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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1935 ***
+THE TREMENDOUS ADVENTURES OF
+MAJOR GAHAGAN
+
+Etc. Etc.
+
+
+by William Makepeace Thackeray
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+ CHAPTER I: “TRUTH IS STRANGE, STRANGER THAN FICTION”
+ CHAPTER II: ALLYGHUR AND LASWAREE
+ CHAPTER III: A PEEP INTO SPAIN—ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND SERVICES OF THE AHMEDNUGGAR IRREGULARS
+ CHAPTER IV: THE INDIAN CAMP—THE SORTIE FROM THE FORT
+ CHAPTER V: THE ISSUE OF MY INTERVIEW WITH MY WIFE
+ CHAPTER VI: FAMINE IN THE GARRISON
+ CHAPTER VII: THE ESCAPE
+ CHAPTER VIII: THE CAPTIVE
+ CHAPTER IX: SURPRISE OF FUTTYGHUR
+ Footnotes:
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+“Truth is strange, Stranger than fiction.”
+
+
+I think it but right that in making my appearance before the public I
+should at once acquaint them with my titles and name. My card, as I
+leave it at the houses of the nobility, my friends, is as follows:—
+
+MAJOR GOLIAH O’GRADY GAHAGAN, H.E.I.C.S.,
+          _Commanding Battalion of
+                    Irregular Horse_,
+                              AHMEDNUGGAR.
+
+Seeing, I say, this simple visiting ticket, the world will avoid any of
+those awkward mistakes as to my person, which have been so frequent of
+late. There has been no end to the blunders regarding this humble title
+of mine, and the confusion thereby created. When I published my volume
+of poems, for instance, the _Morning Post_ newspaper remarked “that the
+Lyrics of the Heart, by Miss Gahagan, may be ranked among the sweetest
+flowrets of the present spring season.” The _Quarterly Review_,
+commenting upon my “Observations on the Pons Asinorum” (4to, London,
+1836), called me “Doctor Gahagan,” and so on. It was time to put an end
+to these mistakes, and I have taken the above simple remedy.
+
+I was urged to it by a very exalted personage. Dining in August last at
+the palace of the T-l-r-es at Paris, the lovely young Duch-ss of Orl-ns
+(who, though she does not speak English, understands it as well as I
+do), said to me in the softest Teutonic, “Lieber Herr Major, haben sie
+den Ahmednuggarischen-jager-battalion gelassen?” “Warum denn?” said I,
+quite astonished at her R—l H—ss’s question. The P-cess then spoke of
+some trifle from my pen, which was simply signed Goliah Gahagan.
+
+There was, unluckily, a dead silence as H.R.H. put this question.
+
+“Comment donc?” said H.M. Lo-is Ph-l-ppe, looking gravely at Count
+Molé; “le cher Major a quitté l’armée! Nicolas donc sera maître de
+l’Inde!” H. M- and the Pr. M-n-ster pursued their conversation in a low
+tone, and left me, as may be imagined, in a dreadful state of
+confusion. I blushed and stuttered, and murmured out a few incoherent
+words to explain—but it would not do—I could not recover my equanimity
+during the course of the dinner; and while endeavouring to help an
+English duke, my neighbour, to _poulet à l’Austerlitz_, fairly sent
+seven mushrooms and three large greasy _croûtes_ over his whiskers and
+shirt-frill. Another laugh at my expense. “Ah! M. le Major,” said the
+Q— of the B-lg—ns, archly, “vous n’aurez jamais votre brevet de
+Colonel.” Her M-y’s joke will be better understood when I state that
+his Grace is the brother of a Minister.
+
+I am not at liberty to violate the sanctity of private life, by
+mentioning the names of the parties concerned in this little anecdote.
+I only wish to have it understood that I am a gentleman, and live at
+least in _decent_ society. _Verbum sat_.
+
+But to be serious. I am obliged always to write the name of Goliah in
+full, to distinguish me from my brother, Gregory Gahagan, who was also
+a Major (in the King’s service), and whom I killed in a duel, as the
+public most likely knows. Poor Greg! a very trivial dispute was the
+cause of our quarrel, which never would have originated but for the
+similarity of our names. The circumstance was this: I had been lucky
+enough to render the Nawaub of Lucknow some trifling service (in the
+notorious affair of Choprasjee Muckjee), and his Highness sent down a
+gold toothpick-case directed to Captain G. Gahagan, which I of course
+thought was for me: my brother madly claimed it; we fought, and the
+consequence was, that in about three minutes he received a slash in the
+right side (cut 6), which effectually did his business:- he was a good
+swordsman enough—I was THE BEST in the universe. The most ridiculous
+part of the affair is, that the toothpick-case was his, after all—he
+had left it on the Nawaub’s table at tiffin. I can’t conceive what
+madness prompted him to fight about such a paltry bauble; he had much
+better have yielded it at once, when he saw I was determined to have
+it. From this slight specimen of my adventures, the reader will
+perceive that my life has been one of no ordinary interest; and, in
+fact, I may say that I have led a more remarkable life than any man in
+the service—I have been at more pitched battles, led more forlorn
+hopes, had more success among the fair sex, drunk harder, read more,
+been a handsomer man than any officer now serving Her Majesty.
+
+When I first went to India in 1802, I was a raw cornet of seventeen,
+with blazing red hair, six feet four in height, athletic at all kinds
+of exercises, owing money to my tailor and everybody else who would
+trust me, possessing an Irish brogue, and my full pay of £120 a year. I
+need not say that with all these advantages I did that which a number
+of clever fellows have done before me—I fell in love, and proposed to
+marry immediately.
+
+But how to overcome the difficulty?—It is true that I loved Julia
+Jowler—loved her to madness; but her father intended her for a Member
+of Council at least, and not for a beggarly Irish ensign. It was,
+however, my fate to make the passage to India (on board of the “Samuel
+Snob” East Indiaman, Captain Duffy) with this lovely creature, and my
+misfortune instantaneously to fall in love with her. We were not out of
+the Channel before I adored her, worshipped the deck which she trod
+upon, kissed a thousand times the cuddy-chair on which she used to sit.
+The same madness fell on every man in the ship. The two mates fought
+about her at the Cape; the surgeon, a sober pious Scotchman, from
+disappointed affection, took so dreadfully to drinking as to threaten
+spontaneous combustion; and old Colonel Lilywhite, carrying his wife
+and seven daughters to Bengal, swore that he would have a divorce from
+Mrs. L., and made an attempt at suicide; the captain himself told me,
+with tears in his eyes, that he hated his hitherto-adored Mrs. Duffy,
+although he had had nineteen children by her.
+
+We used to call her the witch—there was magic in her beauty and in her
+voice. I was spell-bound when I looked at her, and stark staring mad
+when she looked at me! O lustrous black eyes!—O glossy night-black
+ringlets!—O lips!—O dainty frocks of white muslin!—O tiny kid
+slippers!—though old and gouty, Gahagan sees you still! I recollect,
+off Ascension, she looked at me in her particular way one day at
+dinner, just as I happened to be blowing on a piece of scalding hot
+green fat. I was stupefied at once—I thrust the entire morsel (about
+half a pound) into my mouth. I made no attempt to swallow, or to
+masticate it, but left it there for many minutes, burning, burning! I
+had no skin to my palate for seven weeks after, and lived on rice-water
+during the rest of the voyage. The anecdote is trivial, but it shows
+the power of Julia Jowler over me.
+
+The writers of marine novels have so exhausted the subject of storms,
+shipwrecks, mutinies, engagements, sea-sickness, and so forth, that
+(although I have experienced each of these in many varieties) I think
+it quite unnecessary to recount such trifling adventures; suffice it to
+say, that during our five months’ _trajet_, my mad passion for Julia
+daily increased; so did the captain’s and the surgeon’s; so did Colonel
+Lilywhite’s; so did the doctor’s, the mate’s—that of most part of the
+passengers, and a considerable number of the crew. For myself, I
+swore—ensign as I was—I would win her for my wife; I vowed that I would
+make her glorious with my sword—that as soon as I had made a favourable
+impression on my commanding officer (which I did not doubt to create),
+I would lay open to him the state of my affections, and demand his
+daughter’s hand. With such sentimental outpourings did our voyage
+continue and conclude.
+
+We landed at the Sunderbunds on a grilling hot day in December 1802,
+and then for the moment Julia and I separated. She was carried off to
+her papa’s arms in a palankeen, surrounded by at least forty
+hookahbadars; whilst the poor cornet, attended but by two dandies and a
+solitary beasty (by which unnatural name these blackamoors are called),
+made his way humbly to join the regiment at headquarters.
+
+The —th Regiment of Bengal Cavalry, then under the command of
+Lieut.-Colonel Julius Jowler, C.B., was known throughout Asia and
+Europe by the proud title of the Bundelcund Invincibles—so great was
+its character for bravery, so remarkable were its services in that
+delightful district of India. Major Sir George Gutch was next in
+command, and Tom Thrupp, as kind a fellow as ever ran a Mahratta
+through the body, was second Major. We were on the eve of that
+remarkable war which was speedily to spread throughout the whole of
+India, to call forth the valour of a Wellesley, and the indomitable
+gallantry of a Gahagan; which was illustrated by our victories at
+Ahmednuggar (where I was the first over the barricade at the storming
+of the Pettah); at Argaum, where I slew with my own sword twenty-three
+matchlock-men, and cut a dromedary in two; and by that terrible day of
+Assaye, where Wellesley would have been beaten but for me—me alone: I
+headed nineteen charges of cavalry, took (aided by only four men of my
+own troop) seventeen field-pieces, killing the scoundrelly French
+artillerymen; on that day I had eleven elephants shot under me, and
+carried away Scindiah’s nose- ring with a pistol-ball. Wellesley is a
+Duke and a Marshal, I but a simple Major of Irregulars. Such is fortune
+and war! But my feelings carry me away from my narrative, which had
+better proceed with more order.
+
+On arriving, I say, at our barracks at Dum Dum, I for the first time
+put on the beautiful uniform of the Invincibles: a light blue
+swallow-tailed jacket with silver lace and wings, ornamented with about
+3,000 sugar-loaf buttons, rhubarb-coloured leather inexpressibles
+(tights), and red morocco boots with silver spurs and tassels, set off
+to admiration the handsome persons of the officers of our corps. We
+wore powder in those days; and a regulation pigtail of seventeen
+inches, a brass helmet surrounded by leopard skin, with a bearskin top
+and a horsetail feather, gave the head a fierce and chivalrous
+appearance, which is far more easily imagined than described.
+
+Attired in this magnificent costume, I first presented myself before
+Colonel Jowler. He was habited in a manner precisely similar, but not
+being more than five feet in height, and weighing at least fifteen
+stone, the dress he wore did not become him quite so much as slimmer
+and taller men. Flanked by his tall Majors, Thrupp and Gutch, he looked
+like a stumpy skittle-ball between two attenuated skittles. The plump
+little Colonel received me with vast cordiality, and I speedily became
+a prime favourite with himself and the other officers of the corps.
+Jowler was the most hospitable of men; and gratifying my appetite and
+my love together, I continually partook of his dinners, and feasted on
+the sweet presence of Julia.
+
+I can see now, what I would not and could not perceive in those early
+days, that this Miss Jowler—on whom I had lavished my first and warmest
+love, whom I had endowed with all perfection and purity—was no better
+than a little impudent flirt, who played with my feelings, because
+during the monotony of a sea voyage she had no other toy to play with;
+and who deserted others for me, and me for others, just as her whim or
+her interest might guide her. She had not been three weeks at
+headquarters when half the regiment was in love with her. Each and all
+of the candidates had some favour to boast of, or some encouraging
+hopes on which to build. It was the scene of the “Samuel Snob” over
+again, only heightened in interest by a number of duels. The following
+list will give the reader a notion of some of them:—
+
+1. Cornet Gahagan . . . Ensign Hicks, of the Sappers and Miners. Hicks
+received a ball in his jaw, and was half choked by a quantity of
+carroty whisker forced down his throat with the ball.
+
+2. Captain Macgillicuddy, B.N.I. Cornet Gahagan. I was run through the
+body, but the sword passed between the ribs, and injured me very
+slightly.
+
+3. Captain Macgillicuddy, B.N.I. Mr. Mulligatawny, B.C.S., Deputy-
+Assistant Vice Sub-Controller of the Boggleywollah Indigo grounds,
+Ramgolly branch.
+
+Macgillicuddy should have stuck to sword’s play, and he might have come
+off in his second duel as well as in his first; as it was, the civilian
+placed a ball and a part of Mac’s gold repeater in his stomach. A
+remarkable circumstance attended this shot, an account of which I sent
+home to the “Philosophical Transactions:” the surgeon had extracted the
+ball, and was going off, thinking that all was well, when the gold
+repeater struck thirteen in poor Macgillicuddy’s abdomen. I suppose
+that the works must have been disarranged in some way by the bullet,
+for the repeater was one of Barraud’s, never known to fail before, and
+the circumstance occurred at _seven_ o’clock.[1]
+
+I could continue, almost _ad infinitum_, an account of the wars which
+this Helen occasioned, but the above three specimens will, I should
+think, satisfy the peaceful reader. I delight not in scenes of blood,
+Heaven knows, but I was compelled in the course of a few weeks, and for
+the sake of this one woman, to fight nine duels myself, and I know that
+four times as many more took place concerning her.
+
+I forgot to say that Jowler’s wife was a half-caste woman, who had been
+born and bred entirely in India, and whom the Colonel had married from
+the house of her mother, a native. There were some singular rumours
+abroad regarding this latter lady’s history: it was reported that she
+was the daughter of a native Rajah, and had been carried off by a poor
+English subaltern in Lord Clive’s time. The young man was killed very
+soon after, and left his child with its mother. The black Prince
+forgave his daughter and bequeathed to her a handsome sum of money. I
+suppose that it was on this account that Jowler married Mrs. J., a
+creature who had not, I do believe, a Christian name, or a single
+Christian quality: she was a hideous, bloated, yellow creature, with a
+beard, black teeth, and red eyes: she was fat, lying, ugly, and
+stingy—she hated and was hated by all the world, and by her jolly
+husband as devoutly as by any other. She did not pass a month in the
+year with him, but spent most of her time with her native friends. I
+wonder how she could have given birth to so lovely a creature as her
+daughter. This woman was of course with the Colonel when Julia arrived,
+and the spice of the devil in her daughter’s composition was most
+carefully nourished and fed by her. If Julia had been a flirt before,
+she was a downright jilt now; she set the whole cantonment by the ears;
+she made wives jealous and husbands miserable; she caused all those
+duels of which I have discoursed already, and yet such was the
+fascination of THE WITCH that I still thought her an angel. I made
+court to the nasty mother in order to be near the daughter; and I
+listened untiringly to Jowler’s interminable dull stories, because I
+was occupied all the time in watching the graceful movements of Miss
+Julia.
+
+But the trumpet of war was soon ringing in our ears; and on the
+battle-field Gahagan is a man! The Bundelcund Invincibles received
+orders to march, and Jowler, Hector-like, donned his helmet and
+prepared to part from his Andromache. And now arose his perplexity:
+what must be done with his daughter, his Julia? He knew his wife’s
+peculiarities of living, and did not much care to trust his daughter to
+her keeping; but in vain he tried to find her an asylum among the
+respectable ladies of his regiment. Lady Gutch offered to receive her,
+but would have nothing to do with Mrs. Jowler; the surgeon’s wife, Mrs.
+Sawbone, would have neither mother nor daughter: there was no help for
+it, Julia and her mother must have a house together, and Jowler knew
+that his wife would fill it with her odious blackamoor friends.
+
+I could not, however, go forth satisfied to the campaign until I
+learned from Julia my fate. I watched twenty opportunities to see her
+alone, and wandered about the Colonel’s bungalow as an informer does
+about a public-house, marking the incomings and the outgoings of the
+family, and longing to seize the moment when Miss Jowler, unbiassed by
+her mother or her papa, might listen, perhaps, to my eloquence, and
+melt at the tale of my love.
+
+But it would not do—old Jowler seemed to have taken all of a sudden to
+such a fit of domesticity, that there was no finding him out of doors,
+and his rhubarb-coloured wife (I believe that her skin gave the first
+idea of our regimental breeches), who before had been gadding
+ceaselessly abroad, and poking her broad nose into every _ménage_ in
+the cantonment, stopped faithfully at home with her spouse. My only
+chance was to beard the old couple in their den, and ask them at once
+for their _cub_.
+
+So I called one day at tiffin:- old Jowler was always happy to have my
+company at this meal; it amused him, he said, to see me drink Hodgson’s
+pale ale (I drank two hundred and thirty-four dozen the first year I
+was in Bengal)—and it was no small piece of fun, certainly, to see old
+Mrs. Jowler attack the currie-bhaut;—she was exactly the colour of it,
+as I have had already the honour to remark, and she swallowed the
+mixture with a gusto which was never equalled, except by my poor friend
+Dando _à propos d’huîtres_. She consumed the first three platefuls with
+a fork and spoon, like a Christian; but as she warmed to her work, the
+old hag would throw away her silver implements, and dragging the dishes
+towards her, go to work with her hands, flip the rice into her mouth
+with her fingers, and stow away a quantity of eatables sufficient for a
+sepoy company. But why do I diverge from the main point of my story?
+
+Julia, then, Jowler, and Mrs. J., were at luncheon; the dear girl was
+in the act to _sabler_ a glass of Hodgson as I entered. “How do you do,
+Mr. Gagin?” said the old hag, leeringly. “Eat a bit o’
+currie-bhaut,”—and she thrust the dish towards me, securing a heap as
+it passed. “What! Gagy my boy, how do, how do?” said the fat Colonel.
+“What! run through the body?—got well again—have some Hodgson—run
+through your body too!”—and at this, I may say, coarse joke (alluding
+to the fact that in these hot climates the ale oozes out as it were
+from the pores of the skin) old Jowler laughed: a host of swarthy
+chobdars, kitmatgars, sices, consomahs, and bobbychies laughed too, as
+they provided me, unasked, with the grateful fluid. Swallowing six
+tumblers of it, I paused nervously for a moment, and then said -
+
+“Bobbachy, consomah, ballybaloo hoga.”
+
+The black ruffians took the hint, and retired.
+
+“Colonel and Mrs. Jowler,” said I solemnly, “we are alone; and you,
+Miss Jowler, you are alone too; that is—I mean—I take this opportunity
+to—(another glass of ale, if you please)—to express, once for all,
+before departing on a dangerous campaign”—(Julia turned pale)—“before
+entering, I say, upon a war which may stretch in the dust my
+high-raised hopes and me, to express my hopes while life still remains
+to me, and to declare in the face of heaven, earth, and Colonel Jowler,
+that I love you, Julia!” The Colonel, astonished, let fall a steel
+fork, which stuck quivering for some minutes in the calf of my leg; but
+I heeded not the paltry interruption. “Yes, by yon bright heaven,”
+continued I, “I love you, Julia! I respect my commander, I esteem your
+excellent and beauteous mother: tell me, before I leave you, if I may
+hope for a return of my affection. Say that you love me, and I will do
+such deeds in this coming war, as shall make you proud of the name of
+your Gahagan.”
