To other circumstances, however, the fortunate result of the attack may in a great measure be attributed. By an unpardonable oversight the breach was unprovided with a retrenchment, and the workmen’s passage, between the ditch and rampart, left undefended. Had the breach been properly retrenched, it could not have been surmounted in the face of such a garrison; and traverses, that could have been, and were, most obstinately defended, were lost to the besieged by their stupid neglect in having left a means of escalade from the ditch, which the labour of a dozen men would have rendered impracticable. How frequently in war do great results arise from trifling causes.
Every care was taken to prevent plunder and violence in the night. The inhabitants were assured of protection; and the Sultaun’s children kindly received by General Baird, and for better security sent from the fortress to the camp. Even before Tippoo’s death was ascertained, great delicacy was observed in searching the palace, where it was supposed he had concealed himself. The zenana, which contained his women, was scrupulously respected—and a guard was merely drawn around it to prevent the Sultaun’s escape, in the event of his having made that his place of refuge.
Though eight thousand of Tippoo’s garrison fell in the assault, very few of the inhabitants suffered. The British loss during the siege and storm was, of course, severe; twenty-five officers were killed or wounded in the assault; and the total casualties were, of Europeans, twenty-two officers killed, forty-five wounded, eighty-one rank and file killed, six hundred and twenty-two wounded, and twenty-two missing; of the native army, one hundred and nineteen were killed, four hundred and twenty wounded, and one hundred missing, making a general total of one thousand five hundred and thirty-one hors de combat.
Having made necessary arrangements for the protection of the town, Baird marched the 33rd and 74th regiments to the palace, and in one of its magnificent courts the soldiers piled arms, and established their bivouac.[12] Sentries were placed around the zenana for its security; and the general slept on a carpet spread for his accommodation under the verandah. There lay the conqueror of Seringapatam, surrounded by his victorious soldiers, and dispensing protection to the helpless family of the fallen Sultaun. There he lay, on whose breath hung life and death—yet but a few years back, and within three hundred yards of the spot he rested on, that man had occupied a dungeon, dragging on a cheerless captivity, and waiting until the poisoned cup should be presented by “the bondsman of a slave,” or the order delivered for his midnight murder.
Is not the romance of real life oftentimes wilder far than any creation of the imagination?
Sir H. Raeburn.
H. Cook.
D. Baird
The tyrant of Mysore was gone to his account, and “how his audit stood none knew save Heaven;” but assuredly a more tiger-hearted monster never disgraced the musnud. His conduct to the European prisoners after Hyder’s death was atrocious. Of those taken with Bailey, the greater proportion perished from starvation and disease; while Matthews and his officers, who had surrendered under the usual conditions granted in honourable warfare, and guaranteed by Tippoo himself, were savagely murdered. Some of them were led out at night, taken to a retired spot, and hewn in pieces—while seventeen were poisoned with the milk of the cocoa-nut tree. The death of the unhappy general was probably the most horrible of all. Apprised by some means of the fate that was impending, he refused the food sent by the keeladar, and obtained, from the compassion of the guard and servants, as much of theirs as merely sustained existence—the havildar who had him in charge humanely conniving at the proceeding. But when Tippoo learned that his victim still lived, the havildar was sent for, and it was intimated that if his prisoner existed beyond a certain time, his own life should pay the penalty of his humanity. The wretched instrument of tyranny communicated what had passed to the devoted general, and gave him the alternative of death from poison or starvation. “For a few days the love of life maintained a struggle with the importunate calls of hunger. These, however, prevailed in the issue of the contest—he ate of the poisoned food, and drank too—whether to quench the rage of inflamed thirst, or to drown the torments of his soul in utter insensibility—of the poisoned cup; and in six hours after the fatal repast he was found dead.”[13]