The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Miscellany Volume 2 (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: OFFICIAL LIFE IN I N D I A.?No. VI. BY A BENGAL CIVILIAN. Peer Khan had still continued to be in command of my escort, and, removed from European society, I saw more of him than I otherwise should have done. He was very entertaining, had a fund of anecdote and stories, and was in his old age by no means garrulous or fond of speaking of his own exploits, so that I always found difficulty in drawing him on to a relation of his own history, but none in checking him. He had been Col. Skinner's favourite officer during the whole of Lord Lake's campaigns, and had seen many adventures during the course of the war, and I think I recollect sufficient of one of those he related to me to repeat it here. " Sahih," said Peer Khan,?he was sitting, cross-legged, on the carpet of the tent, with his sword across his knees, and his feet carefully covered from sight,?"your servant .was relating the other day how we continued to pursue the enemy through the Dooab. Holkar's numerous and lightly-armed force seemed always to escape from us when we most expected to come up with and annibilate them. The sepoys were beginning to be harassed by forced marches ; Lord Lake had already appealed to them, asking them whether they could not march in discipline as fast as the undisciplined rabble before them. One, bolder than the rest, pointed to his knapsack, and said, ' Relieve us of this, and see how long they will remain before us.' His comrades joined him in the answer, and Lord Lake found it necessary to resort temporarily to the expedient as far as possible. One evening, I was sitting with Col. Skinner, when he received orders from Lord Lake to have his men in complete readiness for an instant march, and to attend himself at the comniander-m-chiePs tent as soon as he was ready. All was arranged in ...