+
+The old woman, as I delivered these touching words, stared, snapped,
+and ground her teeth, like an enraged monkey. Julia was now red, now
+white; the Colonel stretched forward, took the fork out of the calf of
+my leg, wiped it, and then seized a bundle of letters which I had
+remarked by his side.
+
+“A cornet!” said he, in a voice choking with emotion; “a pitiful
+beggarly Irish cornet aspire to the hand of Julia Jowler! Gag— Gahagan,
+are you mad, or laughing at us? Look at these letters, young man—at
+these letters, I say—one hundred and twenty-four epistles from every
+part of India (not including one from the Governor-General, and six
+from his brother, Colonel Wellesley)—one hundred and twenty-four
+proposals for the hand of Miss Jowler! Cornet Gahagan,” he continued,
+“I wish to think well of you: you are the bravest, the most modest,
+and, perhaps, the handsomest man in our corps; but you have not got a
+single rupee. You ask me for Julia, and you do not possess even an
+anna!”—(Here the old rogue grinned, as if he had made a capital
+pun.)—“No, no,” said he, waxing good-natured; “Gagy my boy, it is
+nonsense! Julia love, retire with your mamma; this silly young
+gentleman will remain and smoke a pipe with me.”
+
+I took one: it was the bitterest chillum I ever smoked in my life.
+
+I am not going to give here an account of my military services; they
+will appear in my great national autobiography, in forty volumes, which
+I am now preparing for the press. I was with my regiment in all
+Wellesley’s brilliant campaigns; then taking dawk, I travelled across
+the country north-eastward, and had the honour of fighting by the side
+of Lord Lake at Laswaree, Degg, Furruckabad, Futtyghur, and Bhurtpore:
+but I will not boast of my actions—the military man knows them, MY
+SOVEREIGN appreciates them. If asked who was the bravest man of the
+Indian army, there is not an officer belonging to it who would not cry
+at once, GAHAGAN. The fact is, I was desperate: I cared not for life,
+deprived of Julia Jowler.
+
+With Julia’s stony looks ever before my eyes, her father’s stern
+refusal in my ears, I did not care, at the close of the campaign, again
+to seek her company or to press my suit. We were eighteen months on
+service, marching and counter-marching, and fighting almost every other
+day: to the world I did not seem altered; but the world only saw the
+face, and not the seared and blighted heart within me. My valour,
+always desperate, now reached to a pitch of cruelty; I tortured my
+grooms and grass-cutters for the most trifling offence or error,—I
+never in action spared a man,—I sheared off three hundred and nine
+heads in the course of that single campaign.
+
+Some influence, equally melancholy, seemed to have fallen upon poor old
+Jowler. About six months after we had left Dum Dum, he received a
+parcel of letters from Benares (whither his wife had retired with her
+daughter), and so deeply did they seem to weigh upon his spirits, that
+he ordered eleven men of his regiment to be flogged within two days;
+but it was against the blacks that he chiefly turned his wrath. Our
+fellows, in the heat and hurry of the campaign, were in the habit of
+dealing rather roughly with their prisoners, to extract treasure from
+them: they used to pull their nails out by the root, to boil them in
+kedgeree pots, to flog them and dress their wounds with cayenne pepper,
+and so on. Jowler, when he heard of these proceedings, which before had
+always justly exasperated him (he was a humane and kind little man),
+used now to smile fiercely and say, “D- the black scoundrels! Serve
+them right, serve them right!”
+
+One day, about a couple of miles in advance of the column, I had been
+on a foraging-party with a few dragoons, and was returning peaceably to
+camp, when of a sudden a troop of Mahrattas burst on us from a
+neighbouring mango-tope, in which they had been hidden: in an instant
+three of my men’s saddles were empty, and I was left with but seven
+more to make head against at least thirty of these vagabond black
+horsemen. I never saw in my life a nobler figure than the leader of the
+troop—mounted on a splendid black Arab; he was as tall, very nearly, as
+myself; he wore a steel cap and a shirt of mail, and carried a
+beautiful French carbine, which had already done execution upon two of
+my men. I saw that our only chance of safety lay in the destruction of
+this man. I shouted to him in a voice of thunder (in the Hindustanee
+tongue of course), “Stop, dog, if you dare, and encounter a man!”
+
+In reply his lance came whirling in the air over my head, and mortally
+transfixed poor Foggarty of ours, who was behind me. Grinding my teeth
+and swearing horribly, I drew that scimitar which never yet failed its
+blow,[2] and rushed at the Indian. He came down at full gallop, his own
+sword making ten thousand gleaming circles in the air, shrieking his
+cry of battle.
+
+The contest did not last an instant. With my first blow I cut off his
+sword-arm at the wrist; my second I levelled at his head. I said that
+he wore a steel cap, with a gilt iron spike of six inches, and a hood
+of chain mail. I rose in my stirrups and delivered “_St. George;_” my
+sword caught the spike exactly on the point, split it sheer in two, cut
+crashing through the steel cap and hood, and was only stopped by a ruby
+which he wore in his back- plate. His head, cut clean in two between
+the eyebrows and nostrils, even between the two front teeth, fell one
+side on each shoulder, and he galloped on till his horse was stopped by
+my men, who were not a little amused at the feat.
+
+As I had expected, the remaining ruffians fled on seeing their leader’s
+fate. I took home his helmet by way of curiosity, and we made a single
+prisoner, who was instantly carried before old Jowler.
+
+We asked the prisoner the name of the leader of the troop: he said it
+was Chowder Loll.
+
+“Chowder Loll!” shrieked Colonel Jowler. “O Fate! thy hand is here!” He
+rushed wildly into his tent—the next day applied for leave of absence.
+Gutch took the command of the regiment, and I saw him no more for some
+time.
+
+As I had distinguished myself not a little during the war, General Lake
+sent me up with despatches to Calcutta, where Lord Wellesley received
+me with the greatest distinction. Fancy my surprise, on going to a ball
+at Government House, to meet my old friend Jowler; my trembling,
+blushing, thrilling delight, when I saw Julia by his side!
+
+Jowler seemed to blush too when he beheld me. I thought of my former
+passages with his daughter. “Gagy my boy,” says he, shaking hands,
+“glad to see you. Old friend, Julia—come to tiffin— Hodgson’s
+pale—brave fellow Gagy.” Julia did not speak, but she turned ashy pale,
+and fixed upon me her awful eyes! I fainted almost, and uttered some
+incoherent words. Julia took my hand, gazed at me still, and said,
+“Come!” Need I say I went?
+
+I will not go over the pale ale and currie-bhaut again! but this I
+know, that in half-an-hour I was as much in love as I ever had been:
+and that in three weeks I—yes, I—was the accepted lover of Julia! I did
+not pause to ask where were the one hundred and twenty-four offers? why
+I, refused before, should be accepted now? I only felt that I loved
+her, and was happy!
+
+One night, one memorable night, I could not sleep, and, with a lover’s
+pardonable passion, wandered solitary through the City of Palaces until
+I came to the house which contained my Julia. I peeped into the
+compound—all was still; I looked into the verandah—all was dark, except
+a light—yes, one light—and it was in Julia’s chamber! My heart throbbed
+almost to stifling. I would—I _would_ advance, if but to gaze upon her
+for a moment, and to bless her as she slept. I _did_ look, I _did_
+advance; and, O Heaven! I saw a lamp burning, Mrs. Jow. in a
+night-dress, with a very dark baby in her arms, and Julia looking
+tenderly at an ayah, who was nursing another.
+
+“Oh, Mamma,” said Julia, “what would that fool Gahagan say if he knew
+all?”
+
+“_He does know all!_” shouted I, springing forward, and tearing down
+the tatties from the window. Mrs. Jow. ran shrieking out of the room,
+Julia fainted, the cursed black children squalled, and their d-d nurse
+fell on her knees, gabbling some infernal jargon of Hindustanee. Old
+Jowler at this juncture entered with a candle and a drawn sword.
+
+“Liar! scoundrel! deceiver!” shouted I. “Turn, ruffian, and defend
+yourself!” But old Jowler, when he saw me, only whistled, looked at his
+lifeless daughter, and slowly left the room.
+
+Why continue the tale? I need not now account for Jowler’s gloom on
+receiving his letters from Benares—for his exclamation upon the death
+of the Indian chief—for his desire to marry his daughter: the woman I
+was wooing was no longer Miss Julia Jowler, she was Mrs. Chowder Loll!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+Allyghur and Laswaree
+
+
+I sat down to write gravely and sadly, for (since the appearance of
+some of my adventures in a monthly magazine) unprincipled men have
+endeavoured to rob me of the only good I possess, to question the
+statements that I make, and, themselves without a spark of honour or
+good feeling, to steal from me that which is my sole wealth—my
+character as a teller of THE TRUTH.
+
+The reader will understand that it is to the illiberal strictures of a
+profligate press I now allude; among the London journalists, none
+(luckily for themselves) have dared to question the veracity of my
+statements: they know me, and they know that I am _in London_. If I can
+use the pen, I can also wield a more manly and terrible weapon, and
+would answer their contradictions with my sword! No gold or gems adorn
+the hilt of that war-worn scimitar; but there is blood upon the
+blade—the blood of the enemies of my country, and the maligners of my
+honest fame. There are others, however—the disgrace of a disgraceful
+trade—who, borrowing from distance a despicable courage, have ventured
+to assail me. The infamous editors of the _Kelso Champion_, the _Bungay
+Beacon_, the _Tipperary Argus_, and the _Stoke Pogis Sentinel_, and
+other dastardly organs of the provincial press, have, although
+differing in politics, agreed upon this one point, and, with a
+scoundrelly unanimity, vented a flood of abuse upon the revelations
+made by me.
+
+They say that I have assailed private characters, and wilfully
+perverted history to blacken the reputation of public men. I ask, was
+any one of these men in Bengal in the year 1803? Was any single
+conductor of any one of these paltry prints ever in Bundelcund or the
+Rohilla country? Does this _exquisite_ Tipperary scribe know the
+difference between Hurrygurrybang and Burrumtollah? Not he! and
+because, forsooth, in those strange and distant lands strange
+circumstances have taken place, it is insinuated that the relater is a
+liar: nay, that the very places themselves have no existence but in my
+imagination. Fools!—but I will not waste my anger upon them, and
+proceed to recount some other portions of my personal history.
+
+It is, I presume, a fact which even _these_ scribbling assassins will
+not venture to deny, that before the commencement of the campaign
+against Scindiah, the English General formed a camp at Kanouge on the
+Jumna, where he exercised that brilliant little army which was speedily
+to perform such wonders in the Dooab. It will be as well to give a
+slight account of the causes of a war which was speedily to rage
+through some of the fairest portions of the Indian continent.
+
+Shah Allum, the son of Shah Lollum, the descendant by the female line
+of Nadir Shah (that celebrated Toorkomaun adventurer, who had well-nigh
+hurled Bajazet and Selim the Second from the throne of Bagdad)—Shah
+Allum, I say, although nominally the Emperor of Delhi, was in reality
+the slave of the various warlike chieftains who lorded it by turns over
+the country and the sovereign, until conquered and slain by some more
+successful rebel. Chowder Loll Masolgee, Zubberdust Khan, Dowsunt Row
+Scindiah, and the celebrated Bobbachy Jung Bahawder, had held for a
+time complete mastery in Delhi. The second of these, a ruthless Afghan
+soldier, had abruptly entered the capital; nor was he ejected from it
+until he had seized upon the principal jewels, and likewise put out the
+eyes of the last of the unfortunate family of Afrasiab. Scindiah came
+to the rescue of the sightless Shah Allum, and though he destroyed his
+oppressor, only increased his slavery; holding him in as painful a
+bondage as he had suffered under the tyrannous Afghan.
+
+As long as these heroes were battling among themselves, or as long
+rather as it appeared that they had any strength to fight a battle, the
+British Government, ever anxious to see its enemies by the ears, by no
+means interfered in the contest. But the French Revolution broke out,
+and a host of starving sans-culottes appeared among the various Indian
+States, seeking for military service, and inflaming the minds of the
+various native princes against the British East India Company. A number
+of these entered into Scindiah’s ranks: one of them, Perron, was
+commander of his army; and though that chief was as yet quite engaged
+in his hereditary quarrel with Jeswunt Row Holkar, and never thought of
+an invasion of the British territory, the Company all of a sudden
+discovered that Shah Allum, his sovereign, was shamefully ill-used, and
+determined to re-establish the ancient splendour of his throne.
+
+Of course it was sheer benevolence for poor Shah Allum that prompted
+our governors to take these kindly measures in his favour. I don’t know
+how it happened that, at the end of the war, the poor Shah was not a
+whit better off than at the beginning; and that though Holkar was
+beaten, and Scindiah annihilated, Shah Allum was much such a puppet as
+before. Somehow, in the hurry and confusion of this struggle, the
+oyster remained with the British Government, who had so kindly offered
+to dress it for the Emperor, while His Majesty was obliged to be
+contented with the shell.
+
+The force encamped at Kanouge bore the title of the Grand Army of the
+Ganges and the Jumna; it consisted of eleven regiments of cavalry and
+twelve battalions of infantry, and was commanded by General Lake in
+person.
+
+Well, on the 1st of September we stormed Perron’s camp at Allyghur; on
+the fourth we took that fortress by assault; and as my name was
+mentioned in general orders, I may as well quote the Commander-in-
+Chief’s words regarding me—they will spare me the trouble of composing
+my own eulogium:-
+
+“The Commander-in-Chief is proud thus publicly to declare his high
+sense of the gallantry of Lieutenant Gahagan, of the — Cavalry. In the
+storming of the fortress, although unprovided with a single ladder, and
+accompanied but by a few brave men, Lieutenant Gahagan succeeded in
+escalading the inner and fourteenth wall of the place. Fourteen ditches
+lined with sword-blades and poisoned chevaux-de- frise, fourteen walls
+bristling with innumerable artillery and as smooth as looking-glasses,
+were in turn triumphantly passed by that enterprising officer. His
+course was to be traced by the heaps of slaughtered enemies lying thick
+upon the platforms; and alas! by the corpses of most of the gallant men
+who followed him! When at length he effected his lodgment, and the
+dastardly enemy, who dared not to confront him with arms, let loose
+upon him the tigers and lions of Scindiah’s menagerie, this meritorious
+officer destroyed, with his own hand, four of the largest and most
+ferocious animals, and the rest, awed by the indomitable majesty of
+BRITISH VALOUR, shrank back to their dens. Thomas Higgory, a private,
+and Runty Goss, havildar, were the only two who remained out of the
+nine hundred who followed Lieutenant Gahagan. Honour to them! Honour
+and tears for the brave men who perished on that awful day!”
+
+I have copied this, word for word, from the _Bengal Hurkaru_ of
+September 24, 1803: and anybody who has the slightest doubt as to the
+statement, may refer to the paper itself.
+
+And here I must pause to give thanks to Fortune, which so marvellously
+preserved me, Sergeant-Major Higgory, and Runty Goss. Were I to say
+that any valour of ours had carried us unhurt through this tremendous
+combat, the reader would laugh me to scorn. No: though my narrative is
+extraordinary, it is nevertheless authentic: and never never would I
+sacrifice truth for the mere sake of effect. The fact is this:- the
+citadel of Allyghur is situated upon a rock, about a thousand feet
+above the level of the sea, and is surrounded by fourteen walls, as his
+Excellency was good enough to remark in his despatch. A man who would
+mount these without scaling-ladders, is an ass; he who would _say_ he
+mounted them without such assistance, is a liar and a knave. We _had_
+scaling- ladders at the commencement of the assault, although it was
+quite impossible to carry them beyond the first line of batteries.
+Mounted on them, however, as our troops were falling thick about me, I
+saw that we must ignominiously retreat, unless some other help could be
+found for our brave fellows to escalade the next wall. It was about
+seventy feet high. I instantly turned the guns of wall _A_ on wall _B_,
+and peppered the latter so as to make, not a breach, but a scaling
+place; the men mounting in the holes made by the shot. By this simple
+stratagem, I managed to pass each successive barrier—for to ascend a
+wall which the General was pleased to call “as smooth as glass” is an
+absurd impossibility: I seek to achieve none such:-
+
+    “I dare do all that may become a man;
+    Who dares do more, is neither more nor less.”
+
+Of course, had the enemy’s guns been commonly well served, not one of
+us would ever have been alive out of the three; but whether it was
+owing to fright, or to the excessive smoke caused by so many pieces of
+artillery, arrive we did. On the platforms, too, our work was not quite
+so difficult as might be imagined—killing these fellows was sheer
+butchery. As soon as we appeared, they all turned and fled
+helter-skelter, and the reader may judge of their courage by the fact
+that out of about seven hundred men killed by us, only forty had wounds
+in front, the rest being bayoneted as they ran.
+
+And beyond all other pieces of good fortune was the very letting out of
+these tigers; which was the _dernier ressort_ of Bournonville, the
+second commandant of the fort. I had observed this man (conspicuous for
+a tricoloured scarf which he wore) upon every one of the walls as we
+stormed them, and running away the very first among the fugitives. He
+had all the keys of the gates; and in his tremor, as he opened the
+menagerie portal, left the whole bunch in the door, which I seized when
+the animals were overcome. Runty Goss then opened them one by one, our
+troops entered, and the victorious standard of my country floated on
+the walls of Allyghur!
+
+When the General, accompanied by his staff, entered the last line of
+fortifications, the brave old man raised me from the dead rhinoceros on
+which I was seated, and pressed me to his breast. But the excitement
+which had borne me through the fatigues and perils of that fearful day
+failed all of a sudden, and I wept like a child upon his shoulder.
+
+Promotion, in our army, goes unluckily by seniority; nor is it in the
+power of the General-in-Chief to advance a Cæsar, if he finds him in
+the capacity of a subaltern: _my_ reward for the above exploit was,
+therefore, not very rich. His Excellency had a favourite horn snuff-box
+(for, though exalted in station, he was in his habits most simple): of
+this, and about a quarter of an ounce of high-dried Welsh, which he
+always took, he made me a present, saying, in front of the line,
+“Accept this, Mr. Gahagan, as a token of respect from the first to the
+bravest officer in the army.”
+
+Calculating the snuff to be worth a halfpenny, I should say that
+fourpence was about the value of this gift: but it has at least this
+good effect—it serves to convince any person who doubts my story, that
+the facts of it are really true. I have left it at the office of my
+publisher, along with the extract from the _Bengal Hurkaru_, and
+anybody may examine both by applying in the counting- house of Mr.
+Cunningham.[3] That once popular expression, or proverb, “Are you up to
+snuff?” arose out of the above circumstance; for the officers of my
+corps, none of whom, except myself, had ventured on the storming party,
+used to twit me about this modest reward for my labours. Never mind!
+when they want me to storm a fort _again_, I shall know better.
