basis in popular sentiment. With the consent of his council, he prohibited "satí" absolutely, declaring that all who took any part in it should be held guilty of culpable homicide; and the native population acquiesced in its suppression.
But this was only one of Bentinck's reforms. Armed with peremptory instructions from the home government, he effected large retrenchments in the growing expenditure of the Indian services, both civil and military, and a considerable increase in the Indian revenue. It may be doubted whether one of these retrenchments, involving a strict revision of officers' allowances known as "batta," was considerable enough to be worth the almost mutinous discontent which it provoked. Another, affecting the salaries of civilians, was aggravated, in their eyes, by the admission of natives to "primary jurisdiction," in other words, by enabling native judges to sit in courts of first instance. This important change had been gradually introduced before the arrival of Bentinck, but it was he who most boldly adopted the idea of governing India in the interest and by the agency of the natives. On the other hand, it was he who, supported by Macaulay's famous minute, but contrary to official opinion in Leadenhall Street, issued the ordinance constituting English the official language of India. In a like spirit, he promoted the work of native education, partly for the purpose of developing the political and judicial capacity of the higher orders among the Hindus, but partly also for the purpose of making the English language and literature the instrument of their elevation. He earnestly desired to raise the standard of Indian civilisation, but he equally desired to fashion it in an English mould.
THE EXTIRPATION OF "THAGÍ".
Under the rule of Bentinck, the revenue was largely augmented by a reassessment of land in the north-western provinces, where an increasing number of zamíndárs had fraudulently evaded the payment of rent, and by the imposition of licence-duties on the growers of opium in Málwá, who had carried on a profitable but illicit trade through foreign ports. But the social benefit of the people was ever his first concern, and not the least of his claims to their gratitude was the final extirpation of "thagí". This institution was a secret association of highway robbers and murderers who had plagued Central India almost as widely as the roving troops of Pindárís. Their victims were travellers whom they decoyed into their haunts, plundered, strangled, and buried on the spot. For years they carried on their infamous trade with impunity, and no member of the conspiracy had turned informer. At last, however, a clue was found by a skilful and resolute agent of the government, and the spell of mutual dread which held together the murderous confederacy was effectually broken in India. Meanwhile, the same period of peaceful development witnessed the execution of important public works, the relaxation of restrictions on the liberty of the press, and a general advance towards a more paternal despotism, coincident with the progress of liberal ideas at home. These benign influences were favoured by the continuance of peace and the maintenance of non-intervention, disturbed only by the minor annexations of Cachar and Coorg, to which may be added the assumption of direct control over Mysore.
When the charter of 1833 transformed the "company of British merchants trading to the east" into the "East India Company," with administrative powers only, Bentinck was in failing health, and he soon afterwards returned home. On his resignation in 1835, Metcalfe became provisional governor-general, but his liberal policy displeased the court of directors, and Lord Heytesbury was selected by the short-lived government of Peel as Bentinck's successor. Palmerston, however, on resuming the foreign office, was believed to have used his influence to set aside this nomination, and to procure the appointment of Lord Auckland, then first lord of the admiralty. The supposed objection to Heytesbury was his known sympathy with Russia, at a moment when distrust of Russia's designs on the north-west frontier was about to become the keynote of Anglo-Indian statesmanship. During the interregnum between Bentinck's retirement and Auckland's accession, three more remedial measures were carried into effect, the wisdom of which is not even yet beyond dispute. These were the complete liberation of the Indian press, the abolition of the exclusive privilege whereby British residents could appeal in civil suits to the supreme court at Calcutta, and the definite introduction of English text-books into schools for the people. For all these reforms Macaulay was largely responsible, but the impulse had been given by Bentinck, and was accelerated by Metcalfe.
During the years 1835-37 domestic affairs occupied much less space in the counsels of Indian statesmen than schemes for counteracting the growth of Russian influence at Tihran, and securing the predominance of British influence in Afghánistán. For a time their anxiety was concentrated on Herat, which the Sháh of Persia was besieging, with the intention of penetrating into the heart of Afghán territory, while the Afghán rulers themselves were suspected of secretly conspiring with Persia against our ally, Ranjít Singh. Since Persia, having again lost faith in British support, was drifting more and more into reliance on Russia, this forward movement was regarded as the first step of the Russian advance-guard towards India. The fate of India was felt to depend on the defence of Herat under Pottinger, a young British officer, who volunteered his services without instructions from home. The siege, conducted under Russian officers, lasted ten months, and its ultimate failure was hailed as a triumph of British policy, for Herat was recognised, since the days of Alexander the Great, as the western gate of India.
COMMUNICATION WITH INDIA.
About the same time the question of a shorter route to India attracted much attention both in Russia and in England. The first project was that, ultimately adopted, of a sea passage by Malta to Alexandria, a land transit across Egypt to Suez, and a second voyage by the Red Sea to Indian ports. The alternative line was more properly described as an "overland route," since it was proposed to make the journey from some port in the eastern Levant across Syria and by the Euphrates to the Persian Gulf. Colonel Chesney was sent out in 1835 as the pioneer of an expedition by this route, and parliament twice voted money for its development, but it was vigorously opposed by Russia, and abandoned as impracticable owing to physical difficulties in navigating the Euphrates, then considered as a necessary channel of communication with the sea. The scheme has since been revived on a much grander scale in the form of a projected railway traversing Asia Minor to Baghdad, and running down the valley of the Tigris. In the meantime, the Red Sea route, at first discredited, has far more than justified the hopes of its promoters. With the aid of steam-vessels, since 1845, and of the Suez Canal, since 1869, it has reduced the journey to India from a period of four months to one of three weeks, and profoundly affected its relations with Great Britain.
It would be well if the premature, but not unfounded, fear of Russian invasion had produced no further effects on Anglo-Indian policy. Unhappily, those who justly perceived the importance of Afghánistán, as lying between Persia and the Punjab, were possessed with the delusion that it would prove a more solid buffer as a British dependency than as an independent state. In their ignorance of its internal condition and the sentiments of its unruly tribes, the Indian government despatched Sir Alexander Burnes to Kábul, nominally as a commercial emissary, but not without ulterior objects. They could not have chosen a more capable agent, for he added to a knowledge of several languages a minute geographical acquaintance with Central Asia and an insight into the character of its inhabitants which probably no other Englishman possessed. He was to proceed by way of Sind to Pesháwar, and in passing through Sind he received news of the siege of Herat, the significance of which he was not slow to appreciate. Thenceforward his mission inevitably assumed a political complexion, since the future of Afghánistán became a practical question. His rash negotiations with Dost Muhammad, the Amír of Kábul, and his brother at Kandahár, his return to India, his second mission to Afghánistán in support of a policy which he had deprecated, and his tragical death in the Kábul insurrection, – these are events which belong to a later chapter of history. But, though Burnes cannot be held responsible for the first Afghán war, there can be no doubt that his travels in disguise through Central Asia, and confidential reports on the border countries between the Russian and British spheres of influence, were the immediate prelude to a campaign the most ill-advised and the most disastrous ever organised by the Indian government and sanctioned by that of Great Britain.