courier and spy, and had risen rapidly in favour by | This intimidated the Peishwa, who found himself ministering to the sensual pleasures of his master, compelled to surrender Trimbukjee, who was thrown who then began to neglect, or cease to consult, his into the strong fortress of Thanna, on the island of minister, Munkaseir. Trimbukjee was a man of Salsette, near Bombay. violent character, and a bitter hater of the British, who, no doubt, had laboured hard to introduce something like law and order in the country of the Peishwa, To stir up mischief, Trimbukjee committed several outrages along the frontier of our ally, the Guicowar, who thereupon dispatched an ambassador or vakeel named Gungadhur, the Shastree (on account of his familiarity with the Shastras, or Sanscrit writings), to remonstrate with the Peishwa on the conduct of his favourite. The Peishwa referred the Shastree to Trimbukjee, who barbarously murdered him as he left a Hindoo temple. He was struck from behind with what seemed only a twisted cloth, but which, in reality, concealed a sword-blade. Others followed up the blow, and he was cut to pieces. The people of the Shastree had literally to search for these "pieces;" and, as he was a Brahmin of the highest caste, and enjoyed a great reputation for pure sanctity and much learning, the assassination excited the horror of the Mahrattas, who, though lawless, were brave, and detested such a mode of death. Every way the crime seemed dreadful in their eyes, from the character of the victim and the sanctity of the place where he perished; and they loudly predicted that the vengeance of their gods would speedily fall upon Trimbukjee, and that the ruin of their Peishwa would date from the day of the deed. The Honourable Mountstuart Elphinstone, our Resident at Poonah, lost no time, after communicating with the Marquis of Hastings, in putting our subsidiary force at Seroor in motion. There his captivity proved a brief one. It chanced that a Mahratta groom, having a good character to recommend him, offered his services to the British officer commanding in the fort. He was forthwith employed; and as the stable where he attended his master's horse was directly under the window of Trimbukjee's prison, it was remarked that when attending to the commandant's horse, and while currying and cleaning it, he was always singing snatches of wild Mahratta songs. At length, one night in December, 1816, Trimbukjee was found to have vanished from his prison, together with the horse and groom from the stable below. It was generally believed that Trimbukjee fled straight to his infatuated prince at Poonah. If so, the latter concealed him, and assured the British authorities, with great solemnity, that he knew nothing about him. The assassin's hate for the British had certainly not been lessened by the imprisonment he had undergone among them; and wherever he was lurking, there was little doubt that he urged the Peishwa to avenge himself for the humiliation of his surrender, by entering more keenly than ever into those intrigues by which he hoped to place himself at the head of a new and conquering Mahratta confederacy; to throw the whole Treaty of Bassein to the winds; and to begin that career which ended so fatally for himself and all his followers. We shall have to return, in its place, to the intrigues of Trimbukjee; but, meanwhile, our armies had to take the field against a more lawless foe than even the Mahrattas. CHAPTER XC. THE PINDAREES, AND WHAT LED TO A WAR WITH THEM. THE new contest has often been designated the second Mahratta war, as it began in hostilities with the Pindarees, but ended in a general war with the associated chiefs of the great Mahratta confederation. The Pindarees were not a race apart from others in India, but a great community of people, who differed in blood, descent, religion, and habits, but who were all associated together in one common pursuit-robbery; and the most popular etymology of the name Pindaree is, that they derived it from their intemperate habits, which led them constantly to those shops where intoxicating liquors were sold; and Kureem Khan, the greatest of all their leaders 1816] THE PINDAREES. 