+
+Well, immediately after the capture of this important fortress, Perron,
+who had been the life and soul of Scindiah’s army, came in to us, with
+his family and treasure, and was passed over to the French settlements
+at Chandernagur. Bourquien took his command, and against him we now
+moved. The morning of the 11th of September found us upon the plains of
+Delhi.
+
+It was a burning hot day, and we were all refreshing ourselves after
+the morning’s march, when I, who was on the advanced picket along with
+O’Gawler of the King’s Dragoons, was made aware of the enemy’s
+neighbourhood in a very singular manner. O’Gawler and I were seated
+under a little canopy of horse-cloths, which we had formed to shelter
+us from the intolerable heat of the sun, and were discussing with great
+delight a few Manilla cheroots, and a stone jar of the most exquisite,
+cool, weak, refreshing sangaree. We had been playing cards the night
+before, and O’Gawler had lost to me seven hundred rupees. I emptied the
+last of the sangaree into the two pint tumblers out of which we were
+drinking, and holding mine up, said, “Here’s better luck to you next
+time, O’Gawler!”
+
+As I spoke the words—whish!—a cannon-ball cut the tumbler clean out of
+my hand, and plumped into poor O’Gawler’s stomach. It settled him
+completely, and of course I never got my seven hundred rupees. Such are
+the uncertainties of war!
+
+To strap on my sabre and my accoutrements—to mount my Arab charger—to
+drink off what O’Gawler had left of the sangaree—and to gallop to the
+General, was the work of a moment. I found him as comfortably at tiffin
+as if he were at his own house in London.
+
+“General,” said I, as soon as I got into his paijamahs (or tent), “you
+must leave your lunch if you want to fight the enemy.”
+
+“The enemy—psha! Mr. Gahagan, the enemy is on the other side of the
+river.”
+
+“I can only tell your Excellency that the enemy’s guns will hardly
+carry five miles, and that Cornet O’Gawler was this moment shot dead at
+my side with a cannon-ball.”
+
+“Ha! is it so?” said his Excellency, rising, and laying down the
+drumstick of a grilled chicken. “Gentlemen, remember that the eyes of
+Europe are upon us, and follow me!”
+
+Each aide-de-camp started from table and seized his cocked hat; each
+British heart beat high at the thoughts of the coming _mêlée_. We
+mounted our horses, and galloped swiftly after the brave old General; I
+not the last in the train, upon my famous black charger.
+
+It was perfectly true, the enemy were posted in force within three
+miles of our camp, and from a hillock in the advance to which we
+galloped, we were enabled with our telescopes to see the whole of his
+imposing line. Nothing can better describe it than this:-
+
+    ___________________ A
+  /....................
+ /.
+/.
+
+- A is the enemy, and the dots represent the hundred and twenty pieces
+of artillery which defended his line. He was moreover, entrenched; and
+a wide morass in his front gave him an additional security.
+
+His Excellency for a moment surveyed the line, and then said, turning
+round to one of his aides-de-camp, “Order up Major-General Tinkler and
+the cavalry.”
+
+“_Here_, does your Excellency mean?” said the aide-de-camp, surprised,
+for the enemy had perceived us, and the cannon-balls were flying about
+as thick as peas.
+
+“_Here, sir!_” said the old General, stamping with his foot in a
+passion, and the A.D.C. shrugged his shoulders and galloped away. In
+five minutes we heard the trumpets in our camp, and in twenty more the
+greater part of the cavalry had joined us.
+
+Up they came, five thousand men, their standards flapping in the air,
+their long line of polished jack-boots gleaming in the golden sunlight.
+“And now we are here,” said Major-General Sir Theophilus Tinkler, “what
+next?” “Oh, d- it,” said the Commander-in-Chief, “charge,
+charge—nothing like charging—galloping—guns—rascally black
+scoundrels—charge, charge!” And then turning round to me (perhaps he
+was glad to change the conversation), he said, “Lieutenant Gahagan, you
+will stay with me.”
+
+And well for him I did, for I do not hesitate to say that the battle
+_was gained by me_. I do not mean to insult the reader by pretending
+that any personal exertions of mine turned the day,— that I killed, for
+instance, a regiment of cavalry or swallowed a battery of guns,—such
+absurd tales would disgrace both the hearer and the teller. I, as is
+well known, never say a single word which cannot be proved, and hate
+more than all other vices the absurd sin of egotism: I simply mean that
+my _advice_ to the General, at a quarter-past two o’clock in the
+afternoon of that day, won this great triumph for the British army.
+
+Gleig, Mill, and Thorn have all told the tale of this war, though
+somehow they have omitted all mention of the hero of it. General Lake,
+for the victory of that day, became Lord Lake of Laswaree. Laswaree!
+and who, forsooth, was the real conqueror of Laswaree? I can lay my
+hand upon my heart and say that _I_ was. If any proof is wanting of the
+fact, let me give it at once, and from the highest military testimony
+in the world—I mean that of the Emperor Napoleon.
+
+In the month of March, 1817, I was passenger on board the “Prince
+Regent,” Captain Harris, which touched at St. Helena on its passage
+from Calcutta to England. In company with the other officers on board
+the ship, I paid my respects to the illustrious exile of Longwood, who
+received us in his garden, where he was walking about, in a nankeen
+dress and a large broad-brimmed straw hat, with General Montholon,
+Count Las Casas, and his son Emanuel, then a little boy; who I dare say
+does not recollect me, but who nevertheless played with my sword-knot
+and the tassels of my Hessian boots during the whole of our interview
+with his Imperial Majesty.
+
+Our names were read out (in a pretty accent, by the way!) by General
+Montholon, and the Emperor, as each was pronounced, made a bow to the
+owner of it, but did not vouchsafe a word. At last Montholon came to
+mine. The Emperor looked me at once in the face, took his hands out of
+his pockets, put them behind his back, and coming up to me smiling,
+pronounced the following words:-
+
+“Assaye, Delhi, Deeg, Futtyghur?”
+
+I blushed, and, taking off my hat with a bow, said, “Sire, c’est moi.”
+
+“Parbleu! je le savais bien,” said the Emperor, holding out his
+snuff-box. “En usez-vous, Major?” I took a large pinch (which, with the
+honour of speaking to so great a man, brought the tears into my eyes),
+and he continued as nearly as possible in the following words:-
+
+“Sir, you are known; you come of an heroic nation. Your third brother,
+the Chef de Bataillon, Count Godfrey Gahagan, was in my Irish Brigade.”
+
+_Gahagan_. “Sire, it is true. He and my countrymen in your Majesty’s
+service stood under the green flag in the breach of Burgos, and beat
+Wellington back. It was the only time, as your Majesty knows, that
+Irishmen and Englishmen were beaten in that war.”
+
+_Napoleon_ (_looking as if he would say, “D— your candour, Major
+Gahagan”_). “Well, well; it was so. Your brother was a Count, and died
+a General in my service.”
+
+_Gahagan_. “He was found lying upon the bodies of nine-and-twenty
+Cossacks at Borodino. They were all dead, and bore the Gahagan mark.”
+
+_Napoleon_ (_to Montholon_). “C’est vrai, Montholon: je vous donne ma
+parole d’honneur la plus sacrée, que c’est vrai. Ils ne sont pas
+d’autres, ces terribles Ga’gans. You must know that Monsieur gained the
+battle of Delhi as certainly as I did that of Austerlitz. In this way:—
+Ce bélitre de Lor Lake, after calling up his cavalry, and placing them
+in front of Holkar’s batteries, qui balayaient la plaine, was for
+charging the enemy’s batteries with his horse, who would have been
+écrasés, mitraillés, foudroyés to a man but for the cunning of ce grand
+rogue que vous voyez.”
+
+_Montholon_. “Coquin de Major, va!”
+
+_Napoleon_. “Montholon! tais-toi. When Lord Lake, with his great
+bull-headed English obstinacy, saw the _fâcheuse_ position into which
+he had brought his troops, he was for dying on the spot, and would
+infallibly have done so—and the loss of his army would have been the
+ruin of the East India Company—and the ruin of the English East India
+Company would have established my Empire (bah! it was a republic then!)
+in the East—but that the man before us, Lieutenant Goliah Gahagan, was
+riding at the side of General Lake.”
+
+_Montholon_ (_with an accent of despair and fury_). “Gredin! cent mille
+tonnerres de Dieu!”
+
+_Napoleon_ (_benignantly_). “Calme-toi, mon fidèle ami. What will you?
+It was fate. Gahagan, at the critical period of the battle, or rather
+slaughter (for the English had not slain a man of the enemy), advised a
+retreat.”
+
+_Montholon_. “Le lâche! Un Français meurt, mais il ne recule jamais.”
+
+_Napoleon_. “_Stupide!_ Don’t you see _why_ the retreat was ordered?—
+don’t you know that it was a feint on the part of Gahagan to draw
+Holkar from his impregnable entrenchments? Don’t you know that the
+ignorant Indian fell into the snare, and issuing from behind the cover
+of his guns, came down with his cavalry on the plains in pursuit of
+Lake and his dragoons? Then it was that the Englishmen turned upon him;
+the hardy children of the North swept down his feeble horsemen, bore
+them back to their guns, which were useless, entered Holkar’s
+entrenchments along with his troops, sabred the artillerymen at their
+pieces, and won the battle of Delhi!”
+
+As the Emperor spoke, his pale cheek glowed red, his eye flashed fire,
+his deep clear voice rung as of old when he pointed out the enemy from
+beneath the shadow of the Pyramids, or rallied his regiments to the
+charge upon the death-strewn plain of Wagram. I have had many a proud
+moment in my life, but never such a proud one as this; and I would
+readily pardon the word “coward,” as applied to me by Montholon, in
+consideration of the testimony which his master bore in my favour.
+
+“Major,” said the Emperor to me in conclusion, “why had I not such a
+man as you in my service? I would have made you a Prince and a
+Marshal!” and here he fell into a reverie, of which I knew and
+respected the purport. He was thinking, doubtless, that I might have
+retrieved his fortunes; and indeed I have very little doubt that I
+might.
+
+Very soon after, coffee was brought by Monsieur Marchand, Napoleon’s
+valet-de-chambre, and after partaking of that beverage, and talking
+upon the politics of the day, the Emperor withdrew, leaving me deeply
+impressed by the condescension he had shown in this remarkable
+interview.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+A Peep into Spain—Account of the Origin and Services of the Ahmednuggar
+Irregulars
+
+
+HEADQUARTERS, MORELLA: _September_ 15, 1838
+
+I have been here for some months, along with my young friend Cabrera:
+and in the hurry and bustle of war—daily on guard and in the batteries
+for sixteen hours out of the twenty-four, with fourteen severe wounds
+and seven musket-balls in my body—it may be imagined that I have had
+little time to think about the publication of my memoirs. _Inter arma
+silent leges_—in the midst of fighting be hanged to writing! as the
+poet says; and I never would have bothered myself with a pen, had not
+common gratitude incited me to throw off a few pages.
+
+Along with Oraa’s troops, who have of late been beleaguering this
+place, there was a young Milesian gentleman, Mr. Toone O’Connor Emmett
+Fitzgerald Sheeny by name, a law student, and a member of Gray’s Inn,
+and what he called _Bay Ah_ of Trinity College, Dublin. Mr. Sheeny was
+with the Queen’s people, not in a military capacity, but as
+representative of an English journal; to which, for a trifling weekly
+remuneration, he was in the habit of transmitting accounts of the
+movements of the belligerents, and his own opinion of the politics of
+Spain. Receiving, for the discharge of his duty, a couple of guineas a
+week from the proprietors of the journal in question, he was enabled,
+as I need scarcely say, to make such a show in Oraa’s camp as only a
+Christino general officer, or at the very least a colonel of a
+regiment, can afford to keep up.
+
+In the famous sortie which we made upon the twenty-third, I was of
+course among the foremost in the _mêlée_, and found myself, after a
+good deal of slaughtering (which it would be as disagreeable as useless
+to describe here), in the court of a small inn or podesta, which had
+been made the headquarters of several Queenite officers during the
+siege. The pesatero or landlord of the inn had been despatched by my
+brave chapel-churies, with his fine family of children—the officers
+quartered in the podesta had of course bolted; but one man remained,
+and my fellows were on the point of cutting him into ten thousand
+pieces with their borachios, when I arrived in the room time enough to
+prevent the catastrophe. Seeing before me an individual in the costume
+of a civilian—a white hat, a light blue satin cravat, embroidered with
+butterflies and other quadrupeds, a green coat and brass buttons, and a
+pair of blue plaid trousers, I recognised at once a countryman, and
+interposed to save his life.
+
+In an agonised brogue the unhappy young man was saying all that he
+could to induce the chapel-churies to give up their intention of
+slaughtering him; but it is very little likely that his protestations
+would have had any effect upon them, had not I appeared in the room,
+and shouted to the ruffians to hold their hand.
+
+Seeing a general officer before them (I have the honour to hold that
+rank in the service of His Catholic Majesty), and moreover one six feet
+four in height, and armed with that terrible _cabecilla_ (a sword so
+called, because it is five feet long) which is so well known among the
+Spanish armies—seeing, I say, this figure, the fellows retired,
+exclaiming, “Adios, corpo di bacco nosotros,” and so on, clearly
+proving (by their words) that they would, if they dared, have immolated
+the victim whom I had thus rescued from their fury. “Villains!” shouted
+I, hearing them grumble, “away! quit the apartment!” Each man, sulkily
+sheathing his sombrero, obeyed, and quitted the camarilla.
+
+It was then that Mr. Sheeny detailed to me the particulars to which I
+have briefly adverted; and, informing me at the same time that he had a
+family in England who would feel obliged to me for his release, and
+that his most intimate friend the English Ambassador would move heaven
+and earth to revenge his fall, he directed my attention to a
+portmanteau passably well filled, which he hoped would satisfy the
+cupidity of my troops. I said, though with much regret, that I must
+subject his person to a search; and hence arose the circumstance which
+has called for what I fear you will consider a somewhat tedious
+explanation. I found upon Mr. Sheeny’s person three sovereigns in
+English money (which I have to this day), and singularly enough a copy
+of the _New Monthly Magazine_, containing a portion of my adventures.
+It was a toss-up whether I should let the poor young man be shot or no,
+but this little circumstance saved his life. The gratified vanity of
+authorship induced me to accept his portmanteau and valuables, and to
+allow the poor wretch to go free. I put the Magazine in my coat-pocket,
+and left him and the podesta.
+
+The men, to my surprise, had quitted the building, and it was full time
+for me to follow; for I found our sallying party, after committing
+dreadful ravages in Oraa’s lines, were in full retreat upon the fort,
+hotly pressed by a superior force of the enemy. I am pretty well known
+and respected by the men of both parties in Spain (indeed I served for
+some months on the Queen’s side before I came over to Don Carlos); and,
+as it is my maxim never to give quarter, I never expect to receive it
+when taken myself. On issuing from the podesta with Sheeny’s
+portmanteau and my sword in my hand, I was a little disgusted and
+annoyed to see our own men in a pretty good column retreating at
+double-quick, and about four hundred yards beyond me, up the hill
+leading to the fort; while on my left hand, and at only a hundred
+yards, a troop of the Queenite lancers were clattering along the road.
+
+I had got into the very middle of the road before I made this
+discovery, so that the fellows had a full sight of me, and whizz! came
+a bullet by my left whisker before I could say Jack Robinson. I looked
+round—there were seventy of the accursed malvados at the least, and
+within, as I said, a hundred yards. Were I to say that I stopped to
+fight seventy men, you would write me down a fool or a liar: no, sir, I
+did not fight, I ran away.
+
+I am six feet four—my figure is as well known in the Spanish army as
+that of the Count de Luchana, or my fierce little friend Cabrera
+himself. “GAHAGAN!” shouted out half-a-dozen scoundrelly voices, and
+fifty more shots came rattling after me. I was running— running as the
+brave stag before the hounds—running as I have done a great number of
+times before in my life, when there was no help for it but a race.
+
+After I had run about five hundred yards, I saw that I had gained
+nearly three upon our column in front, and that likewise the Christino
+horsemen were left behind some hundred yards more; with the exception
+of three, who were fearfully near me. The first was an officer without
+a lance; he had fired both his pistols at me, and was twenty yards in
+advance of his comrades; there was a similar distance between the two
+lancers who rode behind him. I determined then to wait for No. 1, and
+as he came up delivered cut 3 at his horse’s near leg—off it flew, and
+down, as I expected, went horse and man. I had hardly time to pass my
+sword through my prostrate enemy, when No. 2 was upon me. If I could
+but get that fellow’s horse, thought I, I am safe; and I executed at
+once the plan which I hoped was to effect my rescue.
+
+I had, as I said, left the podesta with Sheeny’s portmanteau, and,
+unwilling to part with some of the articles it contained—some shirts, a
+bottle of whisky, a few cakes of Windsor soap, &c. &c.,— I had carried
+it thus far on my shoulders, but now was compelled to sacrifice it
+_malgré moi_. As the lancer came up, I dropped my sword from my right
+hand, and hurled the portmanteau at his head, with aim so true, that he
+fell back on his saddle like a sack, and thus when the horse galloped
+up to me, I had no difficulty in dismounting the rider: the
+whisky-bottle struck him over his right eye, and he was completely
+stunned. To dash him from the saddle and spring myself into it, was the
+work of a moment; indeed, the two combats had taken place in about a
+fifth part of the time which it has taken the reader to peruse the
+description. But in the rapidity of the last encounter, and the
+mounting of my enemy’s horse, I had committed a very absurd oversight—I
+was scampering away _without my sword!_ What was I to do?—to scamper
+on, to be sure, and trust to the legs of my horse for safety!
+
+The lancer behind me gained on me every moment, and I could hear his
+horrid laugh as he neared me. I leaned forward jockey-fashion in my
+saddle, and kicked, and urged, and flogged with my hand, but all in
+vain. Closer—closer—the point of his lance was within two feet of my
+back. Ah! ah! he delivered the point, and fancy my agony when I felt it
+enter—through exactly fifty-nine pages of the _New Monthly Magazine_.
+Had it not been for that Magazine, I should have been impaled without a
+shadow of a doubt. Was I wrong in feeling gratitude? Had I not cause to
+continue my contributions to that periodical?
+
+When I got safe into Morella, along with the tail of the sallying
+party, I was for the first time made acquainted with the ridiculous
+result of the lancer’s thrust (as he delivered his lance, I must tell
+you that a ball came whizz over my head from our fellows, and entering
+at his nose, put a stop to _his_ lancing for the future). I hastened to
+Cabrera’s quarter, and related to him some of my adventures during the
+day.
+
+“But, General,” said he, “you are standing. I beg you _chiudete
+l’uscio_ (take a chair).”
+
+I did so, and then for the first time was aware that there was some
+foreign substance in the tail of my coat, which prevented my sitting at
+ease. I drew out the Magazine which I had seized, and there, to my
+wonder, _discovered the Christino lance_ twisted up like a fish-hook or
+a pastoral crook.
+
+“Ha! ha! ha!” said Cabrera (who is a notorious wag).
