an eye-witness "the Sikhs shone down the English." All the great Sirdars were present in their most gorgeous trappings and mounted on their finest steeds, while from a Sikh band the strains of our own national anthem rose upon the air, and from the Sikh guns pealed forth the salute ordained for royalty alone. It must be confessed, however, that Runjeet Singh's ideas of ceremony were not all of the same exalted nature. At a later period of the day, after all the due formalities were over, the Viceroy was required to be present at "an unseemly display of dancing girls, and the antics of some male buffoons." The two following days were devoted to military exercises. On the first Sir Henry Fane manœuvred the British force with elaborate skill and display; and on the second the Sikh cavalry executed some less intricate movements with the unqualified approval of their experienced critics.

With this the ceremony was at an end. Runjeet Singh returned to Lahore, and the Viceroy followed him on his first visit to the Sikh principality. The final dispositions and selections were made by the Commander-in-chief. A few weeks previously Soojah's levies, about 6000 strong, horse, foot, and artillery, under the command of Major-General Simpson, had left Loodhianah on their way to the front, and on December 10th, 1838, the British troops marched out from Ferozepore on their first stage to the Afghan capital.

A glance at the map will suffice to show that a more direct route might have been found from Ferozepore to Cabul than down the bank of the Indus to Bukkur, thence, across the river, by Shikarpoor and Dadur, through the Bolan Pass, to Quettah, and from Quettah, through the Kojuck, by Candahar and Ghuznee to Cabul. In short, as Kaye points out, the army was about to traverse two sides of a triangle, instead of shaping its course along a third. But there were two important reasons for the choice of the longer route. In the first place, Runjeet Singh had strong objections to opening the Punjab to our troops; and in the second place the Ameers of Sindh were to be "coerced."

Shikarpoor, on the northern bank of the Indus, had originally formed a part of the great Douranee Empire, handed down by Timour to Zemaun Shah and his brothers, intact as it had been received from the founder, Ahmed. But piece by piece the kingdom had been dismembered through the quarrels and weaknesses of its rulers. Cashmere, and Mooltan, and Peshawur had been won by the Sikhs; Herat had risen to independence; while Shikarpoor with a fair slice of the southern frontier had passed to the Ameers of Sindh. But though Shikarpoor was theirs, they held, or had held it, in consideration only of a yearly tribute, which tribute, unpaid through many years, had now swelled, as Soojah maintained, to no less a sum than twenty lakhs of rupees, a sum gratuitously increased by the English Government to twenty-five lakhs, that the terms of Runjeet Singh (who was to have received half, but had lately increased his wants) might be granted without Soojah being the sufferer. The Ameers themselves, however, told a different tale. Independently of their not unreasonable objections to the validity of a claim that had been suffered to slumber for upwards of thirty years, they were enabled triumphantly, as they supposed, to point to two releases of the debt, written in Korans, and signed and sealed by Soojah. Thus fortified, they declared to Colonel Pottinger, our agent at Hyderabad, that "they were sure the Governor-General did not intend to make them pay again for what they had already bought and obtained, in the most binding way, a receipt in full"—a mark of confidence which Pottinger was instructed to demolish without delay. Nor was this the only difficulty that the passage through Sindh promised to present. In the treaty which had opened the Indus to navigation, it had been expressly stipulated that the river should be free to commerce only, and it became therefore necessary, for the transport of our army, that this treaty should be broken. Pottinger, sorely against his will, was ordered to point out to the Ameers that if they placed any obstacles in the way of the "first and necessary" undertaking on which their English friends had embarked, it would be the painful duty of those friends to take steps to ensure a more ready and hearty co-operation. In other words, the Ameers were told that if they did not do what was wanted of them, they would be turned out to make room for those who would. They must pay the twenty-five lakhs of rupees, the greater part of which would go into the pockets of a man to whom they were indebted not one single anna; they must consent to the violation of the treaty of the Indus, and they must further the advance of our army through their territory in every possible way. If they did not agree to these demands, they would find the consequences disagreeable. It did not at first appear that they were likely to agree. Burnes had, indeed, managed to settle the difficulty of the Indus, and the Ameers of Khyrpore, more tractable than the Hyderabad princes, had agreed temporarily to cede to the British the fortress of Bukkur, the point selected for the passage. Soojah with his levies, who were some days' march in advance of the Bengal column, had already crossed, and was waiting our arrival at Shikarpoor, but for a while it seemed extremely doubtful when we should be able to join him. The Ameers were waxing turbulent. They had grossly insulted Pottinger, and were openly collecting forces for the defence of their capital. It was feared that the "painful duty" would be found necessary, and orders were despatched to Keane (who had landed with the Bombay army at Vikkur in the end of November, but had been temporarily delayed at Tattah for want of carriage) to prepare to co-operate with Cotton against Hyderabad. As the Bombay column moved up the right bank of the river, the Bengal column, against the urgent remonstrances of Macnaghten, moved down the left bank to meet it. Both forces were in the highest spirits. The defences of Hyderabad were known to be weak; its treasures were believed to be immense, and a prospect of unbounded loot danced before the eyes of a soldiery who had almost forgotten what the word meant. At the eleventh hour, however, the enchanting prospect faded. The Ameers consented to our demands; a part of the tribute was paid, and Hyderabad was saved for a time; while, what was then of still more importance, a collision between the military and political authorities was avoided.

On February 20th, 1839, Cotton was at Shikarpoor, and again differences between him and Macnaghten seemed imminent. Soojah had found himself short of carriage, and Macnaghten had asked Cotton to supply him with 1000 camels from his own train. But the General expressed himself strongly to the effect that if Soojah was unable to advance his men, it were far better that Soojah and his men should be left behind than that their wants should be relieved at the expense of the English troops. It was but too apparent, even at that early stage, that the English military officers were inclined to look upon Soojah and his 6000 soldiers as altogether superfluous. He was, indeed, a king who was to be restored to his throne, but until the throne was ready for him it would be better for all parties that he should remain in the background. Macnaghten, keenly alive to the danger of such sentiments, and feeling himself especially bound, both in honour and interest, to uphold the cause of our ally, combated the military policy resolutely. A collision was happily averted by the timely arrival of despatches from the Viceroy, strongly tending to confirm Macnaghten's views; nevertheless, when the English force advanced, three days afterwards, the