The sketches of the lives and deaths of Sir H. Havelock and Captain Hedley Vicars will, I feel confident, be of interest to many. Their examples in life and death were sublime.
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The purest treasure mortal times afford Is spotless reputation; that away, Men are but gilded loam or painted clay.—Shakespeare. |
The last chapter, I trust, will be found instructive and interesting. It shows the enormous cost of war in blood and treasure, bringing out the indomitable determination of our forefathers “to conquer Napoleon or die.” Often our numbers have been few, but fearless still; often broken and crushed, but never subdued.
With confidence I now submit my work to my fellow-countrymen, trusting that none will criticise too harshly the humble literary efforts of one who has tried to do his duty upon many a hard-fought field, and who is ready to do it again rather than see that flag we love so well trampled in the dust.
T. GOWING,
Late Sergeant-Major, R.F.,
and Allahabad Garrison.
[INTRODUCTION.]
Great Britain has produced a race of heroes who, in moments of danger and terror, have stood as “firm as the rocks of their own native shores,” and when half the world have been arrayed against them have fought the battles of their country with heroic fortitude. We have written with no wish to foster a bellicose spirit, for we regard war as an evil which is only endurable when the cause is just. But no love of peace should deaden our admiration of brilliant deeds, and unquailing heroism. War, like peace, has its virtues, which only a fanatic will under-value. Happy England no longer girds on the sword but with a good reason. But we presume that a record of achievements in war—victories complete and surpassing—gained by our countrymen, our brothers, our fellow citizen-in-arms, who have waved our triumphant standard on the Indus, the Tagus, the St. Lawrence, and the Seine (the thunder of our guns has resounded in China, in the mountains of the Pyrenees, and on the coast of the Black Sea)—a record which stimulates the memory of the bravest of the brave, and brings their gallant deeds before us—will, we are confident, prove acceptable to millions of the happy inhabitants of our silver-coasted isle.
The natives of Britain have at all periods been celebrated for innate courage and unshaken firmness; and the national superiority of the British troops over those of the finest armies of Europe, as well as the multitudinous hosts of Asia, has been evinced in the midst of the most imminent perils. History contains so many proofs of extraordinary acts of bravery that no doubts can be entertained concerning the facts which will follow in this work.