+
+“Valdepeñas madrileños,” growled out Tristany.
+
+“By my cachuca di caballero (upon my honour as a gentleman),” shrieked
+out Ros d’Eroles, convulsed with laughter, “I will send it to the
+Bishop of Leon for a crozier.”
+
+“Gahagan has _consecrated_ it,” giggled out Ramon Cabrera; and so they
+went on with their muchacas for an hour or more. But, when they heard
+that the means of my salvation from the lance of the scoundrelly
+Christino had been the Magazine containing my own history, their laugh
+was changed into wonder. I read them (speaking Spanish more fluently
+than English) every word of my story. “But how is this?” said Cabrera.
+“You surely have other adventures to relate?”
+
+“Excellent sir,” said I, “I have;” and that very evening, as we sat
+over our cups of tertullia (sangaree), I continued my narrative in
+nearly the following words:-
+
+“I left off in the very middle of the battle of Delhi, which ended, as
+everybody knows, in the complete triumph of the British arms. But who
+gained the battle? Lord Lake is called Viscount Lake of Delhi and
+Laswaree, while Major Gaha—nonsense, never mind _him_, never mind the
+charge he executed when, sabre in hand, he leaped the six-foot wall in
+the mouth of the roaring cannon, over the heads of the gleaming pikes;
+when, with one hand seizing the sacred peishcush, or fish—which was the
+banner always borne before Scindiah,—he, with his good sword, cut off
+the trunk of the famous white elephant, which, shrieking with agony,
+plunged madly into the Mahratta ranks, followed by his giant brethren,
+tossing, like chaff before the wind, the affrighted kitmatgars. He,
+meanwhile, now plunging into the midst of a battalion of consomahs, now
+cleaving to the chine a screaming and ferocious bobbachee,[4] rushed
+on, like the simoom across the red Zaharan plain, killing, with his own
+hand, a hundred and forty-thr—but never mind—‘_alone he did it;_’
+sufficient be it for him, however, that the victory was won: he cares
+not for the empty honours which were awarded to more fortunate men!
+
+“We marched after the battle to Delhi, where poor blind old Shah Allum
+received us, and bestowed all kinds of honours and titles on our
+General. As each of the officers passed before him, the Shah did not
+fail to remark my person,[5] and was told my name.
+
+“Lord Lake whispered to him my exploits, and the old man was so
+delighted with the account of my victory over the elephant (whose trunk
+I use to this day), that he said, ‘Let him be called GUJPUTI,’ or the
+lord of elephants; and Gujputi was the name by which I was afterwards
+familiarly known among the natives,—the men, that is. The women had a
+softer appellation for me, and called me ‘Mushook,’ or charmer.
+
+“Well, I shall not describe Delhi, which is doubtless well known to the
+reader; nor the siege of Agra, to which place we went from Delhi; nor
+the terrible day at Laswaree, which went nigh to finish the war.
+Suffice it to say that we were victorious, and that I was wounded; as I
+have invariably been in the two hundred and four occasions when I have
+found myself in action. One point, however, became in the course of
+this campaign _quite_ evident—_that something must be doen for
+Gahagan_. The country cried shame, the King’s troops grumbled, the
+sepoys openly murmured that their Gujputi was only a lieutenant, when
+he had performed such signal services. What was to be done? Lord
+Wellesley was in an evident quandary. ‘Gahagan,’ wrote he, ‘to be a
+subaltern is evidently not your fate—_you were born for command;_ but
+Lake and General Wellesley are good officers, they cannot be turned
+out—I must make a post for you. What say you, my dear fellow, to a
+corps of _irregular horse?_’
+
+“It was thus that the famous corps of AHMEDNUGGAR IRREGULARS had its
+origin; a guerilla force, it is true, but one which will long be
+remembered in the annals of our Indian campaigns.
+
+“As the commander of this regiment, I was allowed to settle the uniform
+of the corps, as well as to select recruits. These were not wanting as
+soon as my appointment was made known, but came flocking to my standard
+a great deal faster than to the regular corps in the Company’s service.
+I had European officers, of course, to command them, and a few of my
+countrymen as sergeants; the rest were all natives, whom I chose of the
+strongest and bravest men in India; chiefly Pitans, Afghans,
+Hurrumzadehs, and Calliawns: for these are well known to be the most
+warlike districts of our Indian territory.
+
+“When on parade and in full uniform we made a singular and noble
+appearance. I was always fond of dress; and, in this instance gave a
+_carte blanche_ to my taste, and invented the most splendid costume
+that ever perhaps decorated a soldier. I am, as I have stated already,
+six feet four inches in height, and of matchless symmetry and
+proportion. My hair and beard are of the most brilliant auburn, so
+bright as scarcely to be distinguished at a distance from scarlet. My
+eyes are bright blue, overshadowed by bushy eyebrows of the colour of
+my hair, and a terrific gash of the deepest purple, which goes over the
+forehead, the eyelid, and the cheek, and finishes at the ear, gives my
+face a more strictly military appearance than can be conceived. When I
+have been drinking (as is pretty often the case) this gash becomes ruby
+bright, and as I have another which took off a piece of my under- lip,
+and shows five of my front teeth, I leave you to imagine that ‘seldom
+lighted on the earth’ (as the monster Burke remarked of one of his
+unhappy victims) ‘a more extraordinary vision.’ I improved these
+natural advantages; and, while in cantonment during the hot winds at
+Chittybobbary, allowed my hair to grow very long, as did my beard,
+which reached to my waist. It took me two hours daily to curl my hair
+in ten thousand little corkscrew ringlets, which waved over my
+shoulders, and to get my moustaches well round to the corners of my
+eyelids. I dressed in loose scarlet trousers and red morocco boots, a
+scarlet jacket, and a shawl of the same colour round my waist; a
+scarlet turban three feet high, and decorated with a tuft of the
+scarlet feathers of the flamingo, formed my head-dress, and I did not
+allow myself a single ornament, except a small silver skull and
+cross-bones in front of my turban. Two brace of pistols, a Malay
+creese, and a tulwar, sharp on both sides, and very nearly six feet in
+length, completed this elegant costume. My two flags were each
+surmounted with a real skull and cross-bones, and ornamented one with a
+black, and the other with a red beard (of enormous length, taken from
+men slain in battle by me). On one flag were of course the arms of John
+Company; on the other, an image of myself bestriding a prostrate
+elephant, with the simple word ‘GUJPUTI’ written underneath in the
+Nagaree, Persian, and Sanscrit characters. I rode my black horse, and
+looked, by the immortal gods, like Mars. To me might be applied the
+words which were written concerning handsome General Webb, in
+Marlborough’s time:-
+
+    “‘To noble danger he conducts the way,
+    His great example all his troop obey,
+    Before the front the Major sternly rides,
+    With such an air as Mars to battle strides.
+    Propitious Heaven must sure a hero save
+    Like Paris handsome, and like Hector brave!’
+
+“My officers (Captains Biggs and Mackanulty, Lieutenants Glogger,
+Pappendick, Stuffle, &c. &c.) were dressed exactly in the same way, but
+in yellow; and the men were similarly equipped, but in black. I have
+seen many regiments since, and many ferocious-looking men, but the
+Ahmednuggar Irregulars were more dreadful to the view than any set of
+ruffians on which I ever set eyes. I would to Heaven that the Czar of
+Muscovy had passed through Cabool and Lahore, and that I with my old
+Ahmednuggars stood on a fair field to meet him! Bless you, bless you,
+my swart companions in victory! through the mist of twenty years I hear
+the booming of your war-cry, and mark the glitter of your scimitars as
+ye rage in the thickest of the battle![6]
+
+“But away with melancholy reminiscences. You may fancy what a figure
+the Irregulars cut on a field-day—a line of five hundred black-faced,
+black-dressed, black-horsed, black-bearded men—Biggs, Glogger, and the
+other officers in yellow, galloping about the field like flashes of
+lightning; myself enlightening them, red, solitary, and majestic, like
+yon glorious orb in heaven.
+
+“There are very few men, I presume, who have not heard of Holkar’s
+sudden and gallant incursion into the Dooab, in the year 1804, when we
+thought that the victory of Laswaree and the brilliant success at Deeg
+had completely finished him. Taking ten thousand horse he broke up his
+camp at Palimbang; and the first thing General Lake heard of him was,
+that he was at Putna, then at Rumpooge, then at Doncaradam—he was, in
+fact, in the very heart of our territory.
+
+“The unfortunate part of the affair was this:- His Excellency,
+despising the Mahratta chieftain, had allowed him to advance about two
+thousand miles in his front, and knew not in the slightest degree where
+to lay hold on him. Was he at Hazarubaug? was he at Bogly Gunge? nobody
+knew, and for a considerable period the movements of Lake’s cavalry
+were quite ambiguous, uncertain, promiscuous, and undetermined.
+
+“Such, briefly, was the state of affairs in October 1804. At the
+beginning of that month I had been wounded (a trifling scratch, cutting
+off my left upper eyelid, a bit of my cheek, and my under- lip), and I
+was obliged to leave Biggs in command of my Irregulars, whilst I
+retired for my wounds to an English station at Furruckabad, _alias_
+Futtyghur—it is, as every twopenny postman knows, at the apex of the
+Dooab. We have there a cantonment, and thither I went for the mere sake
+of the surgeon and the sticking- plaster.
+
+“Furruckabad, then, is divided into two districts or towns: the lower
+Cotwal, inhabited by the natives, and the upper (which is fortified
+slightly, and has all along been called Futtyghur, meaning in
+Hindustanee ‘the-favourite-resort-of-the-white-faced-
+Feringhees-near-the-mango-tope-consecrated-to-Ram’), occupied by
+Europeans. (It is astonishing, by the way, how comprehensive that
+language is, and how much can be conveyed in one or two of the
+commonest phrases.)
+
+“Biggs, then, and my men were playing all sorts of wondrous pranks with
+Lord Lake’s army, whilst I was detained an unwilling prisoner of health
+at Futtyghur.
+
+“An unwilling prisoner, however, I should not say. The cantonment at
+Futtyghur contained that which would have made _any_ man a happy slave.
+Woman, lovely woman, was there in abundance and variety! The fact is,
+that, when the campaign commenced in 1803, the ladies of the army all
+congregated to this place, where they were left, as it was supposed, in
+safety. I might, like Homer, relate the names and qualities of all. I
+may at least mention _some_ whose memory is still most dear to me.
+There was -
+
+“Mrs. Major-General Bulcher, wife of Bulcher of the Infantry.
+
+“Miss Bulcher.
+
+“MISS BELINDA BULCHER (whose name I beg the printer to place in large
+capitals).
+
+“Mrs. Colonel Vandegobbleschroy.
+
+“Mrs. Major Macan and the four Misses Macan.
+
+“The Honourable Mrs. Burgoo, Mrs. Flix, Hicks, Wicks, and many more too
+numerous to mention. The flower of our camp was, however, collected
+there, and the last words of Lord Lake to me, as I left him, were,
+‘Gahagan, I commit those women to your charge. Guard them with your
+life, watch over them with your honour, defend them with the matchless
+power of your indomitable arm.’
+
+“Futtyghur is, as I have said, a European station, and the pretty air
+of the bungalows, amid the clustering topes of mango-trees, has often
+ere this excited the admiration of the tourist and sketcher. On the
+brow of a hill—the Burrumpooter river rolls majestically at its base;
+and no spot, in a word, can be conceived more exquisitely arranged,
+both by art and nature, as a favourite residence of the British fair.
+Mrs. Bulcher, Mrs. Vandegobbleschroy, and the other married ladies
+above mentioned, had each of them delightful bungalows and gardens in
+the place, and between one cottage and another my time passed as
+delightfully as can the hours of any man who is away from his darling
+occupation of war.
+
+“I was the commandant of the fort. It is a little insignificant pettah,
+defended simply by a couple of gabions, a very ordinary counterscarp,
+and a bomb-proof embrasure. On the top of this my flag was planted, and
+the small garrison of forty men only were comfortably barracked off in
+the casemates within. A surgeon and two chaplains (there were besides
+three reverend gentlemen of amateur missions, who lived in the town),
+completed, as I may say, the garrison of our little fortalice, which I
+was left to defend and to command.
+
+“On the night of the first of November, in the year 1804, I had invited
+Mrs. Major-General Bulcher and her daughters, Mrs. Vandegobbleschroy,
+and, indeed, all the ladies in the cantonment, to a little festival in
+honour of the recovery of my health, of the commencement of the
+shooting season, and indeed as a farewell visit, for it was my
+intention to take dawk the very next morning and return to my regiment.
+The three amateur missionaries whom I have mentioned, and some ladies
+in the cantonment of very rigid religious principles, refused to appear
+at my little party. They had better never have been born than have done
+as they did: as you shall hear.
+
+“We had been dancing merrily all night, and the supper (chiefly of the
+delicate condor, the luscious adjutant, and other birds of a similar
+kind, which I had shot in the course of the day) had been duly _fêted_
+by every lady and gentleman present; when I took an opportunity to
+retire on the ramparts, with the interesting and lovely Belinda
+Bulcher. I was occupied, as the French say, in _conter_-ing
+_fleurettes_ to this sweet young creature, when, all of a sudden, a
+rocket was seen whizzing through the air, and a strong light was
+visible in the valley below the little fort.
+
+“‘What, fireworks! Captain Gahagan,’ said Belinda; ‘this is too
+gallant.’
+
+“‘Indeed, my dear Miss Bulcher,’ said I, ‘they are fireworks of which I
+have no idea: perhaps our friends the missionaries—’
+
+“‘Look, look!’ said Belinda, trembling, and clutching tightly hold of
+my arm: ‘what do I see? yes—no—yes! it is—_our bungalow is in flames!_’
+
+“It was true, the spacious bungalow occupied by Mrs. Major-General was
+at that moment seen a prey to the devouring element—another and another
+succeeded it—seven bungalows, before I could almost ejaculate the name
+of Jack Robinson, were seen blazing brightly in the black midnight air!
+
+“I seized my night-glass, and looking towards the spot where the
+conflagration raged, what was my astonishment to see thousands of black
+forms dancing round the fires; whilst by their lights I could observe
+columns after columns of Indian horse, arriving and taking up their
+ground in the very middle of the open square or tank, round which the
+bungalows were built!
+
+“‘Ho, warder!’ shouted I (while the frightened and trembling Belinda
+clung closer to my side, and pressed the stalwart arm that encircled
+her waist), ‘down with the drawbridge! see that your masolgees’ (small
+tumbrels which are used in place of large artillery) ‘be well loaded:
+you, sepoys, hasten and man the ravelin! you, choprasees, put out the
+lights in the embrasures! we shall have warm work of it to-night, or my
+name is not Goliah Gahagan.’
+
+“The ladies, the guests (to the number of eighty-three), the sepoys,
+choprasees, masolgees, and so on, had all crowded on the platform at
+the sound of my shouting, and dreadful was the consternation, shrill
+the screaming, occasioned by my words. The men stood irresolute and
+mute with terror; the women, trembling, knew scarcely whither to fly
+for refuge. ‘Who are yonder ruffians?’ said I. A hundred voices yelped
+in reply—some said the Pindarees, some said the Mahrattas, some vowed
+it was Scindiah, and others declared it was Holkar—no one knew.
+
+“‘Is there any one here,’ said I, ‘who will venture to reconnoitre
+yonder troops?’ There was a dead pause.
+
+“‘A thousand tomauns to the man who will bring me news of yonder army!’
+again I repeated. Still a dead silence. The fact was that Scindiah and
+Holkar both were so notorious for their cruelty, that no one dared
+venture to face the danger. ‘Oh for fifty of my brave Ahmednuggarees!’
+thought I.
+
+“‘Gentlemen,’ said I, ‘I see it—you are cowards—none of you dare
+encounter the chance even of death. It is an encouraging prospect: know
+you not that the ruffian Holkar, if it be he, will with to- morrow’s
+dawn beleaguer our little fort, and throw thousands of men against our
+walls? know you not that, if we are taken, there is no quarter, no
+hope; death for us—and worse than death for these lovely ones assembled
+here?’ Here the ladies shrieked and raised a howl as I have heard the
+jackals on a summer’s evening. Belinda, my dear Belinda! flung both her
+arms round me, and sobbed on my shoulder (or in my waistcoat-pocket
+rather, for the little witch could reach no higher).
+
+“‘Captain Gahagan,’ sobbed she, ‘_Go-Go-Goggle-iah!_’
+
+“‘My soul’s adored!’ replied I.
+
+“‘Swear to me one thing.’
+
+“‘I swear.’
+
+“‘That if—that if—the nasty, horrid, odious black Mah-ra-a-a- attahs
+take the fort, you will put me out of their power.’
+
+“I clasped the dear girl to my heart, and swore upon my sword that,
+rather than she should incur the risk of dishonour, she should perish
+by my own hand. This comforted her; and her mother, Mrs. Major-General
+Bulcher, and her elder sister, who had not until now known a word of
+our attachment, (indeed, but for these extraordinary circumstances, it
+is probable that we ourselves should never have discovered it), were
+under these painful circumstances made aware of my beloved Belinda’s
+partiality for me. Having communicated thus her wish of
+self-destruction, I thought her example a touching and excellent one,
+and proposed to all the ladies that they should follow it, and that at
+the entry of the enemy into the fort, and at a signal given by me, they
+should one and all make away with themselves. Fancy my disgust when,
+after making this proposition, not one of the ladies chose to accede to
+it, and received it with the same chilling denial that my former
+proposal to the garrison had met with.
+
+“In the midst of this hurry and confusion, as if purposely to add to
+it, a trumpet was heard at the gate of the fort, and one of the
+sentinels came running to me, saying that a Mahratta soldier was before
+the gate with a flag of truce!
+
+“I went down, rightly conjecturing, as it turned out, that the party,
+whoever they might be, had no artillery; and received at the point of
+my sword a scroll of which the following is a translation.
+
+“‘_To Goliah Gahagan Gujputi_.
+
+“‘LORD OF ELEPHANTS, SIR,—I have the honour to inform you that I
+arrived before this place at eight o’clock p.m. with ten thousand
+cavalry under my orders. I have burned, since my arrival, seventeen
+bungalows in Furruckabad and Futtyghur, and have likewise been under
+the painful necessity of putting to death three clergymen (mollahs) and
+seven English officers, whom I found in the village; the women have
+been transferred to safe keeping in the harems of my officers and
+myself.
+
+    “‘As I know your courage and talents, I shall be very happy if you
+    will surrender the fortress, and take service as a major-general
+    (hookahbadar) in my army. Should my proposal not meet with your
+    assent, I beg leave to state that to-morrow I shall storm the fort,
+    and on taking it, shall put to death every male in the garrison,
+    and every female above twenty years of age. For yourself I shall
+    reserve a punishment, which for novelty and exquisite torture has,
+    I flatter myself, hardly ever been exceeded. Awaiting the favour of
+    a reply, I am, Sir,
+
+“‘Your very obedient servant,
+
+“‘JESWUNT ROW HOLKAR.
