Extracts.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VIII, Issue 537, 26 December 1857, Page 3

Extracts.

THE INDIAN AEMIES.

(Prom the JV^*; Sepi. 11:) We repubiish .this evening a document which, under any circumstances, would be deserving of public attention, but which recent occurrences have ,in vested with singular interest. It contains the views of * Brigadier-General Jac6b,-^bett'er known, |f i™jps, as Colonel John Jacob, of the Scmde Horse,'—upon the constitution and discipline of the Bengal army, and a sketch of the reforms which, in his opinion, were required to, impart a more desirable character to that force. It must be understood that the remarks in question were penned sometime ago, and it will, of course, be seen that the evil has now exceeded the scope of "ordinary treatment; j but the opinions of such an authority still possess great value both in explanation of „ the past and instruction for the future. Two points will strike the reader as not a little remarkable-—first, that Colonel Jacob,"while probing to the bottom every defect in the Bengal army, omits all allusion to the withdrawal of officers from their, regiments on Staff or "political employment and, secondly, that he actually ascribes to the officers as a body many of those Asiatic habits which in the present day they were presumed to have lost, and which one of our correspondents so ably justified them for discarding.. It would, indeed, be unfortunate if Europeans in the Bengal service adapted themselves to the „ ways of Hindostan in those respects exclusively where the assimilation could be productive of nothing but detriment, and we may hope that the defects alluded to were always partial, and did not prove permanent. As regards the abstraction of officers from their regiments:—a subject on which there can be little doubt either as a question of fact or a question of expediency, it is possible that Colonel Jacob may have been less struck with proceedings which were common to his own service also. As a Bombay officer, he' contrasts with liis own experience whatever is peculiar to-Bengal, but overlooks, perhaps, arrangements which, though manifestly objectionable in themselves, were not more disadvantageous to one army than.the > other. ..:,-

The substance of the document, as might be expected, tends rather to the confirmation of opinions already prevailingthan to the introduction of any new theory. Eight serious defects are specified as damaging* the efficiency of the Bengal army, five of which relate to the position of the officers, two to the character of the soldier, and one to the very comprehensive result of the whole. Besides the Orientalism of tone above noticed, Colonel Jacob —speakingy no doubt, with the peculiar sensitiveness natural, on such a point, to a Commander of Irregulars—deplores and condemns the curtailment of the authority which should'be lodged with regimental commanders, the want of cordiality and fraternity which should exist among the officers themselves, and the " entire absence s<*of a proper confidence" between these officers and the native troops. This last remark may appear somewhat strange after the striking* examples we have recently seen of the trust which was almost invariably placed by European officers in the loyalty of the sepoys up to. the very moment of mutiny j but, when Colonel Jacobs proceeds to explain himself, his observation is found to point only to the very facts which we are at this moment witnessing. There is : confidence enough in the case, but it is not a " proper" confidence^ not a confidence that is well grounded or justified lipon trial. Officers in the field imagine that they are followed by their men, and suddenly find themselves unsupported—examples of which desertion occurred more than once in the Sikh cam-Eaig-ns. They know nothing of mutinies atching1 under their very eyes, and believe in the fidelity of their troops, until they find them in open! rebellion against authority.TThisss is precisely what has happened now, though on such a scale and with such characteristics as probably Colonel Jacob in his most desponding mood never dreamt of anticipating". . It is in the description, however, of tne Bengal Jtepoy that the document before us is most instructive, and, after perusing it we'can only wonder, as the author himself did, ho# " even the outward semblance of an army" could ever have been maintained while such customs prevailed. Everything in the Bengal army turned upon; caste. High-caste men almost exclusively were enlisted, and they were permitted to set their caste and 'its requirements above