477 -who surrendered himself to Sir John Malcolm | their progress was marked by the ruins of burning -told him that he never heard any other origin assigned to it. The name of Pindaree, says a writer,* may be found in Indian history at the commencement of the last century; several bands of these freebooters followed the Mahratta armies in their earlier wars in Hindostan; and they are mentioned by Ferishta as having fought against Zulfeccar Khan and the other generals of Aurungzebe. One of their most daring captains" was named Ponapah, who ravaged the Carnatic, and took Vellore early in the reign of Sahoojee. This chief is said to have been succeeded by Chingaly and Hool Sewar, who commanded 15,000 horse at the battle of Paniput." Under him the Pindaree system began to assume an organised form. They were divided into Durrahs, or tribes, led by chiefs, who enrolled any man-possession of a sharp sword and good horse being the only qualifications for admission. Common interest kept them united, and renown in the Mahratta wars was won by their chiefs, who seized upon lands, retained them by the sword, and transmitted them to their descendants. towns and villages, the shrieks of wretched women, and the groans of their mutilated husbands were heard wherever the Pindarees went; and their horses, which were trained to undergo the same privations as their masters, often received, like them, a stimulus of opium, when impelled to uncommon exertion. From many of their sudden expeditions they returned home laden with spoil, to the mountainous country which borders the Nerbudda to the north, where they found protection for themselves in those great forts which belonged to them, or to those with whom they were openly or secretly in league. The fame of these exploits drew to their ranks many deserters from the loose cavalry establishments of Scindia and Holkar. Plunder being the sole object of the Pindarees, they constituted their force for that purpose only; and, as light cavalry, trained themselves to hard marching and extreme celerity of movement. With this view, it was their custom, till the monsoon should close and the rivers be fordable, to exercise the horses, and prepare them for long marches and hard work. They Two, named Heeroo and Burran are subsequently When the time for marching came, they were mentioned as Pindaree leaders; and in order to carefully shod, and the expedition of many thousand distinguish the followers of Tookojee Holkar from hardened ruffians set forth. Out of every 1,000 those of Mohadajee Scindia, they were hence-about 400 were better mounted than the rest. Their forward denominated the Scindia Shahee and the favourite weapon was a bamboo spear, varying from Holkar Shahee. twelve to eighteen feet in length; every fifteenth or twentieth man carried a matchlock. were always accompanied by an irregular train of attendant slaves and camp-followers, poorly mounted on wild horses, and who kept up with the general mass as well as they could. Moving with a rapidity that defied all pursuit, they could spread their devastations over hundreds of miles without being interrupted or overtaken. Dost Mohammed Khan and Ryan Khan, the sons of Heeroo, were both powerful chiefs in 1820; but, in an association which was daily augmented by the admittance of strangers, it may naturally be supposed that the influence of hereditary claims was lessened, and that men of superior genius or daring rose to the chief command. Thus, in time, Cheetoo, or Seetoo, became the most powerful of the Pindaree leaders, and his followers began to be looked upon, in the time of the Marquis of Hastings, as a kind of independent power, which, if properly combined under an able commander, could seriously disturb the peace and arrest the prosperity of India. By 1814 their actual military strength amounted to no less than 40,000 horse. Their leaders were all men of reckless courage and tried valour, under whom they rode on distant expeditions for the purpose of plundering peaceful countries, moving in bodies of 2,000 or 3,000 strong, holding an undeviating course until they reached their destination, when they at once split into small parties, to collect plunder, and destroy all that they failed to remove. They were guilty of the most inhuman barbarities; "Origin of the Pindarees." "As it was impossible for them to remain more than a few hours on the same spot," says Henry T. Princep, "the utmost dispatch was necessary in rifling any towns or villages into which they could force an entrance; every one whose appearance indicated the probability of his possessing money, was immediately put to the most horrid torture, till he either pointed out his hoard or died under the infliction. Nothing was safe from the pursuit of Pindaree lust or avarice; it was their common practice to burn and destroy what could not be carried away, and in the wantonness of barbarity to outrage and murder women and children under the eyes of their husbands and parents." "Their chief strength," says Sir John Malcolm, "lay in their being intangible. If pursued, they * "Narrative of Pol. and Mil. Transactions in India, 1813-18." frequently made extraordinary marches of sixty had been put to the most cruel deaths, 505 were miles in length, by ways impracticable for regular severely wounded, and 3,603 put to the most troops. If overtaken, they dispersed, to re-assemble barbarous kinds of torture. at an appointed rendezvous; and if followed to the country from whence they issued, they broke into small parties."