+
+“‘CAMP BEFORE FUTTYGHUR: _September_ 1, 1804.
+
+“‘R. S. V. P.’
+
+“The officer who had brought this precious epistle (it is astonishing
+how Holkar had aped the forms of English correspondence), an enormous
+Pitan soldier, with a shirt of mail, and a steel cap and cape, round
+which his turban wound, was leaning against the gate on his matchlock,
+and whistling a national melody. I read the letter, and saw at once
+there was no time to be lost. That man, thought I, must never go back
+to Holkar. Were he to attack us now before we were prepared, the fort
+would be his in half-an-hour.
+
+“Tying my white pocket-handkerchief to a stick, I flung open the gate
+and advanced to the officer: he was standing, I said, on the little
+bridge across the moat. I made him a low salaam, after the fashion of
+the country, and, as he bent forward to return the compliment, I am
+sorry to say, I plunged forward, gave him a violent blow on the head,
+which deprived him of all sensation, and then dragged him within the
+wall, raising the drawbridge after me.
+
+“I bore the body into my own apartment; there, swift as thought, I
+stripped him of his turban, cammerbund, peijammahs, and papooshes, and,
+putting them on myself, determined to go forth and reconnoitre the
+enemy.”
+
+Here I was obliged to stop, for Cabrera, Ros d’Eroles, and the rest of
+the staff, were sound asleep! What I did in my reconnaissance, and how
+I defended the fort of Futtyghur, I shall have the honour of telling on
+another occasion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+The Indian Camp—The Sortie from the Fort
+
+
+HEADQUARTERS, MORELLA: _October_ 3, 1838
+
+It is a balmy night. I hear the merry jingle of the tambourine, and the
+cheery voices of the girls and peasants, as they dance beneath my
+casement, under the shadow of the clustering vines. The laugh and song
+pass gaily round, and even at this distance I can distinguish the
+elegant form of Ramon Cabrera, as he whispers gay nothings in the ears
+of the Andalusian girls, or joins in the thrilling chorus of Riego’s
+hymn, which is ever and anon vociferated by the enthusiastic soldiery
+of Carlos Quinto. I am alone, in the most inaccessible and most
+bomb-proof tower of our little fortalice; the large casements are
+open—the wind, as it enters, whispers in my ear its odorous
+recollections of the orange grove and the myrtle bower. My torch (a
+branch of the fragrant cedar-tree) flares and flickers in the midnight
+breeze, and disperses its scent and burning splinters on my scroll and
+the desk where I write—meet implements for a soldier’s authorship!—it
+is _cartridge_ paper over which my pen runs so glibly, and a yawning
+barrel of gunpowder forms my rough writing-table. Around me, below me,
+above me, all—all is peace! I think, as I sit here so lonely, on my
+country, England! and muse over the sweet and bitter recollections of
+my early days! Let me resume my narrative, at the point where
+(interrupted by the authoritative summons of war) I paused on the last
+occasion.
+
+I left off, I think—(for I am a thousand miles away from proof- sheets
+as I write, and, were I not writing the simple TRUTH, must contradict
+myself a thousand times in the course of my tale)—I think, I say, that
+I left off at that period of my story, when, Holkar being before
+Futtyghur, and I in command of that fortress, I had just been compelled
+to make away with his messenger: and, dressed in the fallen Indian’s
+accoutrements, went forth to reconnoitre the force, and, if possible,
+to learn the intentions of the enemy. However much my figure might have
+resembled that of the Pitan, and, disguised in his armour, might have
+deceived the lynx- eyed Mahrattas, into whose camp I was about to
+plunge, it was evident that a single glance at my fair face and auburn
+beard would have undeceived the dullest blockhead in Holkar’s army.
+Seizing, then, a bottle of Burgess’s walnut catsup, I dyed my face and
+my hands, and, with the simple aid of a flask of Warren’s jet, I made
+my hair and beard as black as ebony. The Indian’s helmet and chain hood
+covered likewise a great part of my face, and I hoped thus, with luck,
+impudence, and a complete command of all the Eastern dialects and
+languages, from Burmah to Afghanistan, to pass scot- free through this
+somewhat dangerous ordeal.
+
+I had not the word of the night, it is true—but I trusted to good
+fortune for that, and passed boldly out of the fortress, bearing the
+flag of truce as before; I had scarcely passed on a couple of hundred
+yards, when lo! a party of Indian horsemen, armed like him I had just
+overcome, trotted towards me. One was leading a noble white charger,
+and no sooner did he see me than, dismounting from his own horse, and
+giving the rein to a companion, he advanced to meet me with the
+charger; a second fellow likewise dismounted and followed the first:
+one held the bridle of the horse, while the other (with a multitude of
+salaams, aleikums, and other genuflexions) held the jewelled stirrup,
+and kneeling, waited until I should mount.
+
+I took the hint at once: the Indian who had come up to the fort was a
+great man—that was evident; I walked on with a majestic air, gathered
+up the velvet reins, and sprung into the magnificent high- peaked
+saddle. “Buk, buk,” said I. “It is good. In the name of the forty-nine
+Imaums, let us ride on.” And the whole party set off at a brisk trot, I
+keeping silence, and thinking with no little trepidation of what I was
+about to encounter.
+
+As we rode along, I heard two of the men commenting upon my unusual
+silence (for I suppose, I—that is the Indian—was a talkative officer).
+“The lips of the Bahawder are closed,” said one. “Where are those birds
+of Paradise, his long-tailed words? they are imprisoned between the
+golden bars of his teeth!”
+
+“Kush,” said his companion, “be quiet! Bobbachy Bahawder has seen the
+dreadful Feringhee, Gahagan Khan Gujputi, the elephant-lord, whose
+sword reaps the harvest of death; there is but one champion who can
+wear the papooshes of the elephant-slayer—it is Bobbachy Bahawder!”
+
+“You speak truly, Puneeree Muckun, the Bahawder ruminates on the words
+of the unbeliever: he is an ostrich, and hatches the eggs of his
+thoughts.”
+
+“Bekhusm! on my nose be it! May the young birds, his actions, be strong
+and swift in flight.”
+
+“May they _digest iron!_” said Puneeree Muckun, who was evidently a wag
+in his way.
+
+“O—ho!” thought I, as suddenly the light flashed upon me. “It was,
+then, the famous Bobbachy Bahawder whom I overcame just now! and he is
+the man destined to stand in _my_ slippers, is he?” and I was at that
+very moment standing in his own! Such are the chances and changes that
+fall to the lot of the soldier!
+
+I suppose everybody—everybody who has been in India, at least—has heard
+the name of Bobbachy Bahawder: it is derived from the two Hindustanee
+words—_bobbachy_, general; _bahawder_, artilleryman. He had entered
+into Holkar’s service in the latter capacity, and had, by his merit and
+his undaunted bravery in action, attained the dignity of the peacock’s
+feather, which is only granted to noblemen of the first class; he was
+married, moreover, to one of Holkar’s innumerable daughters; a match
+which, according to the _Chronique Scandaleuse_, brought more of honour
+than of pleasure to the poor Bobbachy. Gallant as he was in the field,
+it was said that in the harem he was the veriest craven alive,
+completely subjugated by his ugly and odious wife. In all matters of
+importance the late Bahawder had been consulted by his prince, who had,
+as it appears (knowing my character, and not caring to do anything rash
+in his attack upon so formidable an enemy), sent forward the
+unfortunate Pitan to reconnoitre the fort; he was to have done yet
+more, as I learned from the attendant Puneeree Muckun, who was, I soon
+found out, an old favourite with the Bobbachy—doubtless on account of
+his honesty and love of repartee.
+
+“The Bahawder’s lips are closed,” said he, at last, trotting up to me;
+“has he not a word for old Puneeree Muckun?”
+
+“Bismillah, mashallah, barikallah,” said I; which means, “My good
+friend, what I have seen is not worth the trouble of relation, and
+fills my bosom with the darkest forebodings.”
+
+“You could not then see the Gujputi alone, and stab him with your
+dagger?”
+
+[Here was a pretty conspiracy!] “No, I saw him, but not alone; his
+people were always with him.”
+
+“Hurrumzadeh! it is a pity; we waited but the sound of your jogree
+(whistle), and straightway would have galloped up and seized upon every
+man, woman, and child in the fort: however, there are but a dozen men
+in the garrison, and they have not provision for two days—they must
+yield; and then hurrah for the moon-faces! Mashallah! I am told the
+soldiers who first get in are to have their pick. How my old woman,
+Rotee Muckun, will be surprised when I bring home a couple of Feringhee
+wives,—ha! ha!”
+
+“Fool!” said I, “be still!—twelve men in the garrison there are twelve
+hundred! Gahagan himself is as good as a thousand men; and as for food,
+I saw with my own eyes five hundred bullocks grazing in the courtyard
+as I entered.” This _was_ a bouncer, I confess; but my object was to
+deceive Puneeree Muckun, and give him as high a notion as possible of
+the capabilities of defence which the besieged had.
+
+“Pooch, pooch,” murmured the men; “it is a wonder of a fortress: we
+shall never be able to take it until our guns come up.”
+
+There was hope then! they had no battering-train. Ere this arrived I
+trusted that Lord Lake would hear of our plight, and march down to
+rescue us. Thus occupied in thought and conversation, we rode on until
+the advanced sentinel challenged us, when old Puneeree gave the word,
+and we passed on into the centre of Holkar’s camp.
+
+It was a strange—a stirring sight! The camp-fires were lighted; and
+round them—eating, reposing, talking, looking at the merry steps of the
+dancing-girls, or listening to the stories of some Dhol Baut (or Indian
+improvisatore)—were thousands of dusky soldiery. The camels and horses
+were picketed under the banyan- trees, on which the ripe mango fruit
+was growing, and offered them an excellent food. Towards the spot which
+the golden fish and royal purdahs, floating in the wind, designated as
+the tent of Holkar, led an immense avenue—of elephants! the finest
+street, indeed, I ever saw. Each of the monstrous animals had a castle
+on its back, armed with Mauritanian archers and the celebrated Persian
+matchlock-men: it was the feeding time of these royal brutes, and the
+grooms were observed bringing immense toffungs, or baskets, filled with
+pine-apples, plantains, bananas, Indian corn, and cocoa-nuts, which
+grow luxuriantly at all seasons of the year. We passed down this
+extraordinary avenue—no less than three hundred and eighty-eight tails
+did I count on each side—each tail appertaining to an elephant
+twenty-five feet high—each elephant having a two-storied castle on its
+back—each castle containing sleeping and eating rooms for the twelve
+men that formed its garrison, and were keeping watch on the roof—each
+roof bearing a flagstaff twenty feet long on its top, the crescent
+glittering with a thousand gems, and round it the imperial
+standard,—each standard of silk velvet and cloth-of-gold, bearing the
+well-known device of Holkar, argent an or gules, between a sinople of
+the first, a chevron truncated, wavy. I took nine of these myself in
+the course of a very short time after, and shall be happy, when I come
+to England, to show them to any gentleman who has a curiosity that way.
+Through this gorgeous scene our little cavalcade passed, and at last we
+arrived at the quarters occupied by Holkar.
+
+That celebrated chieftain’s tents and followers were gathered round one
+of the British bungalows which had escaped the flames, and which he
+occupied during the siege. When I entered the large room where he sat,
+I found him in the midst of a council of war; his chief generals and
+viziers seated round him, each smoking his hookah, as is the common way
+with these black fellows, before, at, and after breakfast, dinner,
+supper, and bedtime. There was such a cloud raised by their smoke you
+could hardly see a yard before you- -another piece of good-luck for
+me—as it diminished the chances of my detection. When, with the
+ordinary ceremonies, the kitmatgars and consomahs had explained to the
+prince that Bobbachy Bahawder, the right eye of the Sun of the Universe
+(as the ignorant heathens called me), had arrived from his mission,
+Holkar immediately summoned me to the maidaun, or elevated platform, on
+which he was seated in a luxurious easy-chair, and I, instantly taking
+off my slippers, falling on my knees, and beating my head against the
+ground ninety-nine times, proceeded, still on my knees, a hundred and
+twenty feet through the room, and then up the twenty steps which led to
+his maidaun—a silly, painful, and disgusting ceremony, which can only
+be considered as a relic of barbarian darkness, which tears the knees
+and shins to pieces, let alone the pantaloons. I recommend anybody who
+goes to India, with the prospect of entering the service of the native
+rajahs, to recollect my advice, and have them _well wadded_.
+
+Well, the right eye of the Sun of the Universe scrambled as well as he
+could up the steps of the maidaun (on which, in rows, smoking, as I
+have said, the musnuds or general officers were seated), and I arrived
+within speaking distance of Holkar, who instantly asked me the success
+of my mission. The impetuous old man thereon poured out a multitude of
+questions: “How many men are there in the fort?” said he; “how many
+women? Is it victualled? have they ammunition? Did you see Gahagan
+Sahib, the commander? did you kill him?”
+
+All these questions Jeswunt Row Holkar puffed out with so many whiffs
+of tobacco.
+
+Taking a chillum myself, and raising about me such a cloud that, upon
+my honour as a gentleman, no man at three yards’ distance could
+perceive anything of me except the pillar of smoke in which I was
+encompassed, I told Holkar, in Oriental language of course, the best
+tale I could with regard to the fort.
+
+“Sir,” said I, “to answer your last question first—that dreadful
+Gujputi I have seen—and he is alive: he is eight feet, nearly, in
+height; he can eat a bullock daily (of which he has seven hundred at
+present in the compound, and swears that during the siege he will
+content himself with only three a week): he has lost, in battle, his
+left eye; and what is the consequence? O Ram Gunge” (O
+thou-with-the-eye-as-bright-as-morning and-with-beard-as-black-as-
+night), “Goliah Gujputi—NEVER SLEEPS!”
+
+“Ah, you Ghorumsaug (you thief of the world),” said the Prince Vizier,
+Saadut Alee Beg Bimbukchee—“it’s joking you are;”—and there was a
+universal buzz through the room at the announcement of this bouncer.
+
+“By the hundred and eleven incarnations of Vishnu,” said I, solemnly
+(an oath which no Indian was ever known to break), “I swear that so it
+is: so at least he told me, and I have good cause to know his power.
+Gujputi is an enchanter: he is leagued with devils; he is invulnerable.
+Look,” said I, unsheathing my dagger— and every eye turned instantly
+towards me—“thrice did I stab him with this steel—in the back,
+once—twice right through the heart; but he only laughed me to scorn,
+and bade me tell Holkar that the steel was not yet forged which was to
+inflict an injury upon him.”
+
+I never saw a man in such a rage as Holkar was when I gave him this
+somewhat imprudent message.
+
+“Ah, lily-livered rogue!” shouted he out to me, “milk-blooded
+unbeliever! pale-faced miscreant! lives he after insulting thy master
+in thy presence? In the name of the Prophet, I spit on thee, defy thee,
+abhor thee, degrade thee! Take that, thou liar of the universe! and
+that—and that—and that!”
+
+Such are the frightful excesses of barbaric minds! every time this old
+man said, “Take that,” he flung some article near him at the head of
+the undaunted Gahagan—his dagger, his sword, his carbine, his richly
+ornamented pistols, his turban covered with jewels, worth a hundred
+thousand crores of rupees—finally, his hookah, snake mouthpiece,
+silver-bell, chillum and all—which went hissing over my head, and
+flattening into a jelly the nose of the Grand Vizier.
+
+“Yock muzzee! my nose is off,” said the old man, mildly. “Will you have
+my life, O Holkar? it is thine likewise!” and no other word of
+complaint escaped his lips.
+
+Of all these missiles, though a pistol and carbine had gone off as the
+ferocious Indian flung them at my head, and the naked scimitar,
+fiercely but unadroitly thrown, had lopped off the limbs of one or two
+of the musnuds as they sat trembling on their omrahs, yet, strange to
+say, not a single weapon had hurt me. When the hubbub ceased, and the
+unlucky wretches who had been the victims of this fit of rage had been
+removed, Holkar’s good-humour somewhat returned, and he allowed me to
+continue my account of the fort; which I did, not taking the slightest
+notice of his burst of impatience: as indeed it would have been the
+height of impoliteness to have done, for such accidents happened many
+times in the day.
+
+“It is well that the Bobbachy has returned,” snuffled out the poor
+Grand Vizier, after I had explained to the Council the extraordinary
+means of defence possessed by the garrison.
+
+“Your star is bright, O Bahawder! for this very night we had resolved
+upon an escalade of the fort, and we had sworn to put every one of the
+infidel garrison to the edge of the sword.”
+
+“But you have no battering train,” said I.
+
+“Bah! we have a couple of ninety-six pounders, quite sufficient to blow
+the gates open; and then, hey for a charge!” said Loll Mahommed, a
+general of cavalry, who was a rival of Bobbachy’s, and contradicted,
+therefore, every word I said. “In the name of Juggernaut, why wait for
+the heavy artillery? Have we not swords? Have we not hearts? Mashallah!
+Let cravens stay with Bobbachy, all true men will follow Loll Mahommed!
+Allahhumdillah, Bismillah, Barikallah?”[7] and drawing his scimitar, he
+waved it over his head, and shouted out his cry of battle. It was
+repeated by many of the other omrahs; the sound of their cheers was
+carried into the camp, and caught up by the men; the camels began to
+cry, the horses to prance and neigh, the eight hundred elephants set up
+a scream, the trumpeters and drummers clanged away at their
+instruments. I never heard such a din before or after. How I trembled
+for my little garrison when I heard the enthusiastic cries of this
+innumerable host!
+
+There was but one way for it. “Sir,” said I, addressing Holkar, “go out
+to-night, and you go to certain death. Loll Mahommed has not seen the
+fort as I have. Pass the gate if you please, and for what? to fall
+before the fire of a hundred pieces of artillery; to storm another
+gate, and then another, and then to be blown up, with Gahagan’s
+garrison in the citadel. Who talks of courage? Were I not in your
+august presence, O star of the faithful, I would crop Loll Mahommed’s
+nose from his face, and wear his ears as an ornament in my own pugree!
+Who is there here that knows not the difference between yonder
+yellow-skinned coward and Gahagan Khan Guj—I mean Bobbachy Bahawder? I
+am ready to fight one, two, three, or twenty of them, at broad-sword,
+small-sword, single- stick, with fists if you please. By the holy
+piper, fighting is like mate and dthrink to Ga—-to Bobbachy, I
+mane—whoop! come on, you divvle, and I’ll bate the skin off your ugly
+bones.”
+
+This speech had very nearly proved fatal to me, for, when I am
+agitated, I involuntarily adopt some of the phraseology peculiar to my
+own country; which is so un-eastern, that, had there been any suspicion
+as to my real character, detection must indubitably have ensued. As it
+was, Holkar perceived nothing, but instantaneously stopped the dispute.
