privates distinguish themselves, they are, in all armies of a healthy constitution, promoted. But the honorary distinctions of caste are of a peculiar kind. The Brahman sepoy is to his comrades, not merely a person of noble birth, but a superior being altogether, surrounded by the glory of priesthood, yea the halo of divinity. His blessing is invoked, his curse is dreaded as the greatest of afflictions. His feet are worshipped. His whole person adored as an incarnation of Brahma. All sepoys of lower caste stand to their Brahman comrades in the relation of humblest fags, ever ready to listen, to obey, to serve, to propitiate. As to native officers of lower caste, in command of Brahman sepoys, they are in a most embarrassing situation. How can they be strict towards men, at whose feet they have to prostrate themselves? How can they dare to thwart the views, the wishes, the whims of those, whose word may consign them to hell? How punish the "Gods of the earth"? How, then, are native officers to uphold discipline, when they are held in spiritual subjection by a large number of the men under their command?

But how stands the matter of subordination between the European officer and the sepoys as a body? The Brahmanic system, to the essence of which the doctrine of caste belongs, assigns to the British officer, a rank below the lowest sepoys, below the lowest native lascar, below the sweeper and the most abject menial. His touch, his breath, yea, his shadow pollutes the brahmanic sanctity of the men, over whom he holds an official superiority, derived from the will of the Government, who feeds and rules the army. Between the British officers and the Hindu regiments, a gulf is fixed, which can never be filled up, which can never be bridged over, by any official connection, familiarity of intercourse, community of dangers, fellowship on the field of battle, or by any act of kindness, friendship, love on the part of the European commanders.

Add to the above, that the Brahmans are a naturally superior race, who have achieved triumphs two thousand years ago over the spirit of the majority of the different peoples of India, greater than the victory of the Roman priesthood over the wild nations, by which Europe was over-run after the fall of the Roman empire; who have held the real sovereignty of India. amidst all changes of Hindu and Moslem dynasties for nearly two thousand years, and who are inspired with the proudest spirit of caste, in which the power of clanship, of hierarchical fraternity, and of political association are indissolubly united, and fully conscious of their hereditary superiority, and you will perceive at once, that military discipline and subordination cannot exist in reality among an army thus constituted and thus commanded. Nor should we lose sight of the important fact,

that the whole army is one of mercenary soldiers, paid by the rulers of the country, to serve foreign interests, and sprung from among races subjugated and held in subjection by the sword. If Queen Victoria engaged in the attempt of governing Ireland by the help of a Romish native army, swarming with Jesuits, and officered by protestants, she would be in a situation somewhat similar to that of the East India Company, relying on a Brahmanic Bengal army for the security and stability of their empire.

There is a considerable admixture of Mussulmans in the Indian armies. But this ingredient does not sweeten the cup for the British Government. The hereditary innate hatred of the Mohammedan against infidels, is a complete set-off against the Brahmanic abhorrence of the vile stranger. The spirit of caste also is much of the same character and strength among Indian Mohammedans, as among other natives of Hindustan, who have accepted the Goorooship of the Brahmans.

In the Bengal army the preponderance of the Brahmanic element has exceeded all reasonable limits, while it has prevailed much less in the Bombay army, and still less in that of Madras, as will be seen from the following statistics, which are partly taken from Dr. Wilson's admirable discourse, quoted above. Mr. P. Melville, secretary to the military department of the East India Company, in his evidence before the House of Lords, on the 23rd November, 1852, gave the following comparative statement of castes in the regular native infantry of Bengal-Christians (drummers and fifers) 1,118; Brahmans 26,983; Rajputs 27,335; Hindus of an inferior description 15,761. Mohammedans 12,699; Seikhs 50. Total 83,946. These men were almost all from the Upper-provinces, (and particularly the Oude territories) popularly known in India

as

"Hindustan." "About half the Bombay army,—according to the decennial tables of Colonel Jameson,-was in 1851, of the same material from the Upper-provinces, of an average of 16,653 for each of the ten preceding years, out of a strength of 33,145. The number is now, I believe, somewhat reduced." The Madras army-on a rough guess-has the following proportions of classes :

The Brahmanic element is lowest in this branch of the Indian army, the number of Mussulman sepoys exceeds the strength of the Mussulman force in the Bengal army. The Madras army, with the exception of one Mussulman cavalry regiment, has remained, if not perfectly loyal, at least perfectly tranquil. This corroborates, we believe, our general view of the Bengal mutiny as to its essentially Brahmanic character. There is no mutiny where Brahmanism does not prevail, let the number of Mussulmans be ever so large.

We shall now produce our witnesses, few, but of unimpeachable intelligence, knowledge, and character, who describe the state of the Bengal army exactly in accordance with the main principle which we have laid down, viz., that the caste system and caste spirit are absolutely incompatible with the maintenance of military discipline.

Our first witness is Major General H. T. Tucker, for many years adjutant-general of the Bengal army, who retired from active service in the beginning of last year. He wrote a letter to the Times on the 19th of last July, on the subject of the Bengal mutiny. His letter is an extremely valuable document, as it gives the views of one of the most talented and most experienced superior officers on the Bengal establishment, whose impartiality and perfect knowledge of the army, in which he has spent the greater part of his life, no one will venture to call in question. It is very singular, and a strong proof of the guileless truthfulness of the old soldier, that, after stating the purpose of his communication to be "the exoneration from the charge of supineness of the executive, now carrying out the ' details of our Government in the east," he proves the correctness in the main of this very charge, with this modification only, that he shews the blame to rest equally on the men of past generations, and on the whole system of military administration pursued in India, and especially in Bengal, during the last forty years.

