"I have determined, therefore, on a trip to Calcutta."
Wherefore General Anson has interviews with this outrageous lieutenant; is "most polite, even cordial," and "while approving of my idea of going down to Calcutta, and thinking it plucky to undertake a journey of two thousand five hundred miles in such weather," thinks "I had better wait till I hear again from him, for he will himself write to Lord Canning, and try to get justice done me."
In six days from this time India is in a blaze.
With the news of the outbreak come orders to the 1st European Fusileers to move down to Umbala, on the route to Delhi. They march the sixty miles in less than two days, but, on their arrival, find an unsatisfactory state of things:
"Here," writes Hodson, "alarm is the prevalent feeling, and conciliation, of men with arms in their hands and in a state of absolute rebellion, the order of the day. This system, if pursued, is far more dangerous than anything the Sepoys can do to us. I do trust the authorities will act with vigor, else there is no knowing where the affair will end. Oh, for Sir Charles now! The times are critical, but I have no fear of aught save the alarm and indecision of our rulers."
The Commander-in-Chief arrives, and now, to Hodson's most naïve astonishment, which breaks out in the comicalest way in his letters, he regains all he has ever lost by one leap.
"May 17th.—Yesterday, I was sent for by the Commander-in-Chief, and appointed Assistant Quartermaster-General on his personal staff, to be under the immediate orders of his Excellency, and with command to raise one hundred horse and fifty foot, for service in the Intelligence Department, and as personal escort. All this was done, moreover, in a most complimentary way, and it is quite in my line."
We can see clearly enough, from our own point of view, what has been at work for a lieutenant lately under a cloud. The plot thickens apace.
But who, at this juncture, will open the road to Meerut, from the general in command of which place we want papers and intelligence? The following extract from the letter of an officer stationed at that place will, perhaps, explain:—
"When the mutiny broke out, our communications were completely cut off. One night, on outlying picket at Meerut, this subject being discussed, I said, 'Hodson is at Umbala, I know; and I'll bet he will force his way through, and open communications with the Commander-in-Chief and ourselves.' At about three that night I heard my advanced sentries firing. I rode off to see what was the matter, and they told me that a party of the enemy's cavalry had approached their post. When day broke, in galloped Hodson. He had left Kurnâl (seventy-six miles off) at nine the night before, with one led horse and an escort of Sikh cavalry, and, as I had anticipated, here he was with despatches for Wilson. How I quizzed him for approaching an armed post at night without knowing the parole. Hodson rode straight to Wilson, had his interview, a bath, breakfast, and two hours' sleep, and then rode back the seventy-six miles, and had to fight his way for about thirty miles of the distance."