+Loll Mahommed, however, evidently suspected something; for, as Holkar,
+with a voice of thunder, shouted out; “Tomasha (silence),” Loll sprang
+forward and gasped out -
+
+“My lord! my lord! this is not Bob—”
+
+But he could say no more. “Gag the slave!” screamed out Holkar,
+stamping with fury; and a turban was instantly twisted round the poor
+devil’s jaws. “Ho, furoshes! carry out Loll Mahommed Khan, give him a
+hundred dozen on the soles of his feet, set him upon a white donkey,
+and carry him round the camp, with an inscription before him: ‘This is
+the way that Holkar rewards the talkative.’”
+
+I breathed again; and ever as I heard each whack of the bamboo falling
+on Loll Mahommed’s feet, I felt peace returning to my mind, and thanked
+my stars that I was delivered of this danger.
+
+“Vizier,” said Holkar, who enjoyed Loll’s roars amazingly, “I owe you a
+reparation for your nose: kiss the hand of your prince, O Saadut Alee
+Beg Bimbukchee! be from this day forth Zoheir u Dowlut!”
+
+The good old man’s eyes filled with tears. “I can bear thy severity, O
+Prince,” said he; “I cannot bear thy love. Was it not an honour that
+your Highness did me just now when you condescended to pass over the
+bridge of your slave’s nose?”
+
+The phrase was by all voices pronounced to be very poetical. The Vizier
+retired, crowned with his new honours, to bed. Holkar was in high
+good-humour.
+
+“Bobbachy,” said he, “thou, too, must pardon me. _A propos_, I have
+news for thee. Your wife, the incomparable Puttee Rooge” (white and red
+rose), “has arrived in camp.”
+
+“My WIFE, my lord!” said I, aghast.
+
+“Our daughter, the light of thine eyes! Go, my son; I see thou art wild
+with joy. The Princess’s tents are set up close by mine, and I know
+thou longest to join her.”
+
+My wife? Here was a complication truly!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+The Issue of my Interview with my Wife
+
+
+I found Puneeree Muckun, with the rest of my attendants, waiting at the
+gate, and they immediately conducted me to my own tents in the
+neighbourhood. I have been in many dangerous predicaments before that
+time and since, but I don’t care to deny that I felt in the present
+instance such a throbbing of the heart as I never have experienced when
+leading a forlorn hope, or marching up to a battery.
+
+As soon as I entered the tents a host of menials sprang forward, some
+to ease me of my armour, some to offer me refreshments, some with
+hookahs, attar of roses (in great quart bottles), and the thousand
+delicacies of Eastern life. I motioned them away. “I will wear my
+armour,” said I; “I shall go forth to-night. Carry my duty to the
+princess, and say I grieve that to-night I have not the time to see
+her. Spread me a couch here, and bring me supper here: a jar of Persian
+wine well cooled, a lamb stuffed with pistachio- nuts, a pillaw of a
+couple of turkeys, a curried kid—anything. Begone! Give me a pipe;
+leave me alone, and tell me when the meal is ready.”
+
+I thought by these means to put off the fair Puttee Rooge, and hoped to
+be able to escape without subjecting myself to the examination of her
+curious eyes. After smoking for a while, an attendant came to tell me
+that my supper was prepared in the inner apartment of the tent (I
+suppose that the reader, if he be possessed of the commonest
+intelligence, knows that the tents of the Indian grandees are made of
+the finest Cashmere Shawls, and contain a dozen rooms at least, with
+carpets, chimneys, and sash- windows complete). I entered, I say, into
+an inner chamber, and there began with my fingers to devour my meal in
+the Oriental fashion, taking, every now and then, a pull from the
+wine-jar, which was cooling deliciously in another jar of snow.
+
+I was just in the act of despatching the last morsel of a most savoury
+stewed lamb and rice, which had formed my meal, when I heard a scuffle
+of feet, a shrill clatter of female voices, and, the curtain being
+flung open, in marched a lady accompanied by twelve slaves, with moon
+faces and slim waists, lovely as the houris in Paradise.
+
+The lady herself, to do her justice, was as great a contrast to her
+attendants as could possibly be: she was crooked, old, of the
+complexion of molasses, and rendered a thousand times more ugly by the
+tawdry dress and the blazing jewels with which she was covered. A line
+of yellow chalk drawn from her forehead to the tip of her nose (which
+was further ornamented by an immense glittering nose- ring), her
+eyelids painted bright red, and a large dab of the same colour on her
+chin, showed she was not of the Mussulman, but the Brahmin faith—and of
+a very high caste: you could see that by her eyes. My mind was
+instantaneously made up as to my line of action.
+
+The male attendants had of course quitted the apartment, as they heard
+the well-known sound of her voice. It would have been death to them to
+have remained and looked in her face. The females ranged themselves
+round their mistress, as she squatted down opposite to me.
+
+“And is this,” said she, “a welcome, O Khan! after six months’ absence,
+for the most unfortunate and loving wife in all the world? Is this
+lamb, O glutton! half so tender as thy spouse? Is this wine, O sot!
+half so sweet as her looks?”
+
+I saw the storm was brewing—her slaves, to whom she turned, kept up a
+kind of chorus:-
+
+“Oh, the faithless one!” cried they. “Oh, the rascal, the false one,
+who has no eye for beauty, and no heart for love, like the Khanum’s!”
+
+“A lamb is not so sweet as love,” said I gravely; “but a lamb has a
+good temper: a wine-cup is not so intoxicating as a woman—but a
+wine-cup has _no tongue_, O Khanum Gee!” and again I dipped my nose in
+the soul-refreshing jar.
+
+The sweet Puttee Rooge was not, however, to be put off by my repartees;
+she and her maidens recommenced their chorus, and chattered and stormed
+until I lost all patience.
+
+“Retire, friends,” said I, “and leave me in peace.”
+
+“Stir, on your peril!” cried the Khanum.
+
+So, seeing there was no help for it but violence, I drew out my
+pistols, cocked them, and said, “O houris! these pistols contain each
+two balls: the daughter of Holkar bears a sacred life for me- -but for
+you!—by all the saints of Hindustan, four of ye shall die if ye stay a
+moment longer in my presence!” This was enough; the ladies gave a
+shriek, and skurried out of the apartment like a covey of partridges on
+the wing.
+
+Now, then, was the time for action. My wife, or rather Bobbachy’s wife,
+sat still, a little flurried by the unusual ferocity which her lord had
+displayed in her presence. I seized her hand and, gripping it close,
+whispered in her ear, to which I put the other pistol:- “O Khanum,
+listen and scream not; the moment you scream, you die!” She was
+completely beaten: she turned as pale as a woman could in her
+situation, and said, “Speak, Bobbachy Bahawder, I am dumb.”
+
+“Woman,” said I, taking off my helmet, and removing the chain cape
+which had covered almost the whole of my face—“_I am not thy husband_—I
+am the slayer of elephants, the world-renowned GAHAGAN!”
+
+As I said this, and as the long ringlets of red hair fell over my
+shoulders (contrasting strangely with my dyed face and beard), I formed
+one of the finest pictures that can possibly be conceived, and I
+recommend it as a subject to Mr. Heath, for the next “Book of Beauty.”
+
+“Wretch!” said she, “what wouldst thou?”
+
+“You black-faced fiend,” said I, “raise but your voice, and you are
+dead!”
+
+“And afterwards,” said she, “do you suppose that _you_ can escape? The
+torments of hell are not so terrible as the tortures that Holkar will
+invent for thee.”
+
+“Tortures, madam?” answered I, coolly. “Fiddlesticks! You will neither
+betray me, nor will I be put to the torture: on the contrary, you will
+give me your best jewels and facilitate my escape to the fort. Don’t
+grind your teeth and swear at me. Listen, madam: you know this dress
+and these arms;—they are the arms of your husband, Bobbachy
+Bahawder—_my prisoner_. He now lies in yonder fort, and if I do not
+return before daylight, at _sunrise he dies:_ and then, when they send
+his corpse back to Holkar, what will you, _his widow_, do?
+
+“Oh!” said she, shuddering, “spare me, spare me!”
+
+“I’ll tell you what you will do. You will have the pleasure of dying
+along with him—of _being roasted_, madam: an agonising death, from
+which your father cannot save you, to which he will be the first man to
+condemn and conduct you. Ha! I see we understand each other, and you
+will give me over the cash-box and jewels.” And so saying I threw
+myself back with the calmest air imaginable, flinging the pistols over
+to her. “Light me a pipe, my love,” said I, “and then go and hand me
+over the dollars: do you hear?” You see I had her in my power—up a
+tree, as the Americans say, and she very humbly lighted my pipe for me,
+and then departed for the goods I spoke about.
+
+What a thing is luck! If Loll Mahommed had not been made to take that
+ride round the camp, I should infallibly have been lost.
+
+My supper, my quarrel with the princess, and my pipe afterwards, had
+occupied a couple of hours of my time. The princess returned from her
+quest, and brought with her the box, containing valuables to the amount
+of about three millions sterling. (I was cheated of them afterwards,
+but have the box still, a plain deal one.) I was just about to take my
+departure, when a tremendous knocking, shouting, and screaming was
+heard at the entrance of the tent. It was Holkar himself, accompanied
+by that cursed Loll Mahommed, who, after his punishment, found his
+master restored to good-humour, and had communicated to him his firm
+conviction that I was an impostor.
+
+“Ho, Begum!” shouted he, in the ante-room (for he and his people could
+not enter the women’s apartments), “speak, O my daughter! is your
+husband returned?”
+
+“Speak, madam,” said I, “or _remember the roasting_.”
+
+“He is, Papa,” said the Begum.
+
+“Are you sure? Ho! ho! ho!” (the old ruffian was laughing outside)—“are
+you sure it is?—Ha! aha!—_he-e-e!_”
+
+“Indeed it is he, and no other. I pray you, father, to go, and to pass
+no more such shameless jests on your daughter. Have I ever seen the
+face of any other man?” And hereat she began to weep as if her heart
+would break—the deceitful minx!
+
+Holkar’s laugh was instantly turned to fury. “Oh, you liar and eternal
+thief!” said he, turning round (as I presume, for I could only hear) to
+Loll Mahommed, “to make your prince eat such monstrous dirt as this!
+Furoshes, seize this man. I dismiss him from my service, I degrade him
+from his rank, I appropriate to myself all his property: and hark ye,
+furoshes, GIVE HIM A HUNDRED DOZEN MORE!”
+
+Again I heard the whacks of the bamboos, and peace flowed into my soul.
+
+Just as morn began to break, two figures were seen to approach the
+little fortress of Futtyghur: one was a woman wrapped closely in a
+veil; the other a warrior, remarkable for the size and manly beauty of
+his form, who carried in his hand a deal box of considerable size. The
+warrior at the gate gave the word and was admitted; the woman returned
+slowly to the Indian camp. Her name was Puttee Rooge; his was -
+
+G. O’G. G., M.H.E.I.C.S.. C.I.H.A.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+Famine in the Garrison
+
+
+Thus my dangers for the night being overcome, I hastened with my
+precious box into my own apartment, which communicated with another,
+where I had left my prisoner, with a guard to report if he should
+recover, and to prevent his escape. My servant, Ghorumsaug, was one of
+the guard. I called him, and the fellow came, looking very much
+confused and frightened, as it seemed, at my appearance.
+
+“Why, Ghorumsaug,” said I, “what makes thee look so pale, fellow?” (He
+was as white as a sheet.) “It is thy master, dost thou not remember
+him?” The man had seen me dress myself in the Pitan’s clothes, but was
+not present when I had blacked my face and beard in the manner I have
+described.
+
+“O Bramah, Vishnu, and Mahomet!” cried the faithful fellow, “and do I
+see my dear master disguised in this way? For Heaven’s sake let me rid
+you of this odious black paint; for what will the ladies say in the
+ballroom, if the beautiful Feringhee should appear amongst them with
+his roses turned into coal?”
+
+I am still one of the finest men in Europe, and at the time of which I
+write, when only two-and-twenty, I confess I _was_ a little vain of my
+personal appearance, and not very willing to appear before my dear
+Belinda disguised like a blackamoor. I allowed Ghorumsaug to divest me
+of the heathenish armour and habiliments which I wore; and having, with
+a world of scrubbing and trouble, divested my face and beard of their
+black tinge, I put on my own becoming uniform, and hastened to wait on
+the ladies; hastened, I say,—although delayed would have been the
+better word, for the operation of bleaching lasted at least two hours.
+
+“How is the prisoner, Ghorumsaug?” said I, before leaving my apartment.
+
+“He has recovered from the blow which the Lion dealt him; two men and
+myself watch over him; and Macgillicuddy Sahib (the second in command)
+has just been the rounds, and has seen that all was secure.”
+
+I bade Ghorumsaug help me to put away my chest of treasure (my
+exultation in taking it was so great that I could not help informing
+him of its contents); and this done, I despatched him to his post near
+the prisoner, while I prepared to sally forth and pay my respects to
+the fair creatures under my protection. “What good after all have I
+done,” thought I to myself, “in this expedition which I had so rashly
+undertaken?” I had seen the renowned Holkar; I had been in the heart of
+his camp; I knew the disposition of his troops, that there were eleven
+thousand of them, and that he only waited for his guns to make a
+regular attack on the fort. I had seen Puttee Rooge; I had robbed her
+(I say _robbed_ her, and I don’t care what the reader or any other man
+may think of the act) of a deal box, containing jewels to the amount of
+three millions sterling, the property of herself and husband.
+
+Three millions in money and jewels! And what the deuce were money and
+jewels to me or to my poor garrison? Could my adorable Miss Bulcher eat
+a fricassee of diamonds, or, Cleopatra-like, melt down pearls to her
+tea? Could I, careless as I am about food, with a stomach that would
+digest anything—(once, in Spain, I ate the leg of a horse during a
+famine, and was so eager to swallow this morsel that I bolted the shoe,
+as well as the hoof, and never felt the slightest inconvenience from
+either)—could I, I say, expect to live long and well upon a ragout of
+rupees, or a dish of stewed emeralds and rubies? With all the wealth of
+Croesus before me I felt melancholy; and would have paid cheerfully its
+weight in carats for a good honest round of boiled beef. Wealth,
+wealth, what art thou? What is gold?—Soft metal. What are diamonds?—
+Shining tinsel. The great wealth-winners, the only fame-achievers, the
+sole objects worthy of a soldier’s consideration, are beefsteaks,
+gunpowder, and cold iron.
+
+The two latter means of competency we possessed; I had in my own
+apartments a small store of gunpowder (keeping it under my own bed,
+with a candle burning for fear of accidents); I had 14 pieces of
+artillery (4 long 48’s and 4 carronades, 5 howitzers, and a long brass
+mortar, for grape, which I had taken myself at the battle of Assaye),
+and muskets for ten times my force. My garrison, as I have told the
+reader in a previous number, consisted of 40 men, two chaplains, and a
+surgeon; add to these my guests, 83 in number, of whom nine only were
+gentlemen (in tights, powder, pigtails, and silk stockings, who had
+come out merely for a dance, and found themselves in for a siege). Such
+were our numbers:-
+
+Troops and artillerymen        40
+Ladies                         74
+Other non-combatants           11
+MAJOR-GENERAL O’G.GAHAGAN   1,000
+                            1,125
+
+I count myself good for a thousand, for so I was regularly rated in the
+army: with this great benefit to it, that I only consumed as much as an
+ordinary mortal. We were then, as far as the victuals went, 126 mouths;
+as combatants we numbered 1,040 gallant men, with 12 guns and a fort,
+against Holkar and his 12,000. No such alarming odds, if -
+
+_If!_—ay, there was the rub—_if_ we had _shot_, as well as powder for
+our guns; _if_ we had not only _men_ but _meat_. Of the former
+commodity we had only three rounds for each piece. Of the latter, upon
+my sacred honour, to feed 126 souls, we had but
+
+    Two drumsticks of fowls, and a bone of ham.
+    Fourteen bottles of ginger-beer.
+    Of soda-water, four ditto.
+    Two bottles of fine Spanish olives.
+    Raspberry cream—the remainder of two dishes.
+    Seven macaroons, lying in the puddle of a demolished trifle.
+    Half a drum of best Turkey figs.
+    Some bits of broken bread; two Dutch cheeses (whole); the crust of an
+    old Stilton; and about an ounce of almonds and raisins.
+    Three ham-sandwiches, and a pot of currant-jelly, and 197 bottles of
+    brandy, rum, madeira, pale ale (my private stock); a couple of hard
+    eggs for a salad, and a flask of Florence oil.
+
+This was the provision for the whole garrison! The men after supper had
+seized upon the relics of the repast, as they were carried off from the
+table; and these were the miserable remnants I found and counted on my
+return; taking good care to lock the door of the supper-room, and
+treasure what little sustenance still remained in it.
+
+When I appeared in the saloon, now lighted up by the morning sun, I not
+only caused a sensation myself, but felt one in my own bosom which was
+of the most painful description. Oh, my reader! may you never behold
+such a sight as that which presented itself: eighty-three men and women
+in ball-dresses; the former with their lank powdered locks streaming
+over their faces; the latter with faded flowers, uncurled wigs, smudged
+rouge, blear eyes, draggling feathers, rumpled satins—each more
+desperately melancholy and hideous than the other—each, except my
+beloved Belinda Bulcher, whose raven ringlets never having been in curl
+could of course never go _out_ of curl; whose cheek, pale as the lily,
+could, as it may naturally be supposed, grow no paler; whose neck and
+beauteous arms, dazzling as alabaster, needed no pearl-powder, and
+therefore, as I need not state, did not suffer because the pearl-powder
+had come off. Joy (deft link-boy!) lit his lamps in each of her eyes as
+I entered. As if I had been her sun, her spring, lo! blushing roses
+mantled in her cheek! Seventy-three ladies, as I entered, opened their
+fire upon me, and stunned me with cross-questions, regarding my
+adventures in the camp—_she_, as she saw me, gave a faint scream (the
+sweetest, sure, that ever gurgled through the throat of a woman!) then
+started up—then made as if she would sit down—then moved backwards—then
+tottered forwards—then tumbled into my—Psha! why recall, why attempt to
+describe that delicious—that passionate greeting of two young hearts?
+What was the surrounding crowd to _us?_ What cared we for the sneers of
+the men, the titters of the jealous women, the shrill “Upon my word!”
+of the elder Miss Bulcher, and the loud expostulations of Belinda’s
+mamma? The brave girl loved me, and wept in my arms. “Goliah! my
+Goliah!” said she, “my brave, my beautiful, _thou_ art returned, and
+hope comes back with thee. Oh! who can tell the anguish of my soul,
+during this dreadful dreadful night!” Other similar ejaculations of
+love and joy she uttered; and if I _had_ perilled life in her service,
+if I _did_ believe that hope of escape there was none, so exquisite was
+the moment of our meeting, that I forgot all else in this overwhelming
+joy!
+
+[The Major’s description of this meeting, which lasted at the very most
+not ten seconds, occupies thirteen pages of writing. We have been
+compelled to dock off twelve-and-a-half; for the whole passage, though
+highly creditable to his feelings, might possibly be tedious to the
+reader.]
