hat
officer near the city while endeavouring to escape down-country.

Hodson, with his accustomed daring, and accompanied by 100 only of his
own troopers, seized the person of the King from amongst thousands of
armed dependents and rabble, who, awed by his stern demeanour, did not
raise a hand in resisting the capture. The King was brought to Delhi the
same day, and lodged as a prisoner in the house formerly the residence
of the notorious Begum Sumroo. He was guarded by fifty men of my
regiment, under command of a Lieutenant; and on the 22nd I went to see
him, accompanied by our Adjutant.

Sitting cross-legged on a cushion placed on a common native _charpoy_,
or bed, in the verandah of a courtyard, was the last representative of
the Great Mogul dynasty. There was nothing imposing in his appearance,
save a long white beard which reached to his girdle. About middle
height, and upwards of seventy years old, he was dressed in white, with
a conical-shaped turban of the same colour and material, while at his
back two attendants stood, waving over his head large fans of peacocks'
feathers, the emblem of sovereignty--a pitiable farce in the case of one
who was already shorn of his regal attributes, a prisoner in the hands
of his enemies. Not a word came from his lips; in silence he sat day and
night, with his eyes cast on the ground, and as though utterly oblivious
of the condition in which he was placed. On another bed, three feet
from the King, sat the officer on guard, while two stalwart European
sentries, with fixed bayonets, stood on either side. The orders given
were that on any attempt at a rescue the officer was immediately to
shoot the King with his own hand.

[Illustration: KING OF DELHI AS A PRISONER IN 1857.]

[From a photograph taken from a pencil sketch by Captain Robles, who was
placed on guard over him.]

The old King was brought to trial shortly afterwards at the palace, and
found guilty of complicity in the murders of our country men and women,
and was transported beyond the seas, dying in British Burmah before he
could be removed to the Andaman Islands, where, in accordance with his
sentence, he was to have remained in imprisonment for the term of
his natural life. The vicissitudes of fortune, numberless as are the
instances among men of royal birth, can scarcely show anything more
suggestive of the transitoriness of earthly pomp and grandeur than
the case of the last King of Delhi. Sprung from the line