THE PINDÁRÍS.
While the war in Nepál was still undecided, fresh troubles broke out in Central India, where Wellesley's settlement had left no permanent security for peace. The very submission of the great Maráthá powers had set free large bands of irregular troops, with no livelihood but pillage, and ever ready, like the Italian condottieri of the later middle ages, to enlist in the service of any aggressive state. These mounted freebooters, now called the Pindárís, were secretly encouraged by the Maráthá chiefs, who looked upon them as useful auxiliaries in the future, either against the government of India or against other native princes. Several of these still remained in a more or less dependent but restless condition, and the great leaders of the Maráthá confederacy, Sindhia, Malhár Ráo Holkar, son and successor of Jaswant Ráo, the Peshwá, and the Rájá of Nágpur, retained a large share of their former sovereignty. Of these subject-allies, the one most directly under British guidance and protection was the Peshwá, but even he took advantage of hostile movements among his neighbours to join in a combination against British rule, supported by the predatory raids of the Pindárís. He had long been discontented with the subordinate position which he had occupied since the treaty of Bassein. The assassination in 1815 of an envoy of the Gáekwár of Baroda, who had been sent to Poona on a special mission under British guarantees, nearly provoked hostilities. But in June, 1817, a treaty was concluded, by which the Peshwá accepted an increased subsidiary force, ceded part of his territory, renounced his suzerainty over the Gáekwár and undertook to submit all further disputes to the decision of the British government. In November, however, chafing under the restrictions imposed by this treaty, he broke out into hostility, burnt the British residency, and after vainly attacking the British troops, fled from Poona. Almost simultaneously Holkar and the Rájá of Nágpur rose. Holkar was defeated in a pitched battle at Mehidpur in Málwá, while the sepoys successfully held their own against the Rájá's troops at Nágpur. The fugitive Peshwá was energetically pursued, and captured, and was stripped of his dominions. The greater part of these was annexed by the East India Company, but a portion was reserved for the heir of the old Maráthá kings who was established at Sátára. The Rájá of Nágpur was also compelled to cede a large portion of his dominions, and at the same time the Company acquired the overlordship of Rájputána. Henceforth, the British government claimed a control over all the foreign relations of native Indian states, whose internal government was to be carefully watched by a British resident, and whose military forces were to be practically under the supreme command of the paramount power.
THE END OF THE PINDÁRÍS.
Lord Moira, created Marquis of Hastings in 1816, was at last free to hunt down the Pindárís, with the sullen acquiescence of the Maráthá governments, and he executed his task with extraordinary vigour. He would have undertaken it, at the instigation of Metcalfe, then resident at Delhi, a year earlier, but for the peremptory orders of Canning, at that time president of the board of control, who positively forbade him to embark on a new war. These orders were greatly relaxed after the bloodthirsty raid of Chítu, the famous Pindárí leader, who in 1816 desolated vast tracts of Central India. Still no effective action against the Pindárís was possible until the Maráthá lords who harboured and encouraged them had been crippled and overawed. With their connivance, a second Pindárí raid, accompanied by shocking cruelties, was made in the same year, but in 1817, when Holkar's followers were severely defeated at Mehidpur, the secret coalition between these bandits and our nominal allies was thoroughly broken up. Even then it proved a most difficult enterprise to root out the Pindárís, who were not a race, or a tribe, or a sect, but bands of lawless men of all faiths; for they met and vanished like birds of the air, outstripping regular cavalry by the length and rapidity of their marches, and carrying off their booty almost under the eyes of their pursuers. But the resolute tactics of Hastings prevailed in the end. Amír Khán, their most powerful leader, disbanded his troops; and hemmed in on all sides, cut off from every place of shelter, and chased by successive detachments of horsemen almost as fleet as his own, Chítu became a hopeless fugitive, with a handful of faithful adherents, who shared his desperate efforts to escape, but advised him to surrender. He could not bring himself to do so, possessed, it is said, with an unspeakable horror of being transported across "the black sea," and he actually remained at large or in hiding for a year after his lair was discovered. Nor was he ever captured, for, by a strange fate, this ruthless scourge of the Deccan, after baffling human vengeance, found his last refuge in a jungle and died, a tiger's prey. By this time, all the wild bands which sprung into existence out of the Maráthá war had been extirpated or dispersed, and after the year 1818 the dreaded name of Pindárí was heard no more in history.
The suppression of civil war and anarchy in Central India, which completed the work of Wellesley, was the greatest achievement of Hastings. One remarkable incident of it was a portentous outbreak of cholera in 1817, during a campaign in Gwalior conducted by Hastings in person. There had been several minor visitations of this disease in India. But it now first established itself as an endemic disease, and it has ever since infested the valley of the Ganges. So virulent was its onslaught, and so fearful the mortality in Hastings' army, that it was only saved by shifting its quarters, and the governor-general himself made preparations for his own secret burial, in case he should be among the victims. As we have seen already,[140] it was propagated from this centre through other regions of Asia, until it spread to Western Europe, and the "Asiatic cholera" of 1831-32 may be lineally traced back to the last Maráthá war.