* The common modes of torture, when property was supposed to be concealed, was to tie a bag of hot ashes about the victim's head, and he was suffocated by being compelled to inhale the fumes. Others were thrown on their back, had a heavy beam placed across their chest, while a stout Pindaree sat at each end, pressing it down, at the same time inflicting blows on the helpless creature below. Boiling oil and burning straw were also common, because convenient, materials for torture; and often children were torn from their mothers' arms, dashed on the ground, flung into wells, or tossed in the air, to be received, when falling, on the point of a spear. In 1809 and 1812 they penetrated into British territory, and retreated with abundance of spoil. In 1815, they dared to make another invasion, when 8,000 of them crossed the Nerbudda, and moved northwards, after suffering a trifling loss from Major Fraser, with 400 horse and foot only, they reached the banks of the Kistna, which luckily proved impassable; hence the Madras Presidency, which lay on the other side, was secure from devastation. Marching eastward, these freebooters proceeded to plunder all the fertile and populous districts along the banks of the stream for many miles, committing their usual enormities. Returning northward, along the line of the Godavery and Wurdah, they escaped, with immense booty and perfect impunity; and their complete success in this expedition encouraged them to attempt others. Thus, in February, 1815, under different leaders, they crossed the Nerbudda, to the number of 10,000 horse; and on the 10th of March appeared on the western frontier of Masulipatam. On a march of only thirty-eight miles next day, they destroyed ninety-two villages, committing the most dreadful cruelties on the unarmed inhabitants. The next day's march was also thirty-eight miles, and in the course of it, fifty-four villages perished. The third day's march extended to fifty-two miles, and though pursued by our troops, under Colonel Doveton, the whole achieved the passage of the Nerbudda, with enormous booty and without loss; and it was soon after ascertained that, during the twelve days this horde had been in our territories, 182 persons "Memoir of Central India." The attention of Government was now seriously directed to this state of affairs, and to the prevention of further outrages. The Marquis of Hastings, who had brought the Nepaul war to a successful conclusion at the very time when the Pindarees and Mahrattas were confidently hoping for its protraction and to make profit out of it mutually, was now eager to employ all the strength of his unemployed troops in the task of extirpating this atrocious army of robbers. For this purpose, as a temporary expedient, a chain of defensive outposts was established along the bank of the Nerbudda river. These extended across the country for about 150 miles, but were too meagrely supplied with troops to afford a very effectual defence, as, in one instance, two of the posts were ninety miles apart; and it soon became evident, that in a purely defensive war, a lightlyarmed assailant has all the advantages, and may always, by judiciously choosing the point for attack, penetrate the line of defence where weakest. Thus our line of outposts was passed by the Pindarees, and the country ravaged as usual; and though, in this instance, some of them were overtaken and severely handled by the British troops, it was more owing to fortunate chances than any previously well-concerted scheme. The Marquis of Hastings now resolved to commence offensive war, and, not resting satisfied with the mere line of posts, to pursue the Pindarees to their most remote haunts and fastnesses; yet, at this very time, despite the outrages committed, and the indignation they had excited in British India, the timid counsels of the home authorities tended greatly to hamper the Governor-General; and in his instructions from Mr. Canning, President of the Board of Control in 1816, he found the following remarks, with reference to the hostile aspect of the Mahrattas and the Pindaree invasions :— "We are unwilling to incur a general war for the uncertain purpose of extirpating the Pindarees. Extended political and military combinations we cannot sanction or approve. .. We entertain a strong hope that the dangers which arise from both these causes, and which must, perhaps, always exist in a greater or less degree, may, by a judicious management of our existing relations, be prevented from coming upon us in any very formidable force; while, on the other hand, any attempt, at this moment, to establish a new system of policy, tending to a wider diffusion of our power, must necessarily * Princep, &c. 1816.J THE RAJAH OF JEYPORE. interfere with those economical regulations which it is more than ever incumbent on us to recommend as indispensable to the maintenance of our present ascendency, and by exciting the