licable to the three Presidencies) have absolved
them. For it cannot be alleged _now_ for an instant, that perhaps the
regiments might mean to continue faithful. If they _do_ mean this, no
harm will come to any party from the official dispensing order; the
sepoys could suffer by it only in the case of treachery. And, in the
meantime, there has emerged amongst them a new policy of treason,
which requires of us to assume, in mere self-defence, that _all_
sepoys are meditating treason. It is this: they now reserve their
final treason until the critical moment of action in the very crisis
of battle. Ordered to charge the revolters, they discharge their
carbines over their heads; or, if infantry, they blaze away with blank
cartridge. This policy has been played off already eight or nine
times; and by one time, as it happens, too many; for it was tried upon
the stern Havelock, who took away both horses and carbines from the
offenders. Too late it is _now_ for Bengal to baffle this sharper's
trick. But Bombay and Madras, should _their_ turn come after all,
might profit by the experience.

3. For years it has been our nursery bugbear, to apprehend a Russian
invasion on the Indus. This, by testimony from every quarter (the last
being that of Sir Roderick Murchison, who had travelled over most of
the ground), is an infinitely impossible chimera; or at least until
the Russians have colonized Khiva and Bokhara. Meantime, to those who
have suffered anxiety from such an anticipation, let me suggest one
consolation at least amongst the many horrors of the present scenes in
Bengal--namely, that this perfidy of our troops was not displayed
first in the very agony of conflict with Russia, or some more
probable invader.

4. A dismal suggestion arises from the present condition of Bengal,
which possibly it is too late now to regard as a warning. Ravaged by
bands of marauders, no village safe from incursion, the usual culture
of the soil must have been dangerously interrupted. Next, therefore,
comes FAMINE (and note that the famines of India have been always
excessive, from want of adequate carriage), and in the train of
famine, inaudibly but surely, comes cholera; and then, perhaps, the
guiltiest of races will pay down an expiation at which centuries will
tremble. For in the grave of famishing nations treason languishes; the
murderer has no escape; and the infant with its mother sleeps at last
in peace.

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