stant sense of danger.
Applications were made for reinforcements, but, notwithstanding the
prodigious armaments of England in India, and her resources elsewhere,
it was with extreme difficulty that any additional force could be
obtained. The following parliamentary papers show the perilous routine
necessary on every occasion when our officers require even the most
paltry reinforcement. General D'Aguilar applied to Major-general Smelt,
the officer commanding at Ceylon, for two guns and a few artillerymen.
In a month after, General Smelt wrote to Lord Fitzroy Somerset, the
military secretary at the Horse-Guards, informing him that if
he (General Smelt) _heard again_ from General D'Aguilar that the
reinforcement was necessary, he would send it! but that, in doing so, he
should leave Ceylon all but utterly unprotected, so far as artillery
was concerned. Lord Torrington, the governor of Ceylon, at the same
time communicated this "great fact"--that two guns and a few men were
wanting at Hong-Kong--to Earl Grey, the colonial minister, who, at the
latter end of November, sent a despatch to General D'Aguilar, telling
him not to do anything against the Chinese without authority from
home! The discretionary power in the hands of Sir John Davis, and the
promptitude, energy, and enterprise of the general, obtained, with less
bloodshed than frequently occurred in a street riot in Canton, redress
of grievances, a recognition of rights, and a series of important
concessions. If it had been necessary to refer these disputes to the
Colonial Office at home, everything would have been frustrated. Possibly
a grand expedition, at an enormous expense, would have gone out in a
year or so afterwards, and an expenditure of British as well as
Chinese life on a large scale have resulted. In spheres so distant, men
thoroughly competent to act ought, in both civil and military matters,
to be appointed, and the honour of the country should be committed to
their hands. With a small force, complete in itself, at the disposal
of such men, more could be effected at the moment for the honour and
interests of the country than by long and roundabout despatches, passing
through so many hands that one fool in authority nullifies all, as a bad
link in an otherwise good chain renders the whole useless. Omitting
the other portions of the correspondence, the following letter
from Major-general D'Aguilar, dated Hong-Kong, August 21, 1847, to
Major-general Smelt, re