The position of Hastings in Indian history closely resembles that of Wellesley. Disregarding the instructions of the board of control, as well as of the board of directors, he forced upon them, like Wellesley, a large extension of their empire. But it cannot be doubted that his policy, dictated by exigencies beyond the ken of authorities sitting in London, was eminently successful and beneficent in its results. It went far to establish a "Pax Britannica" in the Indian Peninsula, and, if it took little account of dynastic rights, it broke the rod of oppression, and relieved millions upon millions from tyranny and intimidation which overshadowed their whole lives. He retired in 1823, after seven years' tenure of office, and died in 1826 as governor of Malta. Canning had been designated as his successor, and, having accepted the post, was on the eve of starting for Calcutta, when the tragical death of Castlereagh recalled him to the foreign office, and opened to him the most brilliant stage in his career. Thereupon Lord Amherst was appointed governor-general, with every prospect of a pacific vice-royalty, whereas it is now chiefly remembered for the annexation of new provinces on the south-east of Bengal, and the capture of Bhartpur.
THE FIRST BURMESE WAR.
The first Burmese war arose out of persistent aggressions by the new kingdom of Ava or Burma on what is now the British province of Assam, but was then an independent, though feeble, state. There had been earlier frontier disputes between the Indian government and Burma about the districts lying eastward of Chittagong along the Bay of Bengal, but it was not until Burma conquered Arakan, invaded Assam, and occupied passes on the north-east overlooking the plains of Bengal, that serious action was felt to be necessary. Indeed, while Hastings was engaged with the war in Nepál and the suppression of the Pindárís, even he was in no mood to embark on a fresh campaign beyond the borders of India. The incursions of the Burmese, however, became more and more threatening both on the coast line and on the mountains above the Brahmaputra river, and in February, 1824, Amherst resolved to check the extension of their dominion. Notwithstanding the experience recently gained in Nepál, the first operations of the Anglo-Indian troops were conducted with little knowledge of the country, and met with very doubtful success. Rangoon was easily captured, but the expedition was disabled from advancing up the river Irawadi by the want of adequate supplies and the deadliness of the climate. Part of the Tenasserim coast was subdued, but a British force was defeated in Arakan. These reverses were retrieved in the following year, 1825, when one army under Sir Archibald Campbell made its way up the river to Prome, while another army conquered Arakan, and a third, moving along the valley of the Brahmaputra, established itself in Assam. The Burmese now abandoned further resistance. Assam, Arakan, and the Tenasserim provinces were ceded to the company, whose protectorate was also recognised over other territories upon the course of the Brahmaputra. It was not until February, 1826, that the King of Ava could be induced to sign the treaty embodying these cessions, and many years were to elapse before the port of Rangoon was opened to British commerce.
The strong fortress of Bhartpur, in the east of Rájputána, and near to Agra, had acquired an unique importance, in the eyes of all India by its successful resistance to Lake's assaults during the Maráthá war of 1805. It was still held until 1825 by its own petty rájá, the son of Ranjít Singh, who remained on terms of respectful amity with the Indian government, though his little principality was a notorious focus of native disaffection. In that year he died, and his child, after being acknowledged by the Indian government as his successor, was forcibly ousted by a usurper. Sir David Ochterlony, the hero of the Nepálese war, then resident in Málwá and Rájputána, undertook to support the legitimate heir, but was overruled by orders from Amherst. On his resignation he was succeeded by Metcalfe, who had become Sir Charles Metcalfe by his brother's death in 1822, and who now obtained authority to carry out Ochterlony's policy, if necessary, by armed intervention. As negotiation failed, Lord Combermere, as commander-in-chief, proceeded to reduce the virgin fortress, not by the slow process of siege, but by a well-organised assault. Having cut off the water supply, and mined the mud walls, he poured in a storming party and overpowered the garrison. The feat was probably not so great, from a military point of view, as many that have left no record, but its effect on the superstitious native mind was prodigious, especially as it nearly coincided with the victorious issue of the Burmese war. Nevertheless, Amherst was shortly afterwards recalled, and left India in 1828. His annexation of Burmese territory and the increase of expenditure under his rule displeased both the Company and the home government, so often foiled in the attempt to enforce a pacific and economical policy. His successor was Lord William Bentinck, who had been compelled to retire from the governorship of Madras after the mutiny of Vellore.
Like Hastings, Bentinck showed a firmness and wisdom in his Indian administration strongly contrasting with the restless self-assertion of his earlier career. His lot was cast in an interval of tranquillity after a long period of warfare, and his name is associated with internal reforms and social progress in India, not unconnected with a like movement in England. The measure upon which his fame chiefly rests was the abolition of "satí," that is, the practice of Hindoo widows sacrificing themselves by being burned alive on the funeral pile of their husbands. This practice, which specially prevailed in Bengal, has been explained by a false interpretation of certain texts in sacred books of the Hindus, by the selfish eagerness of the husband's family to monopolise all his property, and by the utterly desolate condition of a childless widow in native communities. At all events, it was deeply rooted in Hindu traditions, and no previous governor had dared to go beyond issuing regulations to secure that the widow should be a willing victim. Bentinck had the courage to act on the conviction that inhumanity, however consecrated by superstition and priestcraft, has no permanent basis in popular sentiment. With the consent of his council, he prohibited "satí" absolutely, declaring that all who took any part in it should be held guilty of culpable homicide; and the native population acquiesced in its suppression.