India was to strike down a man whom all men described as able, and to set up a mere puppet whom all men acknowledged to be a weak fool. The authors of this famous policy seem to have themselves felt shame at their own actions; and, in publishing the Afghan despatches, they suppressed every passage which told against their own decision. There is, unhappily, reason to believe that their conduct in doing so has been imitated on other occasions. But the mutilation of the Afghan despatches seemed specially infamous because it involved the suppression of Burnes's own views, when Burnes was himself dead.1 Macnaghten's mission to Lahore. In the first instance, indeed, even Auckland hesitated to send a British expedition to a remote territory with the curious object of pulling down King Stork and setting up King Log. All that he originally contemplated was to employ Runjeet Singh, the ruler of the Sikhs, to do the work for him. Five years before, Runjeet had connived at a bold attempt which Shah Sooja had made to regain his old throne. The success of this expedition had hung suspended on the doubtful chances of a well-contested battle; and Auckland consequently presumed that, if Shah Sooja, with only Runjeet's moral support, had stood on the verge of success, Shah Sooja, with the active help of Runjeet's soldiers and with the moral support of Britain, would win an easy victory. He decided accordingly on sending a mission to Lahore to secure the co-operation of the Sikhs, and he entrusted the mission to Macnaghten-the able but irresponsible counsellor who had 1 The policy which Auckland pursued was almost forced on him by instructions from home. Melbourne wrote on the 29th October 1838: "Auckland has adopted the course which in the meeting we held at Windsor, where there were seven of us, we agreed to recommend to him; viz., not to follow M'Neill's suggestion of moving into Persia from Bushire, but to take decisive measures in Afghanistan." Melbourne, vol. ii. p. 273. The story of the suppression or mutilation of Burnes's despatches will be found fully told in a debate in 1861. Hansard, vol. clxi. p. 37. Soon after the publication of these despatches an impression prevailed that they had been unfairly dealt with; but the report was contradicted by two Presidents of the Board of Control. In 1851, however, Mr. Kaye published his history of the Afghan War; and, as he had access to the genuine documents, he established the fact beyond dispute; and, in 1859, the real documents were laid before Parliament. stood by his side at Simla. Macnaghten was instructed to propose either that the Sikh army should advance through the passes of the Himalayas on Cabul, while Shah Sooja, aided by a British contingent, should occupy Shikarpore and move on Candahar; or that the Sikhs, acting alone, should themselves undertake the whole dangers and win the whole glory of the expedition. Runjeet declined the last, but grasped at the first, of these alternatives; and Auckland consequently learned that, if Shah Sooja were to be restored at all, the restoration would have to be effected by British bayonets.1 The treaty The reluctance of Runjeet to act alone did not make Macnaghten pause. Impatient of the slight delays, which arose from the natural desire of the Sikh to improve his of 26th June own position, on the 26th of June 1838 he put his 1838. signature to the treaty. Under it, Shah Sooja unconditionally abandoned all claim to the Afghan territory in Runjeet's hands; he relinquished any right to the allegiance and tribute of Scinde on the payment to him by the Ameers of Scinde of such a sum as the British Government might fix ; he agreed, out of the sum thus received, to hand over fifteen lacs of rupees to Runjeet Singh; and he undertook to pay a subsidy of two lacs of rupees to the Sikh Government in return for the contingent of 5000 men with which Runjeet Singh engaged to assist him.2 The conditions of the treaty were thus chiefly in favour of Runjeet Singh. Even Shah Sooja-a miserable exile in British India—had the courage to demur to some of them. His remonstrances, however, naturally counted for nothing. He could not afford to refuse the half-loaf which was offered to him, and in the middle of July put his signature to the treaty. A few days after Shah Sooja had signed the memorable treaty, Burnes, in obedience to Auckland's orders, arrived at Simla. He had already written to Macnaghten and urged seq. 1 Kaye's Afghan War, vol. i. p. 315; cf. Durand's Afghan War, p. 67 et 2 The treaty will be found in Parl. Papers, Correspondence relating to Scinde, p. 6. It is reprinted, but not quite accurately, Kaye, vol. i. p. 319. 8 Ibid., p. 338. him to deal with Dost Mahommed and abandon Shah Sooja. On his arrival he repeated this advice. But the Burnes reaches Simla. time was already gone for a policy of this character, and all that Burnes could do was to plead that, if Shah Sooja were restored at all, he should be restored to a strong kingdom. Even this advice fell like an unheeded warning on Auckland and his counsellors. They pushed forward their preparations and assembled their troops. On the 1st of October 1838, still at Simla, Auckland issued a fresh proclamation in which he recapitulated the objects of his policy. Shah Sooja-so ran the concluding The proparagraph of a document which has been described clamation of not unjustly as a most disingenuous distortion of 1838. the truth". -"will enter Afghanistan surrounded by his own troops, and will be supported against foreign interference and factious opposition by a British army."1 Foreign interference! What foreign interference had ever been greater than Auckland's? Factious opposition! The faction which Auckland was encountering was a nation for once made of one mind by the Governor-General's policy. 