HODSON RECONNOITRES AT NUJUFGHURH.

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India as they actually were, and no doubt they will exert themselves now in good earnest to send out troops; and most likely some are by this time in Bombay, overland.

All is quiet here to-day; and I am glad to see that it is getting very cloudy again. We want more rain, or it will soon be very hot again.

Hodson has gone out. He left last night after mess with a party of Cavalry to reconnoitre and find out what had become of the Bareilly brigade, which some of the villagers said was still out near Nujufghurh, where Nicholson's fight took place the other day. Hodson writes in that they are not out there, or anywhere in the neighbourhood; and it seems not improbable that they have walked off altogether. Hodson still remains out, looking about him.

I send a letter for the old khansamah, which will rejoice his aged heart. Harriott sent it to me yesterday afternoon, having paid the twenty rupees as requested.

All was well at Meerut. The Rifles and Artillery only left on the morning of the 27th, but I believe they will be here on the 2nd or 3rd notwithstanding.

Daly, who is just now in our tent, is pretty well, but has not the use of his arm yet; I think he will go up to Simla after Delhi is taken. Young Walker of the Engineers, who married Brigadier Scott's daughter, has been very unwell, but is better to-day and out of all danger; he is living in the same tent with Daly, and is a particularly nice fellow. He was wounded about six weeks ago. That poor man, Dr Ireland, is getting on wonderfully well. Major Palmer has come down here from Mussoorie; I have not seen him yet.

Hodson has just returned, and reports the mutineers to have returned to Delhi; he has brought in a couple of ammunition wagons of the enemy's from Nujufghurh.

Near 4 P.M., and all quiet.

(Diary) 29th August.-Take a short ride, and meet lots of carts coming in with shells-some five hundred carts, they say. Glad to see 10-inch shells. The siege-train to be in on 2nd. Hodson returned. No signs of enemy; supposed to have returned to Delhi. Norman has a letter from Sir Colin Campbell-positively coming

248

SIEGE-TRAIN AT KURNAUL.

as Commander-in-Chief, and Mansfield as Chief of Staff. Short ride in the evening. The band playing in the lines. Firing as we were at dinner.

CAMP, DELHI CANTONMENTS, Sunday, 30th August. There is little to tell you since yesterday. All is very quiet to-day; but last night there was a great deal of firing going onit commenced about dinner-time. It seems the firing was our driving in one of the enemy's advanced posts to allow of our working parties going on with preparations for the batteries that are to be erected when the siege-train arrives. A good deal of opposition was expected, but they made very little, not being able to get the people from the city to come to their assistance; and our people made a very good night's work of it. I was, however, very sorry to hear that two of the 60th Rifles were killed, poor men; we can little afford to lose them, but it is a wonder we did not have more casualties, for the firing continued more or less all night. The enemy had some twenty killed.

The siege-train was to leave Kurnaul this morning, and will be here on the 2nd September if they make forced marches, otherwise not till the 4th, which is the day, I believe, that the Rifles and Artillerymen are expected from Meerut; and the General says he does not want the train till they come. A week after the arrival of the train will, I hope, see us safe inside Delhi.

We have very nice weather now, but the rain continues to keep off, which is, perhaps, just as well, for those who know Delhi, say, that the later the rains are, the less the sickness. Who was it said that there had been so many deaths from fever in Her Majesty's 8th or 61st-Nicoll, was it not? I haven't heard of a single death from fever; but there was a great deal of cholera in the 61st a short time ago. Since their return they have been encamped on a different piece of ground on the opposite side of the Nullah, and they have been comparatively healthy notwithstanding the fatigue and exposure they suffered when out with Nicholson. They were out two whole days exposed to the sun, and marching or fighting nearly the whole time in the intervening night; the only place they had to lie upon was the cold, damp ground, having themselves been exposed for some hours to heavy rain, to say nothing of having to wade occasionally

REINFORCEMENTS AT CALCUTTA.

249

through pools of water waist-deep. The fever here, fortunately, though very prevalent, is said to be of an extremely mild kind, and a little quinine generally sets a person up again.

Letters in from Agra of the 24th and 26th with accounts from Cawnpore of the 19th, and Allahabad 15th. As I told you, Lord Elgin had reached Calcutta with the Frigates (steam) Shannon and Pearl: one of them had one thousand Marines* on board, and the other soldiers. A Naval Brigade was coming up the country under Captain Peel, R.N. Havelock had fallen in with the 42nd Native Infantry, and nearly destroyed them; all well at Cawnpore, but no direct news from Lucknow. The expedition that went from Agra to Hatrass had been most successful; a large party of the enemy were attacked, after Hatrass had been settled, near Coel, and completely routed-four hundred were killed on the field, and our party then returned. We lost three or four killed, and a few wounded of the former, Mr Tandy of the Volunteer Horse, I suppose; and of the latter, Longueville Clarke. Altogether the news seems very satisfactory; and if all continues well at Lucknow till the troops from below reach Cawnpore and enable Havelock to move out to their relief, we shall soon have matters on a different footing again.