We must give the valuable testimony of Major General Tucker almost entire. It contains the fullest confirmation of our own views:-" Sir-at the time, when the whole country is speculating as to the real causes of the mutiny in Bengal, and while in Parliament, and by the Times it seems to be assumed, that our civilians and officers in India have been deceived, blinded and taken by surprise, it becomes a simple act of justice to offer a few brief words of explanation, such as, I trust, will produce 'conviction, and exonerate from the charge of supineness, the executive, now carrying out the civil and military details of our • Government in the east.

"It seems quite to be overlooked, that insubordinate and

'mutinous tendencies in the native army, are not in reality so novel and strange to us as many suppose, for we have been at 'any time during the last forty years on the very verge of internal convulsion, as strong, fierce, and formidable as the present, and in the success alone of this mutiny is to be perceived the difference between the former, and the more recent desire displayed 'for the overthrow of our rule. Let me in proof of this advert 'to some of the better known attempts in which this feeling has 'been plainly shewn.

In 1824, we had the Barrackpore mutiny. On that occasion a vigor and energy was displayed, which has since been charac⚫terized as harsh and bloody. I believe, it was simply necessary: but I have no intention to enter, at this time, into any argu'ment in reference to it. The next symptoms of uneasy feeling, 'following closely on the other, were in 1825 to 1826, when, if we had failed in taking Bhurtpore, as was fully anticipated by the natives generally, our rule and supremacy would have received a severe shock, and the fidelity of the sepoys was, in 'that event, thought by many to be most questionable.

"The fear and anxiety with which the tidings from Bhurtpore were looked for by many officers of rank of that day, I can 'well remember; and one of my oldest and most intimate friends, now holding an important command in India, years ago detailed to me the confession, subsequently made to him, of a conspiracy shared in by his regiment generally to murder all the European 'officers of the corps, excepting, I think, two, who were special favorites; and if the celebrated fortress I have adverted to, had not fallen, if reverse and conspiracy had in those days overtaken us, may we not reasonably conclude, that scenes similar to 'those which now harrow us, would then, in like manner, have • occurred?

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"For one, I am fully impressed with the conviction, that for very many years, we have been subject to this explosion. Upon chance of circumstances alone depended the how, when, and 'where.

"To proceed, we had not many years ago the Scinde mutinya very formidable business. We had other less important indications of insubordination and ill will; and more recently, did not Sir Charles Napier energetically contend, that forty thousand sepoys in the Punjab were, to a man, ripe for revolt? There was no tangible or precise proof of it; but that the feeling was there, that a favorable opportunity would at once have evolved it, many besides Sir Charles confidently believed; and I assert, that it is upon such a mine, liable at any convenient moment to explode, we have all along been resting. It may be contended, that this being so, it was the duty of those

entertaining the opinion boldly to proclaim aloud their conviction, and to advocate a change; but I presume to dispute the 'correctness of any such assumption.

"In Sir Charles Napier's case, the very existence of such a feeling among the sepoys was authoritatively contradicted by the Governor General, Lord Dalhousie; and it must be admitted, that his Lordship had no proofs before him to warrant, as he thought, Sir Charles's statement, or even to enable him fairly to draw any such inference. By a happy combination of cir'cumstances, the mutiny, at that time, of the 66th regiment, was rendered harmless; and it was, doubtless, not considered politic to admit that the sepoy was so tainted, as to be ripe for the 'wholesale revolt Sir Charles with an intuitive and just perception had so wonderfully divined.

"I believe firmly, that he was right in his judgment, but, as 'I have said, there was no precise evidence, and thus things have gone on until now. Fifteen months ago, when I relinquished the post of Adjutant-General of the Bengal army, the most entire calm existed; the repose and apparent contentment of the sepoys were perfect; from Peshawar to Calcutta all was perfectly quiet; but the truth is, that even then one little cloud, the forerunner of many others, was appearing in the horizon. General Anson anxiously desired to innovate. His predecessor has been harshly charged with supineness and lethargic apathy; his own, he designed, should be a reign of a very different description, and he attempted to commence it with a curtailment of the leave of furlough, annually granted to the sepoys-a very hasty and 'injudicious beginning, and apparently so considered by more than myself, for it was then negatived, though I have since heard that at a later period it was successfully advocated.

"General Anson left the plains and went up to Simla without making any preparation for the coming struggle, even although he had himself addressed the Government, representing that the sepoys at Umballa, and in other places, were mutinous and disaffected...

"Much has been said to the effect, that hog's lard and cartridges ‹ have had nothing to do with the mutiny. My own conviction is, that this piece of culpable negligence was as the lighted match to a magazine of powder. The natives generally, and the native army in particular, have been recently strongly impressed, however they came by it-with the idea, that it was intended to subvert their religion, and to make the army con' verts to Christianity. With this idea prevailing, the discovery that impure matter was mixed up wholesale for the lubrication of cartridges would at once and naturally be pointed to as a conclusive proof of the design of the Government to rob them