rming parade. The next morning we started early, the
Europeans heading the column, and when they reached the ground we had
selected they took up a position on the right of the road, the two
batteries in the centre and the 52nd in wings on either flank. The
guns were unlimbered and prepared for action. On the left of the road
was a serai,[11] behind which the officer commanding the 35th was told
to take his regiment, and, as he cleared it, to wheel to the right,
thus bringing his men in column of companies facing the line of
Europeans. This manoeuvre being accomplished, I was ordered to tell
the commanding officer that the regiment was to be disarmed, and that
the men were to pile arms and take off their belts. The sepoys and
their British officers were equally taken aback; the latter had
received no information of what was going to happen, while the former
had cherished the hope that they would be able to cross the Sutlej,
and thence slip off with their arms to Delhi.

I thought I could discover relief in the British officers' faces,
certainly in that of Major Younghusband, the Commandant, and when I
gave him the General's order, he murmured, 'Thank God!' He had been
with the 35th for thirty-three years; he had served with it at the
siege of Bhurtpore, throughout the first Afghan war, and in Sale's
defence of Jalalabad; he had been proud of his old corps, but knowing
probably that his men could no longer be trusted, he rejoiced to feel
that they were not to be given the opportunity for further disgracing
themselves.[12] The sepoys obeyed the command without a word, and in a
few minutes their muskets and belts were all packed in carts and taken
off to the fort.

As the ceremony was completed, the 33rd arrived and was dealt with in
a similar manner; but the British officers of this regiment did not
take things so quietly--they still believed in their men, and the
Colonel, Sandeman, trusted them to any extent. He had been with the
regiment for more than two-and-thirty years, and had commanded it
throughout the Sutlej campaign. On hearing the General's order, he
exclaimed: 'What! disarm my regiment? I will answer with my life for
the loyalty of every man!' On my repeating the order the poor old
fellow burst into tears. His son, the late Sir Robert Sandeman, who
was an Ensign in the regiment at the time, told me afterwards how
terribly his father felt the disgrace inflicted upon the regiment of
which he was so proud.

It