ompletely
the latter's attitude towards us had been changed by the loss of our
military hold over the country.[1]

Deaf to warnings from those who did understand the magnitude of the
danger, the Lieutenant-Governor refused to listen to the Maharaja
Scindia, who, influenced by the wise counsels of his astute and
enlightened minister, Dinkar Rao, told him that the whole Native army
was disloyal, and that the men of his own (the Gwalior) Contingent[2]
were as bad as the rest. The authorities refused to allow the ladies
and children at Gwalior to be sent into Agra for safety; they objected
to arrangements being made for accommodating the non-combatants inside
the walls of the fort, because, forsooth, such precautions would show
a want of confidence in the Natives! and the sanction for supplies
being stored in the fort was tardily and hesitatingly accorded. It was
not, indeed, until the mutinous sepoys from Nimach and Nasirabad were
within sixty miles of Agra that orders were given to put the fort in
a state of defence and provision it, and it was not until they had
reached Futtehpore Sikri, twenty-three miles from Agra, that the women
and children were permitted to seek safety within the stronghold.[3]

Fortunately, however, notwithstanding the intermittent manner in which
instructions were issued, there was no scarcity of supplies, for,
owing to the foresight and energy of Lieutenant Henry Chalmers,
the executive Commissariat officer, assisted by that prince of
contractors, Lalla Joti Persad, and ably supported by Mr. Reade, the
civilian next in rank to the Lieutenant-Governor, food was stored in
sufficient quantities, not only for the garrison, but for all the
refugees from the surrounding districts.[4]

Mr. Drummond, the magistrate of the district, who had from the first
been the chief opponent of precautionary measures for the security of
the residents, had the audacity to set the Lieutenant-Governor's order
for victualling the fort at defiance. He forbad grain or provisions
being sold to the Commissariat contractor, whose duty it was to
collect supplies, and positively imprisoned one man for responding to
the contractor's demands. It was at this official's instigation that
the Native police force was largely increased, instead of being done
away with altogether, as would have been the sensible course; and
as there was an insufficiency of weapons wherewith to arm the
augmentation, a volunteer corps of Christians, lat