1st October The ink with which the proclamation was written was hardly dry before the whole foundation on which this frail superstructure of a policy had been reared gave The siege way beneath its author. The siege of Herat had of Herat. been the only circumstance which had suggested a British expedition beyond the Indus; and the siege of Herat was raised on the 9th of October. After months of suffering and failure, the Persian army retired from the slender fortifications of the town. A young British officer, Eldred Pottinger, travelling in Asia, had thrown himself into the place, and had sustained the defence by his prudence and animated the garrison by his valour. A small expedition, subsequently despatched from Bombay, which had occupied the little island of Karrack in the Persian Gulf,2 had induced the Persian 1 Kaye, vol. i. pp. 359, 361. 2 It is perhaps worth observing that Ellenborough had contemplated the occupation of Karrack nine years before. Diary, vol. ii. p. 93. For Hobhouse's explanation of the occupation, Hansard, vol. xliv. p. 574. For the occupation, Thornton, vol. vi. p. 131; Kaye, vol. i. p. 271. sovereign, already taught by Pottinger to despair, to give the signal for retreat.1 The scanty excuse which a Persian expedition had offered for Auckland's policy in the spring had disappeared in the autumn. The bugbear of a Russian advance was also being slowly removed. Russia, with characteristic patience, was abandoning her design and modifying her policy. Instead, moreover, of bidding one against the other on the Bosphorus, British and Russian statesmen were again approaching one another, and laying the foundation of the quadrilateral alliance of 1840. In these circumstances the humble instruments who had on either side been employed to promote their countries' interests at Cabul were treated with a lack of consideration which was discreditable to their employers. Burnes's despatches were coolly mutilated; poor Vicovitch was simply disowned. Burnes, perhaps the happier of the two, met a soldier's death; Vicovitch, ignored and thrust aside, blew out his own brains.2 Thus every justification for interference had disappeared. The Persians had withdrawn from Afghanistan; Russian influence had retreated with the Persian battalions; and the interests of Britain-if Britain had any interests at all in these remote districts—were concerned with the preservation of order and not with the destruction of authority. Unfortunately. for Auckland, however, the treaty which he had made with Runjeet Singh, and to which Shah Sooja had acceded, made a policy of non-intervention more difficult. He had not the moral courage to sheathe the sword simply because his object had been secured without using it. Like many weak men, he fancied that his country's reputation depended on the demonstration of its strength and not on the success of its policy; and, with literally no object to secure except the miserable purpose of pulling down one king and setting up another, he plunged into hostilities.3 1 For the siege of Herat, Watson's Persia, pp. 266, 324 seq. 2 For Vicovitch's death, see Kaye, vol. i. p. 200, note. 3 It is worth while adding that some of the highest Indian authorities were opposed to the expedition. For Outram's condemnation of it, see Life of Outram, vol. i. p. 170; for Metcalfe's, Greville, Memoirs, Pt. ii., vol. ii. p. 99. Two armies were collected for the invasion of Afghanistan. One, drawn from the Presidency of Bengal and placed under Sir Willoughby Cotton, was assembled at Ferozepore in the beginning of December 1838. The other, composed of Bombay troops, under Sir J. Keane, to whom the command-in-chief was assigned,1 was instructed to land at Kurrachee and march through Scinde. Scinde. He re Scinde is the territory through which the Indus, after the junction of its five great confluents, finds its way to the sea. Nearly half a century before the Afghan war, the rule in it had passed to Meer Futteh Ali, chief of the Talpores. Futteh Ali divided the country which he had acquired, and conferred portions of it round Khyrpore and Meerpore respectively on relations of his own. tained, however, the lion's share of the possession in his own hands, and he associated with himself his three brothers in its administration. The Ameer of Khyrpore imitated his example. Scinde therefore consisted of three distinct principalities; and at Hyderabad, the capital of the chief state, and at Khyrpore, a plurality of Ameers was associated in the government.2 It was only of recent years that much intercourse had taken place between Scinde and Britain. A factory, established in 1758, was withdrawn in 1775, and in 1799 a new attempt to open a factory at Tatta, on the lower Indus, resulted in failure. In 1809, however, a treaty was concluded with the Ameers by which they consented to exclude Frenchmen from their territory; and this treaty was supplemented in 1820 by another, under which the Ameers engaged not to permit any European or American to settle in their dominions.3 In 1828 Ellen 1 The force was originally placed under the command of Sir H. Fane, Commander-in-Chief in India. Its strength was reduced after the fall of Herat, and the command entrusted to Keane, the Commander-in-Chief of the Bombay Presidency. Kaye's Afghan War, vol. i. p. 378; Havelock's Afghan War, vol. i. p. 55; Durand's Afghan War, p. 92. 2 Thornton's History of India, vol. vi. p. 395; Calcutta Review, vol. vi. p. 570. 3 Ibid. p. 397. Correspondence relating to Scinde, p. i. Napier's Conquest of Scinde, p. 38; Goldsmid's Life of Outram, vol. i. pp. 154-5. |