Near 4 P.M., and all quiet, not a gun firing on our side or theirs.

Do you see Chamberlain in Orders as pucka Adjutant-General ? But he does not intend to keep it.

CAMP, DELHI CANTONMENTS, Monday, 31st August.

I received your letter of the 28th yesterday evening at the mess. Arthur Becher got his also, and so did several others. You say that your letter was a very shabby and untidy one; but it didn't strike me to be so. I thought it just what it ought to be, except that I should have liked it to be a little longer; but, as Sam Weller says, 'the perfection of letter writing is to leave off always so as to make the person to whom you write wish for more!'-and this, I think, I should always do with yours, however long they were. I took Arthur Becher to task yesterday for allowing his wife to write to him crossed letters; the one he was reading was * This story as to the thousand Marines' was untrue.-H. W. NORMAN.

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TROOPS ARRIVING AT BOMBAY.

so, and indeed they usually are. This letter, I fear, will be a very untidy production, for I can hardly see to write. It came on to rain about an hour ago, and is pouring down in torrents. We are obliged to keep the chicks down on account of the flies, and the consequence is that the darkness in the tent is something like what you describe and complain of when you have such cloudy and rough weather at Simla.

The rain here had been brewing up for some days past, and there is every prospect of our having a deluge of it now for several hours to come. We are rather glad of it in camp, and it will do a great deal of good, we hope, in driving off what sickness is still flying about; and it will effectually prevent the enemy from leaving the city for some days to come to try and bother our rear, should such be their intention. And now that the siege-train is well in the pucka road, the rain won't stop it; it was to have been at Paniput this morning, and will not reach here until the 4th or 5th September. The Rifles and Artillery are to be here about the same time. It is a pity we have had to wait so long for the train, and I don't know who is in fault. They say, I believe, that carriage couldn't be procured, and so, in fact, nobody is in fault; but it seems strange, for the siege-train was ordered to be got ready about two months ago.

There has been nothing further from Agra or Cawnpore since I wrote to you yesterday, but I hope in a day or two we shall hear of Havelock having got reinforcements moved on to Lucknow. Troops appear to be arriving fast in Calcutta and Bombay. I told you of the two steamers full at the former, and one at the latter place; and I see by a Bombay paper that reached here to-day, of the 12th August (it has come very quickly), that a vessel which left England in May for the Mauritius, with the 4th Regiment, was expected to come to Bombay-and she ought to be there by this time.

There is no particular news from the city, but the wretches inside are said to be in a sad plight, and there is a rumour in camp that they are anxious to obtain terms; of course no terms would be given but unconditional surrender. It is to be hoped, however, that there may be no surrender, as it would be a most puzzling thing in such a case to know how to deal with them. There are said to be now about ten thousand Infantry and four thousand

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Cavalry in the city and the environs; at one time they are supposed to have numbered about forty thousand altogether.

What do you think of the Umballa business? It seems rather to have been sharp practice, that adopted with the mutineers; but with such brutes as they have shown themselves to be no treatment of them can be too bad.

There are some Government General Orders in the paper I spoke of the 12th August, and I see that Mackinnon is made an Acting Superintending Surgeon. Curzon's leave is also in Orders, and it does not read very well.

The box of books arrived all right; some have been made over to the sick and wounded, and some Mactier (who has taken charge of them) has kept for our edification. The letter you speak of from Mrs Carlyon must be a very interesting one. Poor Goldney, I hope he is safe; and with his knowledge of the language and of Natives he is very likely to have escaped.

(Diary) 31st August.-Take a ride early this morning up to the left flank-what a wretchedly dirty place it is! Came on to rain soon after breakfast, and poured down in torrents for three or four hours. Nothing going on. An attack was spoken of, but none came off.

Captain EDEN to Colonel KEITH Young.

JEYPORE, 31st August.

MY DEAR COLONEL,-I am not in the way of giving you later intelligence than that conveyed to Delhi by Mr Colvin from the southward and eastward. We are all quiet here, and the Mohurram has passed off without disturbance in Jeypore; I was very apprehensive about it.

The Joudhpore Legion mutinied on 23rd, and have, it is said, the Adjutant, Sergeant, and families prisoners, having looted the cantonments. A company sent by Colonel Hall to check some Goojurs, went off to Aboo, stirred up forty others on duty there, and, in a dense fog, fired on the Erinpoorah barracks and Colonel Hall's house, but would seem to have been driven off the hill again. Lawrence's son was wounded in the hip slightly; One hundred and fifty of the Legion on duty at

all rest safe.