conquest of Tipu Sultan in 1799: the Ruler had to be deposed and the country was placed under British administration for a period of fifty years down to the year 1881, when an adopted son of the deposed Maharaja was reinstated as Ruler. Since this time there has been no further necessity for interference. The administrative system has been brought up to the standard obtaining in British provinces, and that standard, as Sir David Barr has shown, has been on the whole worthily maintained ever since. Owing to the mad action of the Ruler of Coorg in plotting against the British Government, war was declared against him, and Lord William Bentinck himself personally directed the campaign. The Raja eventually surrendered, and was deposed, and sent to Benares as a State prisoner ; Coorg, with the tacit acquiescence of the people themselves, became British territory.

A few difficulties occurred in connexion with the King of Delhi; the King had adopted the unusual course of sending a special emissary to England to press certain claims; he selected for this purpose the great Hindu reformer, Ram Mohan Roy. The Mission came to nothing, as the British Government refused to recognize it; this move on the part of the King of Delhi naturally annoyed the Governor-General, but he took no active steps in this particular matter. However, he had to interfere actively in the matter of taking steps to have the murderer of the Political Commissioner of Delhi, Mr. Fraser, brought to justice; and the man was tried and hanged like an ordinary criminal. This murder alone was proof of the disorganized state of affairs in the old Mogul capital, which eventually culminated in the events of the Great Mutiny of 1857, when the Mogul dynasty was finally ousted from even the semblance of power. Lord William Bentinck paid a personal visit to Oudh to try and persuade the King to govern better, and the warning he gave the King had at least a temporary effect; he went so far as to replace in office a former Dewan, one Mahdi Ali, on the representations of the Indian Government, but unfortunately this man did not continue to receive that support from the British that was necessary for him in order to carry out and make his reforms effective. The British Resident was compelled to refuse Mahdi Ali's

appeals for support, on the ground of non-intervention, and things went from bad to worse, until the maladministration of the King became so bad that Lord Dalhousie was compelled, some years later, to actively intervene, and the State ceased to exist as an independent unit. Active interference in the affairs of Jaipur was necessitated by the murder of a British officer as the results of plots and counterplots between the Rani and the Thakurs, or Barons, of Jaipur. Sir Charles Metcalfe had used his influence to effect a reconciliation; and what the historian has described as one of the most pathetic incidents in the history of the English in India occurred on the occasion of his visit to the State. This was the sudden appearance of the Raja, a child of eight years old, and a representative of a family whose origin is lost in antiquity, from behind the purdah, and his throwing himself, with touching confidence in the justice and sympathy of English authority, into the arms of Sir Charles Metcalfe, and begging his protection for himself and respect for his mother. Eventually the affairs of Jaipur were adjusted by a Council of Regency, and the new Raja, a mere child, was placed under the protection of a British Resident permanently placed at the capital.

The foreign policy of Bentinck was conducted mainly with the view of checking the Russian advance on India. He drew up a masterly minute on the whole subject of the position of the English in India; in it he reviewed what he considered to be dangers from within and dangers from without. Chief among the latter he placed the traditional Russian designs on India. The principal objects of his policy are described as having been to convert the Indus into the Ditch of British India; to associate the Sikhs and the Rulers of the Sindh Valley with the British in its defence, and to create a friendly Afghanistan as a Buffer State between India and any possible invader from the North-West. With this policy in view, Bentinck always maintained friendly relations with the Sikh Maharaja, Ranjit Singh. A special Mission under Alexander Burnes was sent to Lahore in 1831. Burnes carried with him on this occasion an autograph letter from the King of England, William IV. He also took with him a present of English horses, with which present the Maharaja, who

was a good horseman, as most Sikh gentlemen are, and a keen lover of horse-flesh, was especially pleased. The Governor-General himself had a personal interview with the Maharaja, at Rupar on the Sutlej, in the following year. A commercial Treaty followed from this meeting. Bentinck gave his indirect support to the exiled monarch of Afghanistan, Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk; and he gave him and his family a pension. He also entered into negotiations with the Amirs of Sindh; and negotiated a Treaty with them for the promotion of trade beyond the Indus. Bentinck paid great attention to this matter of trade, especially in connexion with the trade routes to India and China. Especially he encouraged the enterprise of the early pioneer in the movement for swifter steam communication between England and India, Lieutenant Waghorn, and helped him substantially in his exertions to divert the current of trade from the old ocean highway round the Cape of Good Hope to the more expeditious route down the Red Sea.

During the debate that took place in the House of Lords on the subject of the renewal of the Company's Charter in 1833, the Marquess of Lansdowne paid an eloquent tribute to the good service that Lord William Bentinck had rendered to India. Indeed, it has been recorded that it was very largely due to the recognition by the Government of the excellence of Bentinck's administration that the Company received such favourable terms under the new Charter. Bentinck's term of office came to a close in March, 1835, when he finally left India. He was offered a Peerage on his return to England, but declined the offer. He resumed his Parliamentary career, but it was not destined to be a long one. He passed away in the year 1839 at the age of sixty-five.

The inscription on Lord William Bentinck's statue in Calcutta, composed by his friend and coadjutor, Lord Macaulay, may well conclude this sketch of an eminent Ruler:

To

WILLIAM CAVENDISH BENTINCK

who, during seven years, ruled India with eminent prudence, integrity, and benevolence: who, placed at the head of

a great Empire, never laid aside the simplicity and moderation of a private citizen: who infused into Oriental Despotism the spirit of British Freedom: who never forgot that the end of Government is the happiness of the governed who abolished cruel rites: who effaced humiliating distinctions: who gave liberty to the expression of public opinion: whose constant study it was to elevate the intellectual and moral character of the Nation committed to his charge:

This monument was erected by men who, differing in race, in manners, in language, and in religion, cherish with equal veneration and gratitude, the memory of his wise, reforming, and paternal administration.

CHAPTER VI

THE FIRST AFGHAN WAR

EARL OF AUCKLAND, 1784-1849

GEORGE EDEN, Earl of Auckland, was the second son of the first Lord Auckland, who had been created a peer by William Pitt. His family were not unconnected with India, his mother being a sister of a former GovernorGeneral, Lord Minto. He himself never married, and when he afterwards proceeded to India he was accompanied by one of his sisters, the Honourable Emily Eden, who contributed some interesting portraits of the princes and people of India to literature in the shape of letters to her sister, written from the Upper Provinces of India. Being a younger son he was originally intended for a professional career. After leaving school he matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, in 1802, and after taking his degree, was called to the Bar in 1809. His elder brother was drowned the following year, and, as was not uncommon in the days when pocket boroughs were the fashion, he succeeded to his brother's seat and entered the House of Commons for a Parliamentary career. 1814, by the death of his father, he became Lord Auckland. He was constantly present in his seat in the House of Lords, and in 1830 obtained a seat in the Cabinet as PresiIdent of the Board of Trade and Master of the Mint. In 1834 he became First Lord of the Admiralty. He was regarded as an able and popular member of the Cabinet.

In

On the resignation, early in 1835, of Lord William Bentinck, Lord Auckland was selected to be his successor as Governor-General of India by the Court of Directors, on the recommendation of Lord Melbourne; but he was unable to assume office till the spring of 1836, when he took over charge from Sir Charles Metcalfe, who had been acting as Governor-General pending his arrival in India. The Directors were in the habit of entertaining their