every consideration of .disciplines or duty, ihe "lazy and insolent Brahmins" who failed the ranks of the army refused to dig, to build, or to perform any one of the thousand services as needful in a campaign as fighting- itself. A regiment of cavalry on arriving at its halting-ground would decline to picket, unsaddle, or groom its own horses, and would wait for hours in conceited indolence till servants of subordinate caste came to do the work for them. Another story told of these fanatical coxcombs is so outrageous, that it reads like one of the best American exaggerations. At the quarter-guard of a battalion on duty is kept a gong, which isstruck for signals according to regulations, but a Bengal sentry would not demean himself by touching the instrument at his very elbow, and the gongs were sounded by men kept and paid for the purpose! , But this part of the tale has hitherto been only half told. Colonel Jacob admits us to a view of the case, which places the point in a light far more significant than before. Assuming that a Hindoo has imbibed all these conceits so thoroughly that they have become inherent elements of his very system, it of course follows that if we engage the services of high-caste natives we must do so with the necessary obligations, and take the men with their draw-backs as well as their recommendations. Colonel Jacob, however, expressly tells us, and upon authority which no one can impeach, that this assumption is utterly unfounded, and that the incredible pretensions of the Bengal sepoy are based, not upon the inexorable precepts of his religoa, but simply upon his own subtle and designing- policy. These men can forget their castes when they please to do so, and are glad enough indeed to put it out of the way when they see that it brings disparagement rather than indulgence. In the "Bombay army such pretensions arc never heard of, whereas there is no doubt about the identity of the two cases. In that army, says Colonel Jacob, "hundreds and thojusands of men from Hindostan, from the same villages, of the same caste, and even of the same families, brothers by the same fathers and mothers as the fine gentlemen of the Bengal army, are seen in the ranks shoulder to shoulder—nay, even sleeping in the same tent, with the Mahratta, the Dhor, and the Purwharree, without scruple or thought of objection." Afterwards, too, we are told that the Bombay soldiers will build houses, manufacture bricks, and, in short " turn their hands to any labour which they may be ordered to execute," without any talk of defilement or degradation.

Clearly, therefore, the evil has lain less in the system of caste itself, than in the system by which castes were.unnecessarily recognized. It is impossible, indeed; to give a more complete or comprehensive explanation of the whole case than is contained in the author's simple remark, that the Bombay sepoy prides himself upon being1 a soldier, the Bengal sepoy upon being a Hindoo. Let the reader but consider what a world of error has been involved in the policy thus expressed. We have not been maintaining a military force in Bengal, we have been preserving a hotbed of Hindooism. We have taken the very prejudices most obnoxious to civilization and authority, and pampered them with extraordinary solicitude. We have enrolled Hindoos on terms of their own dictation, recognised them as Brahmins while we paid them as soldiers, given them an organization which they would never have acquired of themselves, and placed arms in their hands, so that they might feel their own strength and terrify their employers. The word " sepoy "is a misnomer. Our Bengal army consisted not of soldiers but of Brahmins—of men who guided thek* conduct, not by the rules of the service, but by pretensions of their creed. It was an institution for the elevation of Brahminism and the preservation of caste. This is really no exaggerated picture. Colonel Jacob himself remarks, that a "native soldier in Bengal is far more afraid of an offence against caste than an offence against the Articles of War," and he relates an anecdote of the sepoys of a regiment demanding, and obtaining the dismissal of a comrade, who, though an excellent soldier, fell short of the Brahminical standard of purity. After this, we can certainly wonder no longer that in the Bengal army there should have been van entire absence of projper discipline" nor will it be otherwise than favourable to the work of reorganization that the old frame-work of such a force has been annihilated altogether. :

LORD STRATFORD DE REDCLIPFE

(Prom the Times, September 8.) . What are we to do with a refractory ambassador? France and England are now perfectly agreed on the Danubian Principalities question; the countries are agreed the Sovereigns are agreed, the Prime Ministers are agreed, and every body is satisfied, but Lord Stratford de Redcliffe will not consent. If this is not a strong case of ego et Bex metes, it is at any rate ultra patriotism. Our Ambassador differs in opinion from his country, and of course it is better for the country that it should give way. He will not let us expose ourselves, or discredit ourselves; he loves his country too much to let it judge for itself. No, he knows much better than we do how to manage things in the East, and we shall, whether we will or not, have the benefit of his great experience. He is aware-- that he is throwing pearls before swine, that we should not thank him for it and that we simply want him to obey orders, but he will not let us command him to our own injury.