+
+As I said, the ladies and gentlemen were inclined to sneer, and were
+giggling audibly. I led the dear girl to a chair, and, scowling round
+with a tremendous fierceness, which those who know me know I can
+sometimes put on, I shouted out, “Hark ye! men and women—I am this
+lady’s truest knight—her husband I hope one day to be. I am commander,
+too, in this fort—the enemy is without it; another word of
+mockery—another glance of scorn—and, by Heaven, I will hurl every man
+and woman from the battlements, a prey to the ruffianly Holkar!” This
+quieted them. I am a man of my word, and none of them stirred or looked
+disrespectfully from that moment.
+
+It was now _my_ turn to make _them_ look foolish. Mrs.
+Vandegobbleschroy (whose unfailing appetite is pretty well known to
+every person who has been in India) cried, “Well, Captain Gahagan, your
+ball has been so pleasant, and the supper was despatched so long ago,
+that myself and the ladies would be very glad of a little breakfast.”
+And Mrs. Van giggled as if she had made a very witty and reasonable
+speech. “Oh! breakfast, breakfast, by all means,” said the rest; “we
+really are dying for a warm cup of tea.”
+
+“Is it bohay tay or souchong tay that you’d like, ladies?” says I.
+
+“Nonsense, you silly man; any tea you like,” said fat Mrs. Van.
+
+“What do you say, then, to some prime _gunpowder?_” Of course they said
+it was the very thing.
+
+“And do you like hot rowls or cowld—muffins or crumpets—fresh butter or
+salt? And you, gentlemen, what do you say to some ilegant
+divvled-kidneys for yourselves, and just a trifle of grilled turkeys,
+and a couple of hundthred new-laid eggs for the ladies?”
+
+“Pooh, pooh! be it as you will, my dear fellow,” answered they all.
+
+“But stop,” says I. “O ladies, O ladies! O gentlemen, gentlemen! that
+you should ever have come to the quarters of Goliah Gahagan, and he
+been without—”
+
+“What?” said they, in a breath.
+
+“Alas! alas! I have not got a single stick of chocolate in the whole
+house.”
+
+“Well, well, we can do without it.”
+
+“Or a single pound of coffee.”
+
+“Never mind; let that pass too.” (Mrs. Van and the rest were beginning
+to look alarmed.)
+
+“And about the kidneys—now I remember, the black divvles outside the
+fort have seized upon all the sheep; and how are we to have kidneys
+without them?” (Here there was a slight o-o-o!)
+
+“And with regard to the milk and crame, it may be remarked that the
+cows are likewise in pawn, and not a single drop can be had for money
+or love: but we can beat up eggs, you know, in the tay, which will be
+just as good.”
+
+“Oh! just as good.”
+
+“Only the divvle’s in the luck, there’s not a fresh egg to be had— no,
+nor a fresh chicken,” continued I, “nor a stale one either; not a
+tayspoonful of souchong, nor a thimbleful of bohay; nor the laste taste
+in life of butther, salt or fresh; nor hot rowls or cowld!”
+
+“In the name of Heaven!” said Mrs. Van, growing very pale, “what is
+there, then?”
+
+“Ladies and gentlemen, I’ll tell you what there is now,” shouted I.
+“There’s
+
+    “Two drumsticks of fowls, and a bone of ham.
+    Fourteen bottles of ginger-beer,” &c. &c. &c.
+
+And I went through the whole list of eatables as before, ending with
+the ham-sandwiches and the pot of jelly.
+
+“Law! Mr. Gahagan,” said Mrs. Colonel Vandegobbleschroy, “give me the
+ham-sandwiches—I must manage to breakfast off them.”
+
+And you should have heard the pretty to-do there was at this modest
+proposition! Of course I did not accede to it—why should I? I was the
+commander of the fort, and intended to keep these three very sandwiches
+for the use of myself and my dear Belinda. “Ladies,” said I, “there are
+in this fort one hundred and twenty- six souls, and this is all the
+food which is to last us during the siege. Meat there is none—of drink
+there is a tolerable quantity; and at one o’clock punctually, a glass
+of wine and one olive shall be served out to each woman: the men will
+receive two glasses, and an olive and a fig—and this must be your food
+during the siege. Lord Lake cannot be absent more than three days; and
+if he be—why, still there is a chance—why do I say a chance?—_a
+certainty_ of escaping from the hands of these ruffians.”
+
+“Oh, name it, name it, dear Captain Gahagan!” screeched the whole covey
+at a breath.
+
+“It lies,” answered I, “in the _powder magazine_. I will blow this
+fort, and all it contains, to atoms, ere it becomes the prey of
+Holkar.”
+
+The women, at this, raised a squeal that might have been heard in
+Holkar’s camp, and fainted in different directions; but my dear Belinda
+whispered in my ear, “Well done, thou noble knight! bravely said, my
+heart’s Goliah!” I felt I was right: I could have blown her up twenty
+times for the luxury of that single moment! “And now, ladies,” said I,
+“I must leave you. The two chaplains will remain with you to administer
+professional consolation—the other gentlemen will follow me upstairs to
+the ramparts, where I shall find plenty of work for them.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+The Escape
+
+
+Loth as they were, these gentlemen had nothing for it but to obey, and
+they accordingly followed me to the ramparts, where I proceeded to
+review my men. The fort, in my absence, had been left in command of
+Lieutenant Macgillicuddy, a countryman of my own (with whom, as may be
+seen in an early chapter of my memoirs, I had an affair of honour); and
+the prisoner Bobbachy Bahawder, whom I had only stunned, never wishing
+to kill him, had been left in charge of that officer. Three of the
+garrison (one of them a man of the Ahmednuggar Irregulars, my own
+body-servant, Ghorumsaug above named) were appointed to watch the
+captive by turns, and never leave him out of their sight. The
+lieutenant was instructed to look to them and to their prisoner; and as
+Bobbachy was severely injured by the blow which I had given him, and
+was, moreover, bound hand and foot, and gagged smartly with cords, I
+considered myself sure of his person.
+
+Macgillicuddy did not make his appearance when I reviewed my little
+force, and the three havildars were likewise absent: this did not
+surprise me, as I had told them not to leave their prisoner; but
+desirous to speak with the lieutenant, I despatched a messenger to him,
+and ordered him to appear immediately.
+
+The messenger came back; he was looking ghastly pale: he whispered some
+information into my ear, which instantly caused me to hasten to the
+apartments where I had caused Bobbachy Bahawder to be confined.
+
+The men had fled;—Bobbachy had fled; and in his place, fancy my
+astonishment when I found—with a rope cutting his naturally wide mouth
+almost into his ears—with a dreadful sabre-cut across his forehead—with
+his legs tied over his head, and his arms tied between his legs—my
+unhappy, my attached friend—Mortimer Macgillicuddy!
+
+He had been in this position for about three hours—it was the very
+position in which I had caused Bobbachy Bahawder to be placed—an
+attitude uncomfortable, it is true, but one which renders escape
+impossible, unless treason aid the prisoner.
+
+I restored the lieutenant to his natural erect position; I poured
+half-a-bottle of whisky down the immensely enlarged orifice of his
+mouth; and when he had been released, he informed me of the
+circumstances that had taken place.
+
+Fool that I was! idiot!—upon my return to the fort, to have been
+anxious about my personal appearance, and to have spent a couple of
+hours in removing the artificial blackening from my beard and
+complexion, instead of going to examine my prisoner—when his escape
+would have been prevented. O foppery, foppery!—it was that cursed love
+of personal appearance which had led me to forget my duty to my
+general, my country, my monarch, and my own honour!
+
+Thus it was that the escape took place:- My own fellow of the
+Irregulars, whom I had summoned to dress me, performed the operation to
+my satisfaction, invested me with the elegant uniform of my corps, and
+removed the Pitan’s disguise, which I had taken from the back of the
+prostrate Bobbachy Bahawder. What did the rogue do next?—Why, he
+carried back the dress to the Bobbachy—he put it, once more, on its
+right owner; he and his infernal black companions (who had been won
+over by the Bobbachy with promises of enormous reward) gagged
+Macgillicuddy, who was going the rounds, and then marched with the
+Indian coolly up to the outer gate, and gave the word. The sentinel,
+thinking it was myself, who had first come in, and was as likely to go
+out again—(indeed my rascally valet said that Gahagan Sahib was about
+to go out with him and his two companions to reconnoitre)—opened the
+gates, and off they went!
+
+This accounted for the confusion of my valet when I entered!—and for
+the scoundrel’s speech, that the lieutenant had _just been the
+rounds;_—he _had_, poor fellow, and had been seized and bound in this
+cruel way. The three men, with their liberated prisoner, had just been
+on the point of escape, when my arrival disconcerted them: I had
+changed the guard at the gate (whom they had won over likewise); and
+yet, although they had overcome poor Mac, and although they were ready
+for the start, they had positively no means for effecting their escape,
+until I was ass enough to put means in their way. Fool! fool! thrice
+besotted fool that I was, to think of my own silly person when I should
+have been occupied solely with my public duty.
+
+From Macgillicuddy’s incoherent accounts, as he was gasping from the
+effects of the gag and the whisky he had taken to revive him, and from
+my own subsequent observations, I learned this sad story. A sudden and
+painful thought struck me—my precious box!—I rushed back, I found that
+box—I have it still. Opening it, there, where I had left ingots, sacks
+of bright tomauns, kopeks and rupees, strings of diamonds as big as
+ducks’ eggs, rubies as red as the lips of my Belinda, countless strings
+of pearls, amethysts, emeralds, piles upon piles of bank-notes—I
+found—a piece of paper! with a few lines in the Sanscrit language,
+which are thus, word for word, translated:-
+
+“EPIGRAM.
+
+(_On disappointing a certain Major_.)
+
+    “The conquering lion return’d with his prey,
+        And safe in his cavern he set it;
+    The sly little fox stole the booty away,
+    And, as he escaped, to the lion did say,
+        ‘_Aha!_ don’t you wish you may get it?’”
+
+Confusion! Oh, how my blood boiled as I read these cutting lines. I
+stamped,—I swore,—I don’t know to what insane lengths my rage might
+have carried me, had not at this moment a soldier rushed in, screaming,
+“The enemy, the enemy!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+The Captive
+
+
+It was high time, indeed, that I should make my appearance. Waving my
+sword with one hand and seizing my telescope with the other, I at once
+frightened and examined the enemy. Well they knew when they saw that
+flamingo-plume floating in the breeze—that awful figure standing in the
+breach—that waving war-sword sparkling in the sky—well, I say, they
+knew the name of the humble individual who owned the sword, the plume,
+and the figure. The ruffians were mustered in front, the cavalry
+behind. The flags were flying, the drums, gongs, tambourines,
+violoncellos, and other instruments of Eastern music, raised in the air
+a strange barbaric melody; the officers (yatabals), mounted on white
+dromedaries, were seen galloping to and fro, carrying to the advancing
+hosts the orders of Holkar.
+
+You see that two sides of the fort of Futtyghur (rising as it does on a
+rock that is almost perpendicular) are defended by the Burrumpooter
+river, two hundred feet deep at this point, and a thousand yards wide,
+so that I had no fear about them attacking me in _that_ quarter. My
+guns, therefore (with their six-and-thirty miserable charges of shot),
+were dragged round to the point at which I conceived Holkar would be
+most likely to attack me. I was in a situation that I did not dare to
+fire, except at such times as I could kill a hundred men by a single
+discharge of a cannon; so the attacking party marched and marched, very
+strongly, about a mile and a half off, the elephants marching without
+receiving the slightest damage from us, until they had come to within
+four hundred yards of our walls (the rogues knew all the secrets of our
+weakness, through the betrayal of the dastardly Ghorumsaug, or they
+never would have ventured so near). At that distance—it was about the
+spot where the Futtyghur hill began gradually to rise—the invading
+force stopped; the elephants drew up in a line, at right angles with
+our wall (the fools! they thought they should expose themselves too
+much by taking a position parallel to it); the cavalry halted too,
+and—after the deuce’s own flourish of trumpets and banging of gongs, to
+be sure,—somebody, in a flame-coloured satin dress, with an immense
+jewel blazing in his pugree (that looked through my telescope like a
+small but very bright planet), got up from the back of one of the very
+biggest elephants, and began a speech.
+
+The elephants were, as I said, in a line formed with admirable
+precision, about three hundred of them. The following little diagram
+will explain matters:-
+
+.......   G |
+E           |
+            | F
+
+_E_ is the line of elephants. _F_ is the wall of the fort. _G_ a gun in
+the fort. _Now_ the reader will see what I did.
+
+The elephants were standing, their trunks waggling to and fro
+gracefully before them; and I, with superhuman skill and activity,
+brought the gun _G_ (a devilish long brass gun) to bear upon them.  I
+pointed it myself; bang! it went, and what was the consequence? Why,
+this:-
+
+  x
+.......   G |
+E           |
+            | F
+
+_F_ is the fort, as before. _G_ is the gun, as before. _E_, the
+elephants, as we have previously seen them. What then is x? x _is the
+line taken by the ball fired from_ G, which took off _one hundred and
+thirty-four elephants’_ trunks, and only spent itself in the tusk of a
+very old animal, that stood the hundred and thirty-fifth!
+
+I say that such a shot was never fired before or since; that a gun was
+never pointed in such a way. Suppose I had been a common man, and
+contented myself with firing bang at the head of the first animal? An
+ass would have done it, prided himself had he hit his mark, and what
+would have been the consequence? Why, that the ball might have killed
+two elephants and wounded a third; but here, probably, it would have
+stopped, and done no further mischief. The _trunk_ was the place at
+which to aim; there are no bones there; and away, consequently, went
+the bullet, shearing, as I have said, through one hundred and
+thirty-five probosces. Heavens! what a howl there was when the shot
+took effect! What a sudden stoppage of Holkar’s speech! What a hideous
+snorting of elephants! What a rush backwards was made by the whole
+army, as if some demon was pursuing them!
+
+Away they went. No sooner did I see them in full retreat, than, rushing
+forward myself, I shouted to my men, “My friends, yonder lies your
+dinner!” We flung open the gates—we tore down to the spot where the
+elephants had fallen: seven of them were killed; and of those that
+escaped to die of their hideous wounds elsewhere, most had left their
+trunks behind them. A great quantity of them we seized; and I myself,
+cutting up with my scimitar a couple of the fallen animals, as a
+butcher would a calf, motioned to the men to take the pieces back to
+the fort, where barbecued elephant was served round for dinner, instead
+of the miserable allowance of an olive and a glass of wine, which I had
+promised to my female friends, in my speech to them. The animal
+reserved for the ladies was a young white one—the fattest and tenderest
+I ever ate in my life: they are very fair eating, but the flesh has an
+India-rubber flavour, which, until one is accustomed to it, is
+unpalatable.
+
+It was well that I had obtained this supply, for, during my absence on
+the works, Mrs. Vandegobbleschroy and one or two others had forced
+their way into the supper-room, and devoured every morsel of the
+garrison larder, with the exception of the cheeses, the olives, and the
+wine, which were locked up in my own apartment, before which stood a
+sentinel. Disgusting Mrs. Van! When I heard of her gluttony, I had
+almost a mind to eat _her_. However, we made a very comfortable dinner
+off the barbecued steaks, and when everybody had done, had the comfort
+of knowing that there was enough for one meal more.
+
+The next day, as I expected, the enemy attacked us in great force,
+attempting to escalade the fort; but by the help of my guns, and my
+good sword, by the distinguished bravery of Lieutenant Macgillicuddy
+and the rest of the garrison, we beat this attack off completely, the
+enemy sustaining a loss of seven hundred men. We were victorious; but
+when another attack was made, what were we to do? We had still a little
+powder left, but had fired off all the shot, stones, iron-bars, &c. in
+the garrison! On this day, too, we devoured the last morsel of our
+food: I shall never forget Mrs. Vandegobbleschroy’s despairing look, as
+I saw her sitting alone, attempting to make some impression on the
+little white elephant’s roasted tail.
+
+The third day the attack was repeated. The resources of genius are
+never at an end. Yesterday I had no ammunition; to-day, I discovered
+charges sufficient for two guns, and two swivels, which were much
+longer, but had bores of about blunderbuss size.
+
+This time my friend Loll Mahommed, who had received, as the reader may
+remember, such a bastinadoing for my sake, headed the attack. The poor
+wretch could not walk, but he was carried in an open palanquin, and
+came on waving his sword, and cursing horribly in his Hindustan jargon.
+Behind him came troops of matchlock-men, who picked off every one of
+our men who showed their noses above the ramparts; and a great host of
+blackamoors with scaling-ladders, bundles to fill the ditch, fascines,
+gabions, culverins, demilunes, counterscarps, and all the other
+appurtenances of offensive war.
+
+On they came; my guns and men were ready for them. You will ask how my
+pieces were loaded? I answer, that though my garrison were without
+food, I knew my duty as an officer, and _had put the two Dutch cheeses
+into the two guns, and had crammed the contents of a bottle of olives
+into each swivel_.
+
+They advanced,—whish! went one of the Dutch cheeses,—bang! went the
+other. Alas! they did little execution. In their first contact with an
+opposing body, they certainly floored it; but they became at once like
+so much Welsh-rabbit, and did no execution beyond the man whom they
+struck down.
+
+“Hogree, pogree, wongree-fum (praise to Allah and the forty-nine
+Imaums!)” shouted out the ferocious Loll Mahommed when he saw the
+failure of my shot. “Onward, sons of the Prophet! the infidel has no
+more ammunition. A hundred thousand lakhs of rupees to the man who
+brings me Gahagan’s head!”
+
+His men set up a shout, and rushed forward—he, to do him justice, was
+at the very head, urging on his own palanquin-bearers, and poking them
+with the tip of his scimitar. They came panting up the hill: I was
+black with rage, but it was the cold concentrated rage of despair.
+“Macgillicuddy,” said I, calling that faithful officer, “you know where
+the barrels of powder are?” He did. “You know the use to make of them?”
+He did. He grasped my hand. “Goliah,” said he, “farewell! I swear that
+the fort shall be in atoms, as soon as yonder unbelievers have carried
+it. Oh, my poor mother!” added the gallant youth, as sighing, yet
+fearless, he retired to his post.
+
+I gave one thought to my blessed, my beautiful Belinda, and then,
+stepping into the front, took down one of the swivels;—a shower of
+matchlock balls came whizzing round my head. I did not heed them.
+
+I took the swivel, and aimed coolly. Loll Mahommed, his palanquin, and
+his men, were now not above two hundred yards from the fort. Loll was
+straight before me, gesticulating and shouting to his men. I
+fired—bang!!!
