NEWS ARRIVES OF THE JHELUM AFFAIR.

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able-bodied men in all-constituted the European strength of the station; while there were several ladies with their families, who had disregarded the advice to move down to Lahore. All these were in the power and at the caprice of some 250 mounted troopers, and above 700 armed sepoys. For six weeks, it may truly be said, every man's life was in his hand they were all living, and they felt it too, on the edge of a mine of treason, which might be sprung at any moment, and destroy them all, while they were utterly powerless to avert it. The policy of Brigadier F. Brind, who commanded the station, was throughout to appear to place the fullest confidence in the native troops, for every effective European soldier had been withdrawn for the Column.* To have acted otherwise would only have hastened the catastrophe. To the wisdom of that policy, those six weeks of unbroken quiet are the best testimony. That it at length failed, under irresistible pressure from without, can hardly reflect on his judgment or his courage.

In the course of the 8th, private intelligence reached Mr Monckton, the Deputy-Commissioner, of the attempt to disarm the 14th at Jhelum, and their desperate resistance. It was communicated confidentially to the Brigadier; he felt that probably the fate of the station was now sealed; and no effort they could make would at all avail to ward it off.

The news from Jhelum had also found its way into the lines, probably in an exaggerated report of the *See vol. i., p. 229, note.

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THE SEALKOTE OUTBREAK COMMENCES.

success of the mutineers. By an unhappy coincidence, a trooper of the 9th Cavalry had that day come in on leave from the left wing, and reported that the Column was moving up, had reached Umritsur, and was probably coming on to disarm the Sealkote troops; moreover-which perhaps settled all-a foot-messenger arrived with a letter from the King of Delhi.* Thus did the clouds gather and close in on the night of the 8th of July; and while the residents, ignorant that a more than ordinary danger was at hand, resigned themselves to rest, the traitorous troopers of the 9th Cavalry were planning with the utmost deliberation for their morning work of bloodshed, even to the placing picquets, mounted and armed, on every road by which escape was likely to be attempted, especially the one leading to the fort.

At gun-fire the outbreak commenced.

The main

picquet, which the Brigadier had originally established on the south-west of cantonments (and always retained, as if to impress upon the sepoys his belief that any danger that might befall Sealkote would come from without), marched off without orders to their own lines.~

* An officer of the 46th N. I., on galloping down to the lines, met his pay-havildar, and asked him what the disturbance all meant; the havildar replied that four troopers of the 9th Cavalry had just been through the lines, and said that "the chhuppa (printed letter or circular) had come, and," added the havildar, "what can we do?" Another officer, in his flight, at the village of Tulwundee, was told by a villager that a king's messenger had passed through the day before for Sealkote. One of the sepoys who saved the life of Colonel Farquharson and escorted him to the fort, declared that the names of the 35th L. I. and 46th N. I. were down in the King of Delhi's book as pledged to join in the mutiny so long ago as last January. The chhuppa was doubtless a call on them to fulfil their pledge.

THE SEALKOTE OUTBREAK.

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Shouts and yells were soon heard on the 46th paradeground. The officers, roused from their sleep, were quickly mounted and among their men, whom they found in open mutiny. Brigadier Brind (in whose house Captain Chambers, the cantonment magistrate, and Captain Balmain of the 9th Cavalry, had passed the night for many weeks, keeping alternate watch) soon learned that the crisis had come. Capt. Balmain, relieved of his guard by Capt. Chambers, had just before gun-fire gone to his own house close by, and thrown himself on his bed to snatch a short sleep, when a faithful trooper of the 9th Cavalry rushed in in undress, and told him the men were mounting and "mischief would come." Rousing the Brigadier as he passed, he hastened down to his lines; here he found it hopeless to attempt to restore order; the men were already mounted, and one troop had galloped off to force the jail. Escape was the only course; some of his troopers offered to protect him in the lines, but this he would not hear of. He galloped back to the Brigadier, and urged him to mount and fly to the fort. As if reluctant to leave his post, even when all was over, the Brigadier delayed over some final arrangements; and that delay was fatal. On turning out of his compound-gate, a body of troopers were seen bearing down along the road which led to the fort, pistol in hand; as they passed, all, except three, fired, but without effect; neither the Brigadier nor any of the officers who were with him were touched. The three troopers who had reserved their fire wheeled round. sharp as they passed, and shot at the Brigadier from

behind; a ball entered his back; repeated attempts were now made to cut him down as he rode off; and it was mainly through Captain Balmain, and the other officers who had rallied round him in his retreat, that he was able to reach the fort at all.

On the parade-ground of the 46th, the officers, warned* and entreated by the better disposed of the sepoys, had galloped off in the opposite direction, the road to the fort being no longer open, and reached Goojranwalla; a few stray shots followed them as they passed the lines and one of the guards, but they escaped untouched. Dr Graham, the superintending surgeon, a man whose kindliness of heart towards all classes should have been his safeguard, endeavoured to escape in his buggy across cantonments to the fort, accompanied by his daughter, but some troopers, apparently on the watch for him, cut him off, and shot him down in his carriage. His poor daughter was allowed to proceed unmolested, and escaped into a garden; here she was subsequently discovered by a trooper, who carried her off to the cavalry quarter-guard, where she found Colonel and Mrs Lorn Campbell (the colonel commanding the cavalry), and with them was protected during the day. Dr J. Graham, of the medical depot, was also attacked while driving his carriage towards the fort, and shot down; but Mrs Graham and Mrs Gray, the wife of Lieutenant Gray,

"Jao, Sahib, jao, runj ootha hai" (Go, sir, go, grief has come; or, We are come to grief), said a havildar to the Adjutant Le Gallais. Lieutenant Smith's horse's bridle was seized by a sepoy, who led him off the parade-ground, and implored him to fly.

CAPTAIN BISHOP KILLED.

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adjutant of the artillery division, were suffered to proceed towards the fort. Captain Bishop of the 46th N. I., officiating as brigade major, was the only other victim in cantonments. Driving his wife and children to the fort, he had almost gained it when a trooper overtook him. Bishop, hoping to divert the ruffian's attention from his wife and children, and probably thinking he might also escape himself, sprang off the box and plunged into the ditch which surrounds the fort; the water, however, was too shallow to cover him, and he was soon wounded and cut down. So near to the fort wall was the spot where he was killed, that Captain Balmain, who with the Brigadier and others had already gained it, was on the rampart, and saw the attack on Capt. Bishop; seizing a musket, he fired two or three shots at the trooper, but the distance was too great, and the wretch was not to be intimidated; he did not leave his victim till life was extinct. Mrs Bishop saved herself by driving round to the fort gateway.

Without any defined plan for retreat having been arranged in the event of the sepoys rising, it was generally understood that the fort* would be the rallying-point, as furnishing the nearest asylum; and here the residents of the station had flocked, with the exception, as already noticed, of the officers of the 46th N. I.

* This old building belongs to the Rajah Tej Singh, the old Sikh general. It was perhaps most wise not to give out that this would be the rallying-point, for the only gate into it is in one of the streets of the city itself, and if it had been known that a general rush would have been made here, nothing would have been easier than for the troops to raise the city budmashes, and occupy the street leading to it. The absence of such a plan of retreat thus doubtless saved many lives.