Now, everybody knows that Lord Stratford is a kind of Sultan at Constantinople, that trembling- Pashas lick the dust at his feet, and feel their promotion secured or their fate sealed according- as he smiles or frowns. He has now lived in the East some 50 years, he has devoted himself to a thorough acquaintance with all the intricacies and disguises, the frauds, the chicanery, and whole subterranean machinery of the Ottoman Court. He has stuck to his work ; he has can-led his head high, as well from natural temper as from policy. No one has known better the maxim that an Asiatic will respect you in proportion as you respect yourself, or has used it to more advantage. He has carried this policy a little too far at "times indeed even for Asiatics, and has treated the Sultan himself with a dignity which the latter mistook for insolence; but, whatever mistakes he may have made, he has had about as much of his own way as any Ambassador ever had, and it is a reward which industry and perseverance have earned. Lord Stratford has talents which would have justified an entrance upon the home arena, and the aim .at;}a less local name and influence thaClie - has 'acquired ; he was, indeed, talked of for Foreign Minister under Lord Derby's Government, and public reports for a short time- hinted at a recall from Constantinople' for this higher po'it. How he would have borne the unceremonious conflicts of our home field of politics is indeed a question* his dignity would have been sorely put to the test, and he would have found a great difference between one of pur Parliamentary debates and a tete-a-tete with a Pasha. He would have been knocked about a good deal, for we are rather an irreverent race; —we do not allow ourselves to be put down by a look, we are not annihilated by majestic disdain, and the airs of greatness are a good deal thrown away upon us. We measure a man, as pugilists do, by his strength, rather than by his air or grandeur of carriage, and this many a great man very soon finds out to his cost, when, notwithstanding1 his imposing manners and his stately carriage, his ineffable bows and his Olympian smiles, his Serene Highness finds himself rolling in the dust from an encounter with some quick-witted antagonist who has simply asked him a few plain questions and requested an immediate answer. It is to Lord Stratford's credit, however, that he has not made his Turkish mission a mere stepping-stone to home power or office, but has made it the work of his life, though it is to be feared that so long an Eastern residence has not been without its injurious effects upon him. As the representative of a great Power, he has been surrounded by flatterers, and those flatterers who do not spare the seasoning. It is said that a man is first disgusted with flattery, then tolerates it, and then relishes it, such frail creatures are we and so little, do we know our weaknesses. One might think Asiatic flattery was too strong to be hurtful, but it tells in time ; the dram which almost burnt our throat at first becomes mild by repetition, and is soon necessary to soothe our humour and make us feel contented with ourselves. Fifty years of Asiatic flattery are no joke; a man gets to think by that time that there must be some truth in what people tell him about himself. In ancient times the issue of this long process of adultation would have been mythological; Lord Stratford Would have had a celestial pedigree presented to him, or been assigned a place in the Zodiac, or/been made a sea god, in compliment to his insular extraction. But ? as we do not live in mythological days ?

and as Mahomedan flattery is hot idolatrous, our Ambassador has been content to be thought the greatest earthly potentate next to the Sultan. That is, as we say, trying to a man, and Lord Stratford is probably now the most imperious subject that Her Majesty has. His sphere of power is indeed a local one, and his subjects are not the most respectable in the world; but he makes up for the quality of the subject material by the remorseless sternness with which he controls it. He rules his Court.with a rod of iron; he is a King among the Pashas, a Triton among the minnows. Some tempers are so constituted that they prefer being* despotic in their own sphere, however small it may be, to having to meet the claims of equals in a much larger one, and Lord Stratford would doubtless rather be first in Constantinople than second in England. Well, this is Lord Stratford, and we should be prepared- for a little awkwardness in such a potentate on things not going exactly his own way in the East. He is also an old servant, and should be humoured to a certain extent. But there is a limit to good humour. When two Sovereigns have met, and their Ministers have met, and the issue of this conference is that the elections in the Danubian Principalities must be repeated, the English Ambassador at the Porte really ought to •support this resolution, or else withdraw. Lord Stratford, we believe, does not exactly disobey orders; as Ambassador he must communicate the message from- our Government to the Porte, and he does so. But he simply communicates it, and does not support it. He allows it to be seen that he is opposed himself to his own instructions, of which he will only consent to be the official and formal channel. This is intolerable in an Ambassador, and, though Government might find Lord Stratford an awkward and impracticable man in the House of Lords, such an inconvenience attending his recall ought to be. submitted to rather than such an anomaly as that of an Ambassador opposing his own instructions. What our correspondent has said is probably true, that the diplomatic ground at Constantinople wants clearing. "It is useless to give orders and instructions; .they will not .change old animosities and bad traditions.'^ The French and English Embassies will quarrel so long- as the present men stay, and when an Ambassador dislikes his instructions he can always impede them by stirring up minor questions. There is nothing now really to impede ths settlement of affairs in the East but the animosities of Ambassadors, and the sooner, therefore, both English and French are recalled and their functions committed to a couple of Chai'g-es d'Affaires who will simply do what the Governments at home tell them to do, the better. Lord Stratford will make a second rejected and ill-used great man in the House, nor can we promise Government that they will soon hear the last of it. But it is better that the Upper House should listen to another great man's wrongs, and Government feel his retaliations, than that this country should be thwarted by its own Ambassador on such an important subject as that of the settle- j ment of the Eastern difficulty. j