NOTES ON THE NARRATOR’S NARRATIVE.
NOTE A.
THE battle of Kirkee was the turning-point in the last Mahratta war, which sealed the fate of the Peishwa’s dynasty and transferred the Deccan to British rule, and is naturally, in that part of India, still regarded, by all whose recollections go back to those days, as the one great event of modern history.
When the collector of these tales was in India, the house temporarily occupied by the Governor of Bombay overlooked the field of battle, and among those who came to see the Governor on business or pleasure were some—natives as well as Europeans—to whom the events of half a century ago were matters of living memory.
Old soldiers would tell how the fidelity of the native Sepoys resisted all the bribes and threats of Bajee Row Peishwa, the absolute Brahmin ruler of Poona, and thus, while the Peishwa hoped to effect his purpose by treachery, enabled Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone to defer open hostilities—a matter of vital importance to the operations of Lord Hastings on the other side of India, in preparing for his great campaign against the Pindarees.
The veterans would recount all the romantic incidents of the struggle which followed—how the “old Toughs” (now H. M.’s 103d Regiment), the only European corps within reach, when at last slipped from the leash at Panwell, marched seventy-two miles straight up over the ghauts to Poona, with only a single three-hours’ halt en route; how they closed up their ranks of travel-soiled warriors and entered the British lines with band playing and colors flying; and how not a straggler dropped behind, “for all knew that there must be a battle soon.” Their arrival was the signal for the Peishwa to throw off the mask, and, as the British Residency was untenable, the English troops moved out to take up a safer position at Kirkee, about three miles from the city of Poona; and as they marched they saw all the houses of the Resident and his suite fired by the enemy, who swarmed out of the city. As they formed in line of battle, they anxiously watched the native regiments coming up on their flank from Dapoorie, for that was the moment for successful treachery if the native soldiers were untrue! Not a Sepoy, however, in the British ranks wavered, though before the junction was complete a cloud of Mahratta cavalry poured down upon them, dashed through the opening left between the two lines, enveloped either flank of the little army, and attacked the European regiment in the rear. Then, as a last resource, the European regiment faced about their second rank, and kept up such a steady rolling fire to front and rear at the same time that but few of the eager horsemen ever came within spear’s length of the British bayonets.
One of the most touching recollections of those times attracted our notice almost the last day we spent at Kirkee. An old chief, Jadowrow of Malagaom, had come to take leave of the departing Governor. He was head of one of the oldest Mahratta families, for his ancestors were famous as a very ancient royal house before the Mohammedans invaded the Deccan. The old man had borne arms as a youthful commander of horse when the great Duke was at Poona in 1802, just before the battle of Assaye, had been greatly distinguished for his gallantry in the battle of Kirkee, so fatal to his race, and had followed the fortunes of the Peishwa to the last. Disdaining to make separate terms for himself with the English conqueror, he remained one of the few thoroughly faithful to his sovereign—not from love, for he loved not Bajee Row, but “because he had eaten his salt”—and only after the Peishwa’s surrender returned to his old castle near Poona. There for many years he lived, hunting and hawking over his diminished acres, and greatly respected as a model of a gallant and honorable old chief; but he could never be persuaded to revisit the capital of the Mahrattas after its occupation by the English. “He had no child,” he said, “and his race would die with him.” At last, as years rolled on, an only son was born to him; and then, touched by some unexpected act of liberality on the part of the British government which would secure his ancestral estate to this child of his old age, he resolved to go to Poona, and visited the Governor, whose temporary residence happened to overlook the battle-field of Kirkee. He gazed long and wistfully from the drawing-room windows and said, “This place is much changed since I was here last, fifty years ago. It was here the battle was fought, and it was from near this very spot that we charged down that slope on the English line as it formed beyond that brook. I never thought to have seen this place again.”
Almost every hill, fort, and every large village round Poona, has some tradition, not only of the days of Alumgeer, Sivajee and of early Mahratta history, but of the campaigns of Wellesley in 1802 and of the last great struggle in 1817-18.