Through the Sikh War: A Tale of the Conquest of the Punjaub

by G. A. Henty

"I don't care for that, father; I have always made up my mind to be a soldier, as you were. I should like very much to go out to my uncle if he will have me."

The major was silent for a few minutes.

"I don't know that it is a wise step," he murmured to himself; "but the boy has no friends here—my old comrades will do what they can for him when the time comes, but until then he will have but a lonely life.

"Very well, Percy," he went on, turning to his son, "I will write to your uncle. It may be eighteen months before you get an answer from him—that is all the better. Work hard at school, lad, and learn as much as you can, for you will get but little learning out there. If your uncle does not care to have you, or thinks that things are too disturbed and unsettled out there for him to undertake the responsibility, you must fall back on the other plan and remain at Dr. Bubear's until you are seventeen. I have written letters to the friends who promised to see after your commission; you will find them in my desk. Keep them by you until you are leaving school, and then post them, that is if your wish to go into the army is unchanged. If it should be changed, Messrs. Sims & Hammond, my lawyers, will put you in the way of carrying out your wishes in whatever direction they may lie."

There had been several such talks between father and son, and Percy knew that he should not have his father long with him. He listened, therefore, gravely to his words, but without showing emotion; for although when alone he often gave way to tears, he knew that the major, himself a quiet and self-restrained man, was adverse to any display of feeling. The boy did not think the end was so near, and though prepared in some way for the blow, it was a terrible shock to him when his father, five days later, expired. He had again become a boarder at Dr. Bubear's, remaining there during the holidays as well as in school-time.

Two or three times old friends of his father had come to see him, and had taken him out for the day. This was the only change he had had, but he had worked hard and risen considerably in his place in the school. In accordance with instructions from Messrs. Sims & Hammond he had gone regularly to a riding-school, as the major, knowing the Sikhs to be a nation of horsemen, had thought it desirable that he should learn to have a good seat on a horse. The lawyers had also arranged that he should twice a week have lessons in Hindustani, and he was allowed to work at this instead of Greek. His progress was comparatively rapid, as after a time the language he had heard spoken for the first eight years of his life came back to him rapidly. He had hardly begun to look for a reply from his uncle when Dr. Bubear handed him the letter, which he doubted not contained the answer. He had hardly hoped that it would be favourable, for during the intervening time he had learned something of what was going on in the Punjaub, and knew that since Runjeet Singh's death there had been many troubles there, and that things were in a very unsettled state.

This information he had received from one of the boys whose father was a director of the East India Company. The doctor's words, however, gave him some hope, and when alone he opened the letter with less trepidation than he would otherwise have felt. Messrs. Sims & Hammond wrote as follows:—

"We have pleasure in forwarding to you a communication from Colonel Roland Groves, which was inclosed in one sent to us. In the latter he expressed his readiness to receive you, while pointing out that the position of affairs in the Punjaub was unsettled in the extreme. He doubtless speaks further of this in his letter to you. As our late client, your father, instructed us that we were to be guided entirely by your decision in the matter, we leave it in your hands, observing, however, that in the face of your uncle's statements with regard to the country, it appears to us that to go out to him at present would be an exceedingly ill-advised and rash step. Should you, however, decide upon doing so, we will, upon hearing from you, take the necessary steps for obtaining your outfit and securing your berth. A client of ours in Calcutta will, we doubt not, arrange on your arrival there for forwarding you up the country to your uncle."

Having read this, Percy broke the seal of the inclosure and read as follows:—

"MY DEAR NEPHEW,—I am filled with grief to learn from a letter, forwarded to me after his death, that your father is no more. It is many years since I saw him; but we were always capital friends, though as unlike in disposition as two brothers could be. He tells me that he has no friends in England in whose charge he could place you, and asks if I will have you out with me until you are of an age to enter the army at home, if, indeed, you do not decide to follow my example and take service with one of the native princes.