ery of six 3-pounders
complete, with due proportion of ammunition and stores, together with
draught bullocks and nine elephants.]

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXXIX.
1869-1871

The Lushais--The Lushai expedition--Defective transport again
--Practice _versus_ theory--A severe march
--Lushais foiled by Gurkhas--A successful turning movement
--Murder of Lord Mayo

We spent a very quiet year at Simla. My wife was far from strong, and
we had another great sorrow in the death of a baby boy three weeks
after his birth.

That winter I was left in charge of the Quartermaster-General's
office, and we moved into 'Ellerslie,' a larger and warmer house than
that in which we had lived during the summer.

Simla in the winter, after a fresh fall of snow, is particularly
beautiful. Range after range of hills clothed in their spotless
garments stretch away as far as the eye can reach, relieved in the
foreground by masses of reddish-brown perpendicular cliffs and
dark-green ilex and deodar trees, each bearing its pure white burden,
and decked with glistening fringes of icicles. Towards evening the
scene changes, and the snow takes the most gorgeous colouring from
the descending rays of the brilliant eastern sun--brilliant even in
mid-winter--turning opal, pink, scarlet, and crimson; gradually, as
the light wanes, fading into delicate lilacs and grays, which slowly
mount upwards, till at last even the highest pinnacle loses the
life-giving tints, and the whole snowy range itself turns cold and
white and dead against a background of deepest sapphire blue. The
spectator shivers, folds himself more closely in his wraps, and
retreats indoors, glad to be greeted by a blazing log-fire and a hot
cup of tea.

In the spring of the next year (1870) Sir William Mansfield's term
of command came to an end, and he was succeeded by Lord Napier of
Magd[=a]la. The selection of this distinguished officer for the
highest military position in India was greatly appreciated by the
Indian army, as no officer of that army had held it since the days of
Lord Clive.

In September a daughter was born, and that winter we again remained
at Simla. I amused myself by going through a course of electric
telegraphy, which may seem rather like a work of supererogation; but
during the Umbeyla campaign, when the telegraph office had to be
closed in consequence of all the clerks being laid up with fever, and
we could neither r