Afghanistan and China have seen at once the forces at his disposal, and the effect with which they can be applied.
Sincerely attached to peace for the sake of the benefits it confers upon the people, the Governor-General is resolved that peace shall be observed, and will put forth the whole power of the British Government to coerce the state by which it shall be infringed.
By order of the Right Honourable the Governor-General of India.
T. H. Maddock,
Secretary to the Government of India, with
the Governor-General.
It would have been well if Lord Ellenborough had resisted the puerile temptation to date this proclamation on the 1st of October. That it was written then is not to be doubted. But, though written, it was not issued.[333] The Governor-General was not prepared to issue it. There was no immediate necessity, indeed, for the preparation of such a notification as this. It might have been delayed for a few weeks without injury to the state; whilst, on the other hand, it could not have been delayed for a few days without great advantage to Lord Ellenborough. On the 1st of October, the Governor-General knew that the British ensign was floating over the Balla Hissar of Caubul; but he did not know that the British prisoners had been released from captivity. Had he suppressed the inclination to write “October 1” at the head of his proclamation, he might have announced in it the attainment of all those objects which his countrymen had at heart, and fully declared that the war was at an end. But there were not wanting those who now commented bitterly on the fact that this proclamation was drawn up by the Governor-General of India whilst yet in ignorance of the fate of the prisoners. The delay of a few days would have placed him in possession of the intelligence, for which all India was looking with the deepest interest and anxiety; but the temptation of the “1st of October” was not to be resisted; and Lord Ellenborough sacrificed his character for humanity for the sake of a little dramatic effect.
Having drawn up this proclamation, and handed it over to the translators to be arrayed in Oriental costume, Lord Ellenborough began to take counsel with Sir Jasper Nicolls on the subject of the honorary distinctions to be conferred on the officers and men who had gained these great victories in Afghanistan; and to draft another proclamation to be issued to the Chiefs and Princes of India. This was the famous proclamation of the Gates. On the 5th of October, he sent a rough draft of it to Sir Jasper Nicolls, inviting the comments of the Chief. Freely asked, they were freely given. What they were is not on record. The Governor-General took the comments of the Commander-in-Chief “in good part,” and was not wholly impervious to the criticism of the veteran commander.[334] Subjected to a long and laborious incubation, this address to “all the Princes, chiefs, and people of India,” was translated into the Persian and Hindee languages, circulated among those to whom it especially appealed, and finally published in its English dress on the 16th of November.[335] It was by no means, therefore, an ebullition of impulse and enthusiasm on the part of the Governor-General, but the result of many weeks of thought and study, and, perhaps, much consultation with others. The Duke of Wellington called it a “Song of triumph.” Thus rose the pæan, in its English dress:
FROM THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL TO ALL THE PRINCES AND CHIEFS, AND PEOPLE OF INDIA.
My Brothers and my Friends,