+
+I aimed so true, that _one hundred and seventeen best Spanish olives
+were lodged in a lump in the face of the unhappy Loll Mahommed_. The
+wretch, uttering a yell the most hideous and unearthly I ever heard,
+fell back dead; the frightened bearers flung down the palanquin and
+ran—the whole host ran as one man: their screams might be heard for
+leagues. “Tomasha, tomasha,” they cried, “it is enchantment!” Away they
+fled, and the victory a third time was ours. Soon as the fight was
+done, I flew back to my Belinda. We had eaten nothing for twenty-four
+hours, but I forgot hunger in the thought of once more beholding _her!_
+
+The sweet soul turned towards me with a sickly smile as I entered, and
+almost fainted in my arms; but alas! it was not love which caused in
+her bosom an emotion so strong—it was hunger! “Oh! my Goliah,”
+whispered she, “for three days I have not tasted food—I could not eat
+that horrid elephant yesterday; but now—oh! Heaven!—” She could say no
+more, but sank almost lifeless on my shoulder. I administered to her a
+trifling dram of rum, which revived her for a moment, and then rushed
+downstairs, determined that if it were a piece of my own leg, she
+should still have something to satisfy her hunger. Luckily I remembered
+that three or four elephants were still lying in the field, having been
+killed by us in the first action, two days before. Necessity, thought
+I, has no law; my adorable girl must eat elephant, until she can get
+something better.
+
+I rushed into the court where the men were, for the most part,
+assembled. “Men,” said I, “our larder is empty; we must fill it as we
+did the day before yesterday. Who will follow Gahagan on a foraging
+party?” I expected that, as on former occasions, every man would offer
+to accompany me.
+
+To my astonishment, not a soul moved—a murmur arose among the troops;
+and at last one of the oldest and bravest came forward.
+
+“Captain,” he said, “it is of no use; we cannot feed upon elephants for
+ever; we have not a grain of powder left, and must give up the fort
+when the attack is made to-morrow. We may as well be prisoners now as
+then, and we won’t go elephant-hunting any more.”
+
+“Ruffian!” I said, “he who first talks of surrender, dies!” and I cut
+him down. “Is there anyone else who wishes to speak?”
+
+No one stirred.
+
+“Cowards! miserable cowards!” shouted I; “what, you dare not move for
+fear of death at the hands of those wretches who even now fled before
+your arms—what, do I say _your_ arms?—before _mine!_—alone I did it;
+and as alone I routed the foe, alone I will victual the fortress! Ho!
+open the gate!”
+
+I rushed out; not a single man would follow. The bodies of the
+elephants that we had killed still lay on the ground where they had
+fallen, about four hundred yards from the fort. I descended calmly the
+hill, a very steep one, and coming to the spot, took my pick of the
+animals, choosing a tolerably small and plump one, of about thirteen
+feet high, which the vultures had respected. I threw this animal over
+my shoulders, and made for the fort.
+
+As I marched up the acclivity, whizz—piff—whirr! came the balls over my
+head; and pitter-patter, pitter-patter! they fell on the body of the
+elephant like drops of rain. The enemy were behind me; I knew it, and
+quickened my pace. I heard the gallop of their horse: they came nearer,
+nearer; I was within a hundred yards of the fort—seventy—fifty! I
+strained every nerve; I panted with the superhuman exertion—I ran—could
+a man run very fast with such a tremendous weight on his shoulders?
+
+Up came the enemy; fifty horsemen were shouting and screaming at my
+tail. O Heaven! five yards more—one moment—and I am saved. It is done—I
+strain the last strain—I make the last step—I fling forward my precious
+burden into the gate opened wide to receive me and it, and—I fall! The
+gate thunders to, and I am left _on the outside!_ Fifty knives are
+gleaming before my bloodshot eyes—fifty black hands are at my throat,
+when a voice exclaims, “Stop!—kill him not, it is Gujputi!” A film came
+over my eyes—exhausted nature would bear no more.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+Surprise of Futtyghur
+
+
+When I awoke from the trance into which I had fallen, I found myself in
+a bath, surrounded by innumerable black faces; and a Hindoo pothukoor
+(whence our word apothecary) feeling my pulse and looking at me with an
+air of sagacity.
+
+“Where am I?” I exclaimed, looking round and examining the strange
+faces, and the strange apartment which met my view. “Bekhusm!” said the
+apothecary. “Silence! Gahagan Sahib is in the hands of those who know
+his valour, and will save his life.”
+
+“Know my valour, slave? Of course you do,” said I; “but the fort— the
+garrison—the elephant—Belinda, my love—my darling— Macgillicuddy—the
+scoundrelly mutineers—the deal bo- “
+
+I could say no more; the painful recollections pressed so heavily upon
+my poor shattered mind and frame, that both failed once more. I fainted
+again, and I know not how long I lay insensible.
+
+Again, however, I came to my senses: the pothukoor applied
+restoratives, and after a slumber of some hours I awoke, much
+refreshed. I had no wound; my repeated swoons had been brought on (as
+indeed well they might) by my gigantic efforts in carrying the elephant
+up a steep hill a quarter of a mile in length. Walking, the task is bad
+enough: but running, it is the deuce; and I would recommend any of my
+readers who may be disposed to try and carry a dead elephant, never, on
+any account, to go a pace of more than five miles an hour.
+
+Scarcely was I awake, when I heard the clash of arms at my door
+(plainly indicating that sentinels were posted there), and a single old
+gentleman, richly habited, entered the room. Did my eyes deceive me? I
+had surely seen him before. No—yes—no—yes—it _was_ he: the snowy white
+beard, the mild eyes, the nose flattened to a jelly, and level with the
+rest of the venerable face, proclaimed him at once to be—Saadut Alee
+Beg Bimbukchee, Holkar’s Prime Vizier; whose nose, as the reader may
+recollect, his Highness had flattened with his kaleawn during my
+interview with him in the Pitan’s disguise. I now knew my fate but too
+well—I was in the hands of Holkar.
+
+Saadut Alee Beg Bimbukchee slowly advanced towards me, and with a mild
+air of benevolence which distinguished that excellent man (he was torn
+to pieces by wild horses the year after, on account of a difference
+with Holkar), he came to my bedside and, taking gently my hand, said,
+“Life and death, my son, are not ours. Strength is deceitful, valour is
+unavailing, fame is only wind—the nightingale sings of the rose all
+night—where is the rose in the morning? Booch, booch! it is withered by
+a frost. The rose makes remarks regarding the nightingale, and where is
+that delightful song-bird? Pena-bekhoda, he is netted, plucked,
+spitted, and roasted! Who knows how misfortune comes? It has come to
+Gahagan Gujputi!”
+
+“It is well,” said I, stoutly, and in the Malay language. “Gahagan
+Gujputi will bear it like a man.”
+
+“No doubt—like a wise man and a brave one; but there is no lane so long
+to which there is not a turning, no night so black to which there comes
+not a morning. Icy winter is followed by merry springtime—grief is
+often succeeded by joy.”
+
+“Interpret, O riddler!” said I; “Gahagan Khan is no reader of
+puzzles—no prating mollah. Gujputi loves not words, but swords.”
+
+“Listen then, O Gujputi: you are in Holkar’s power.”
+
+“I know it.”
+
+“You will die by the most horrible tortures to-morrow morning.”
+
+“I dare say.”
+
+“They will tear your teeth from your jaws, your nails from your
+fingers, and your eyes from your head.”
+
+“Very possibly.”
+
+“They will flay you alive, and then burn you.”
+
+“Well; they can’t do any more.”
+
+“They will seize upon every man and woman in yonder fort”—it was not
+then taken!—“and repeat upon them the same tortures.”
+
+“Ha! Belinda! Speak—how can all this be avoided?”
+
+“Listen. Gahagan loves the moon-face called Belinda.”
+
+“He does, Vizier, to distraction.”
+
+“Of what rank is he in the Koompani’s army?”
+
+“A captain.”
+
+“A miserable captain—oh, shame! Of what creed is he?”
+
+“I am an Irishman, and a Catholic.”
+
+“But he has not been very particular about his religious duties?”
+
+“Alas, no!”
+
+“He has not been to his mosque for these twelve years?”
+
+“’Tis too true.”
+
+“Hearken now, Gahagan Khan. His Highness Prince Holkar has sent me to
+thee. You shall have the moon-face for your wife—your second wife, that
+is;—the first shall be the incomparable Puttee Rooge, who loves you to
+madness;—with Puttee Rooge, who is the wife, you shall have the wealth
+and rank of Bobbachy Bahawder, of whom his Highness intends to get rid.
+You shall be second in command of his Highness’s forces. Look, here is
+his commission signed with the celestial seal, and attested by the
+sacred names of the forty-nine Imaums. You have but to renounce your
+religion and your service, and all these rewards are yours.”
+
+He produced a parchment, signed as he said, and gave it to me (it was
+beautifully written in Indian ink: I had it for fourteen years, but a
+rascally valet, seeing it very dirty, _washed_ it, forsooth, and washed
+off every bit of the writing). I took it calmly, and said, “This is a
+tempting offer. O Vizier, how long wilt thou give me to consider of
+it?”
+
+After a long parley, he allowed me six hours, when I promised to give
+him an answer. My mind, however, was made up—as soon as he was gone, I
+threw myself on the sofa and fell asleep.
+
+At the end of the six hours the Vizier came back: two people were with
+him; one, by his martial appearance, I knew to be Holkar, the other I
+did not recognise. It was about midnight.
+
+“Have you considered?” said the Vizier, as he came to my couch.
+
+“I have,” said I, sitting up,—I could not stand, for my legs were tied,
+and my arms fixed in a neat pair of steel handcuffs. “I have,” said I,
+“unbelieving dogs! I have. Do you think to pervert a Christian
+gentleman from his faith and honour? Ruffian blackamoors! do your
+worst; heap tortures on this body, they cannot last long. Tear me to
+pieces: after you have torn me into a certain number of pieces, I shall
+not feel it; and if I did, if each torture could last a life, if each
+limb were to feel the agonies of a whole body, what then? I would bear
+all—all—all— all—all—ALL!” My breast heaved—my form dilated—my eye
+flashed as I spoke these words. “Tyrants!” said I, “dulce et decorum
+est pro patria mori.” Having thus clinched the argument, I was silent.
+
+The venerable. Grand Vizier turned away; I saw a tear trickling down
+his cheeks.
+
+“What a constancy!” said he. “Oh, that such beauty and such bravery
+should be doomed so soon to quit the earth!”
+
+His tall companion only sneered and said, “_And Belinda_”—
+
+“Ha!” said I, “ruffian, be still!—Heaven will protect her spotless
+innocence. Holkar, I know thee, and thou knowest _me_ too! Who, with
+his single sword, destroyed thy armies? Who, with his pistol, cleft in
+twain thy nose-ring? Who slew thy generals? Who slew thy elephants?
+Three hundred mighty beasts went forth to battle: of these _I_ slew one
+hundred and thirty-five! Dog, coward, ruffian, tyrant, unbeliever!
+Gahagan hates thee, spurns thee, spits on thee!”
+
+Holkar, as I made these uncomplimentary remarks, gave a scream of rage,
+and, drawing his scimitar, rushed on to despatch me at once (it was the
+very thing I wished for), when the third person sprang forward and,
+seizing his arm, cried -
+
+“Papa! oh, save him!” It was Puttee Rooge! “Remember,” continued she,
+“his misfortunes—remember, oh, remember my—love!”—and here she blushed,
+and putting one finger into her mouth, and hanging down her head,
+looked the very picture of modest affection.
+
+Holkar sulkily sheathed his scimitar, and muttered, “’Tis better as it
+is; had I killed him now, I had spared him the torture. None of this
+shameless fooling, Puttee Rooge,” continued the tyrant, dragging her
+away. “Captain Gahagan dies three hours from hence.” Puttee Rooge gave
+one scream and fainted—her father and the Vizier carried her off
+between them; nor was I loth to part with her, for, with all her love,
+she was as ugly as the deuce.
+
+They were gone—my fate was decided. I had but three hours more of life:
+so I flung myself again on the sofa, and fell profoundly asleep. As it
+may happen to any of my readers to be in the same situation, and to be
+hanged themselves, let me earnestly entreat them to adopt this plan of
+going to sleep, which I for my part have repeatedly found to be
+successful. It saves unnecessary annoyance, it passes away a great deal
+of unpleasant time, and it prepares one to meet like a man the coming
+catastrophe.
+
+Three o’clock came: the sun was at this time making his appearance in
+the heavens, and with it came the guards, who were appointed to conduct
+me to the torture. I woke, rose, was carried out, and was set on the
+very white donkey on which Loll Mahommed was conducted through the camp
+after he was bastinadoed. Bobbachy Bahawder rode behind me, restored to
+his rank and state; troops of cavalry hemmed us in on all sides; my ass
+was conducted by the common executioner: a crier went forward, shouting
+out, “Make way for the destroyer of the faithful—he goes to bear the
+punishment of his crimes.” We came to the fatal plain: it was the very
+spot whence I had borne away the elephant, and in full sight of the
+fort. I looked towards it. Thank Heaven! King George’s banner waved on
+it still—a crowd were gathered on the walls—the men, the dastards who
+had deserted me—and women, too. Among the latter I thought I
+distinguished _one_ who—O gods! the thought turned me sick—I trembled
+and looked pale for the first time.
+
+“He trembles! he turns pale,” shouted out Bobbachy Bahawder,
+ferociously exulting over his conquered enemy.
+
+“Dog!” shouted I—(I was sitting with my head to the donkey’s tail, and
+so looked the Bobbachy full in the face)—“not so pale as you looked
+when I felled you with this arm—not so pale as your women looked when I
+entered your harem!” Completely chop-fallen, the Indian ruffian was
+silent: at any rate, I had done for _him_.
+
+We arrived at the place of execution. A stake, a couple of feet thick
+and eight high, was driven in the grass: round the stake, about seven
+feet from the ground, was an iron ring, to which were attached two
+fetters; in these my wrists were placed. Two or three executioners
+stood near, with strange-looking instruments: others were blowing at a
+fire, over which was a cauldron, and in the embers were stuck prongs
+and other instruments of iron.
+
+The crier came forward and read my sentence. It was the same in effect
+as that which had been hinted to me the day previous by the Grand
+Vizier. I confess I was too agitated to catch every word that was
+spoken.
+
+Holkar himself, on a tall dromedary, was at a little distance. The
+Grand Vizier came up to me—it was his duty to stand by, and see the
+punishment performed. “It is yet time!” said he.
+
+I nodded my head, but did not answer.
+
+The Vizier cast up to heaven a look of inexpressible anguish, and with
+a voice choking with emotion, said, “_Executioner—do—your—duty!_”
+
+The horrid man advanced—he whispered sulkily in the ears of the Grand
+Vizier, “_Guggly ka ghee, hum khedgeree_,” said he, “_the oil does not
+boil yet_—wait one minute.” The assistants blew, the fire blazed, the
+oil was heated. The Vizier drew a few feet aside: taking a large ladle
+full of the boiling liquid, he advanced -
+
+“Whish! bang, bang! pop!” the executioner was dead at my feet, shot
+through the head; the ladle of scalding oil had been dashed in the face
+of the unhappy Grand Vizier, who lay on the plain, howling. “Whish!
+bang! pop! Hurrah!—charge!—forwards!—cut them down!—no quarter!”
+
+I saw—yes, no, yes, no, yes!—I saw regiment upon regiment of galloping
+British horsemen riding over the ranks of the flying natives. First of
+the host, I recognised, O Heaven! my AHMEDNUGGAR IRREGULARS! On came
+the gallant line of black steeds and horsemen; swift swift before them
+rode my officers in yellow—Glogger, Pappendick, and Stuffle; their
+sabres gleamed in the sun, their voices rung in the air. “D— them!”
+they cried, “give it them, boys!” A strength supernatural thrilled
+through my veins at that delicious music: by one tremendous effort, I
+wrested the post from its foundation, five feet in the ground. I could
+not release my hands from the fetters, it is true; but, grasping the
+beam tightly, I sprung forward—with one blow I levelled the five
+executioners in the midst of the fire, their fall upsetting the
+scalding oil-can; with the next, I swept the bearers of Bobbachy’s
+palanquin off their legs; with the third, I caught that chief himself
+in the small of the back, and sent him flying on to the sabres of my
+advancing soldiers!
+
+The next minute, Glogger and Stuffle were in my arms, Pappendick
+leading on the Irregulars. Friend and foe in that wild chase had swept
+far away. We were alone: I was freed from my immense bar; and ten
+minutes afterwards, when Lord Lake trotted up with his staff, he found
+me sitting on it.
+
+“Look at Gahagan,” said his Lordship. “Gentlemen, did I not tell you we
+should be sure to find him _at his post?_”
+
+The gallant old nobleman rode on: and this was the famous BATTLE OF
+FURRUCKABAD, or SURPRISE OF FUTTYGHUR, fought on the 17th of November,
+1804.
+
+About a month afterwards, the following announcement appeared in the
+_Boggleywollah Hurkaru_ and other Indian papers:-
+
+“Married, on the 25th of December, at Futtyghur, by the Rev. Dr.
+Snorter, Captain Goliah O’Grady Gahagan, Commanding Irregular Horse,
+Ahmednuggar, to Belinda, second daughter of Major-General Bulcher, C.B.
+His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief gave away the bride; and, after a
+splendid _déjeuner_, the happy pair set off to pass the Mango season at
+Hurrygurrybang. Venus must recollect, however, that Mars must not
+_always_ be at her side. The Irregulars are nothing without their
+leader.”
+
+Such was the paragraph—such the event—the happiest in the existence of
+
+G. O’G. G., M.H.E.I.C.S., C.I.H.A.
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes:
+
+
+ [1] So admirable are the performances of these watches, which will
+ stand in any climate, that I repeatedly heard poor Macgillicuddy
+ relate the following fact. The hours, as it is known, count in Italy
+ from one to twenty-four: _The day Mac landed at Naples his repeater
+ rung the Italian hours, from one to twenty-four;_ as soon as he
+ crossed the Alps it only sounded as usual.—G. O’G. G.
+
+ [2] In my affair with Macgillicuddy, I was fool enough to go out with
+ small swords:- miserable weapons, only fit for tailors.—G. O’G. G.
+
+ [3] The Major certainly offered to leave an old snuff-box at Mr.
+ Cunningham’s office; but it contained no extract from a newspaper, and
+ does not _quite_ prove that he killed a rhinoceros and stormed
+ fourteen entrenchments at the siege of Allyghur.
+
+ [4] The double-jointed camel of Bactria, which the classic reader may
+ recollect is mentioned by Suidas (in his Commentary on the Flight of
+ Darius), is so called by the Mahrattas.
+
+ [5] There is some trifling inconsistency on the Major’s part. Shah
+ Allum was notoriously blind: how, then, could he have seen Gahagan?
+ The thing is manifestly impossible.
+
+ [6] I do not wish to brag of my style of writing, or to pretend that
+ my genius as a writer has not been equalled in former times; but if,
+ in the works of Byron, Scott, Goethe, or Victor Hugo, the reader can
+ find a more beautiful sentence than the above, I will be obliged to
+ him, that is all—I simply say, _I will be obliged to him_.—G. O’G. G.,
+ M.H.E.I.C.S., C.I.H.A.
+
+ [7] The Major has put the most approved language into the mouths of
+ his Indian characters. Bismillah, Barikallah, and so on, according to
+ the novelists, form the very essence of Eastern conversation.
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1935 ***