jealousy and suspicion of other states, may too probably produce or mature those very projects of hostile confederacy which constitute the chief object of your apprehension." To the pusillanimous policy thus suggested the Marquis wrote a very indignant reply concerning the Pindarees, and saying, "I am roused to the fear that we have been culpably deficient in pointing out to the authorities at home the brutal and atrocious qualities of those wretches. Had we not failed to describe sufficiently the horror and execration in which the Pindarees are justly held, I am satisfied that nothing could have been more repugnant to the feelings of the Honourable Committee, than the notion that this Government should be soiled by a procedure which was to bear the colour of confidential intercourse-of a common cause with any of these gangs." This outburst referred to a suggestion made by Mr. Canning, that the marquis should endeavour to split up the confederacy by taking advantage of some dissensions then existing among the Pindarees. Ere long, the home Government became convinced that nothing but the sword would crush them, and counselled that which was necessary-a bolder policy-to the Marquis of Hastings, who lost no time in acting on their injunctions; and, preparatory to taking the field, he sought to strengthen himself by the co-operation of several of the native powers, while a large part of the Bengal army was kept in advanced cantonments, ready to act at an hour's notice. Hastings had undoubted information that the Peishwa, Scindia, and other Mahratta princes, were in close and secret correspondence with the Pindaree leaders, and that some great and combined movement was in view; but, fortunately, at this crisis, the interests of Britain were greatly furthered by the death of two of her greatest enemies the Nabob of Bhopal, and Ragojee Bhonsla, the Rajah of Nagpore, both of whom expired in the March of 1816. As usual, the musnuds of these potentates became the subjects of dire dispute between selfish claimants; and the two who proved successful, feeling their seats insecure, were glad to purchase British aid by the conclusion of treaties favourable to our interests. Apa Sahib, who was installed at Nagpore, accepted a subsidiary force of six battalions of native 479 infantry and a corps of native cavalry, for which he was to pay seven and a half lacs of rupees per annum; while at the same time binding himself to keep on foot a contingent force of his own, consisting of 5,000 men, who were to co-operate with the British in putting down the Pindarees. While these negociations were in progress, others were carried on with the Rajah of Jeypore, a once powerful Rajpoot state, famous for the manufacture of its rich stuffs, swords, and matchlocks, whose alliance had been declined by Sir George Barlow in 1806. Since then, the rajah's territories had been desolated again and again by the Mahrattas and Patans; and, by the end of 1815, in his very despair, he implored the Governor-General to take him under his protection. Though many members of the Supreme Council were strongly and strangely averse to this measure, the marquis resolved to extend the protection of the British flag to one who had been its old and faithful ally in times past, believing that, by so doing, it would aid in his great plan for the suppression of the Pindarees; though, apart from that, the measure in itself was good, as it would reduce the resources of their predatory powers, and save a noble territory (with an area of 14,900 square miles) from ruin and devastation.* Thus, a subsidiary treaty was offered to the rajah at the very time his capital was beleagured by Meer Khan and the Patans. So long as the blockade lasted, the rajah seemed most willing to comply with all the terms of the proffered document, and with all the requisitions made by Mr. Metcalfe, our Resident at Delhi, to whom the negociation had been confided; but when the siege was raised, and the Patans were bought off by a round sum in treasure, the rajah then gave ear to some of his haughty Rajpoot chiefs, who disdained the British alliance, as destructive of their national independence, and their own feudal, or rather, local power. After this, his vakeels at Delhi raised so many doubts and difficulties concerning the alliance, that Mr. Metcalfe dismissed them, and broke off all negociations. But now the people of Jeypore, who preferred peace and security, under British protection, to plunder and war, under the ministers of the rajah, began to murmur so loudly, that he found himself under the unpleasant necessity of sending his vakeels back to Delhi to renew the negociations. The vakeels, however, were indignantly dismissed again by Mr. Metcalfe, as they made propositions to which Britain could never accede; asked large pensions for themselves, and for British aid to • Princep's "Narrative." |