The Tiger of Mysore: A Story of the War with Tippoo Saib

by G. A. Henty

"Well, my lad, you have done wonders," his father said, when he had finished; "and if I had as much enterprise and go as you have, I should have been out of this place years ago. But in the first place, I was very slow in picking up their lingo. You see, until within the last three or four years, there have always been other Englishmen with me. Of course we talked together, and as most of them were able to speak a little of the lingo, there was no occasion for me to learn it. Then I was always, from the first, when they saw that I was handy at all sorts of things, kept at odd jobs, and so got less chance of picking up the language than those who were employed in drilling, or who had nothing to do but talk to their guards. But most of all, I did not try to escape because I found that, if I did so, it would certainly cost my companions their lives. That was the way that scoundrel Tippoo kept us from making attempts to get off.

"Well, soon after the last of the other captives was murdered, we moved away to Kistnagherry, which was a very difficult place to escape from; and besides, very soon after we got there, I heard of the war with our people, and hoped that they would take the place. It was, as you may suppose, a terrible disappointment to me when they failed in their attack on it. Still, I hoped that they would finally thrash Tippoo, and that, somehow, I might get handed over to them. However, as you know, when peace was made, and Kistnagherry had to be given over, the governor got orders to evacuate it, without waiting for the English to come up to take possession.

"Well, since I have been at Savandroog, I have thought often of trying to get away. By the time I got there, I had learned to speak the language fairly enough to make my way across the country, and I have been living in hopes that, somehow or other, I might get possession of a rope long enough to let myself down the rocks. But, as I told you, I have never so much as seen one up there twenty feet long.

"I did think of gradually buying enough cotton cloth to twist up and make a rope of; but you see, when one has been years in captivity, one loses a lot of one's energy. If I had been worse off, I should have set about the thing in earnest; but you see, I was not badly treated at all. I was always doing odd carpentering jobs for the colonel and officers, and armourer's work at the guns. Any odd time I had over, I did jobs for the soldiers and their wives. I got a good many little presents, enough to keep me in decent clothes and decent food--if you can call the food you have up there decent--and to provide me with tobacco; so that, except that I was a prisoner, and for the thought of my wife and you, I had really nothing to grumble about, and was indeed better off than anyone in the fortress, except the officers. So you see, I just existed, always making up my mind that some day I should see a good chance of making my escape, but not really making any preparations towards casting off my moorings.

"Now, Dick, it must be past twelve o'clock, and I am dog tired. How far have we to ride tomorrow?"

"It is thirty-five miles from Oussoor to Kistnagherry, which will be far enough for us to go tomorrow, and then another five-and-twenty will take us down to Tripataly. As the horses have gone about forty miles, it would be a long journey for them to go right through tomorrow."

"I don't think I could do it, Dick, if they could. I expect I shall be stiffer tomorrow than I am now. Eager as I am to see your dear mother, I don't want to have to be lifted off my horse when I arrive there, almost speechless with fatigue."

The next day they rode on to Kistnagherry, passing a small frontier fort without question. They slept at the post house there, Dick and Surajah having removed their scarves and emblems of rank, as soon as they passed the frontier, in order to escape all inquiries. They started next morning at daybreak, and arrived within sight of Tripataly at ten o'clock.

"Now, Father, I will gallop on," Dick said. "I must break the news to Mother, before you arrive."

"Certainly, Dick," his father, who had scarcely spoken since they started, replied. "I have been feeling very anxious about it, all the morning; for though, as you tell me, she has never lost faith in my being alive, my return cannot but be a great shock to her."