has so ably exposed this bearing of the question, that we cannot do better than quote his words:

It is well to spare the feelings of surviving friends in England, but I for one think that it would be wholesome for the nation to know, so far as unutterable horrors may be expressed, the manner in which our dear countrywomen and their children were publicly tortured to death in the streets of Delhi, partly by the mutineers and partly by the Muhummedan citizens. Nothing but these stern and appalling realities will stir up the English people to insist on the adoption of those energetic measures by which alone, under the blessing of the Most High, our most important national interests can be secured and our national honour be redeemed.

Already the continental nations view our apathy as to the one, and our feeble efforts to secure the other, with mingled emotions of astonishment and contempt; and you may be sure that among Oriental tribes and peoples, from Constantinople to Canton, the remains of the prestige of the "Ungreez" (English) are fast disappearing under the impression that God has judged us, and that our time has come. You may point to our so-called Persian successes and exclaim, Have not these re-established our influence and reputation? My answer is, No, no, no! The abrupt termination of the Persian war, in the midst of signal success, has not made that impression on the Oriental mind which was fondly hoped by several Quakers, philanthropic old gentlemen, and really Christian mothers of families. An Englishman or woman may be highly intellectual and well-educated, their hearts may be in the right place, and their religious principles genuine, and still they may be quite unable to apprehend or comprehend the perverse modes of reasoning and the un-Christian conclusions of our tawny Eastern brethren.

For many years the sayings and doings and the comparative importance, as regards Asia, of European powers have formed a fertile and interesting topic for the nations of that quarter of the globe. Intelligence of our proceedings and status in India circulates far and wide with inconceivable rapidity, and it is perhaps needless for me to call your attention to the extreme sensitiveness of Asiatics on the point of honour as connected with their females. The monstrous outrages on and murder of our ladies are regarded by all Asiatics-Indians, Turcomans, Persians, &c.—as a damning national insult; and so they are. magnitude of the conspiracy against us in India, and the gigantic hopes of the conspirators, may be measured in a great degree by their having dared to offer this particular insult, not accidentally, but systematically, wherever the outbreaks have taken place.

The

This is an indication of determined and devilish animosity, on a scale unprecedented in the annals of Indian insurrections and mutinies. For although three years ago an English officer and his wife and daughter were robbed, stripped, and wounded in the Hyderabad territory (an ominous outrage, which was unresented and unatoned for !), still, in general, a European woman, lady or otherwise, was held sacred from one end of India to the other, from the impression of the natives, that the conquering and governing race would avenge any insult to their wives and daughters with unflinching and exemplary severity. My knowledge of the moral, social, and political tenets and notions of Orientals in this respect, has made me dwell on this painful subject more emphatically than I should other wise have done, for truly as I write my blood courses like boiling lava through my veins. Why, a tribe of Rajpoots would perish to a man, rather than not avenge an insult offered to the meanest woman of their race; and we are solemnly called upon to lay down our lives for our brethren, à fortiori for our sisters.-["The Crisis in India: its Causes and Proposed Remedies." Bentley.] The Times has also spoken out upon the same subject, if possible still more to the point:

England, religion, and civilisation have received the most intolerable insult that Mahomedan fanaticism could devise in a systematic series of deliberate

brutalities on European women and children. Throughout all the East this is the particular mode of expressing the utmost national scorn and defiance. A people, it is there felt, that cannot, or does not choose, to protect and avenge its women is no people at all, and unfit to be served or obeyed. The Mahomedans of every class do not allow their women to be seen by the eye of man, and nowhere is this scruple so strong as in Hindostan, where even Turks and Persians are thought less refined. However dissolute an old Begum may be,—and some of them are something extraordinary in this way,-wherever she goes curtains and draperies must protect her from the profanation of male eyes. In various less settled districts of Hindostan,-Rajpootana, for instance,-where the state of society makes it difficult to protect women from insult, it is customary to destroy most female infants, in order to prevent what would be a disgrace to the tribe, but which a foe would always, for that reason, be ready to perpetrate. Now, we in India stand in this respect on tender ground. They cannot understand, though to a certain extent they envy, the freedom of our female society. But this is the particular point on which they hold us most accessible to insult, and accordingly the native journals have always been full of the most scandalous libels upon English ladies. Balls, pic-nics, morning calls, and every occasion on which English gentlemen and ladies see one another, are continually recorded with malicious additions. There can be no doubt of a design in the horrors committed on our women and girls; and, if there were any doubt, it would be removed by the manner and method which has been deliberately adopted. It ought to be known, reluctant as we are to tell it, that the women and unmarried girls who fell into the hands of the mutineers and populace of Delhi were carried in procession for hours through the chief thoroughfare of the city, with every horror that could degrade them in the eyes of the people, previous to the last brutalities and cruelties that then, in the sight of thousands, were perpetrated upon them. It was done of settled purpose, to degrade England, to degrade Europe, to degrade a Christian empire, and a Christian Queen. Now, we say it after full deliberation, and with a due regard to the objections always forthcoming against any real and effectual policy, that not one stone of that city should be left upon another. Delhi should for the future be only known in history as Sodom and Gomorrha, so that its place shall not be known. We are well aware that this will try the fidelity of some friends, but they cannot really be our friends if they wish to preserve the memorial of our disgrace. It must be fully explained to them that no disrespect is intended to the Mahomedan dynasties or the Mahomedan religion, but we desire also that no disrespect shall be intended or permitted to us. An execution of this solemn character is not to be performed without a proper force; but, if thirty thousand British soldiers are required to keep order on the occasion, we trust that no Englishman would be found to grudge a year's more Income-tax that the work may be done. It will be the eighth time that Delhi has been destroyed, and never before was its destruction so merited. All Asia will be wiser and better for the example.-Times, Aug. 29.

We are continually twitted with our ignorance of Oriental customs and manners: a young subaltern is called a griffin till he is disgraced by a semi-orientalisation, and whenever anything goes wrong in India, the cause is always traced to some neglect or oversight of the prejudices of the people! We have now an opportunity of exacting a retribution perfectly Oriental in its character, and consonant to Oriental ideas of retributive justice. Let it be done, then; but let it not be said that it is done without disrespect to Islamism. It would be an untruth, and, as usual, the expression of distrust in our religion, and of our being ashamed of the banner under which we fight.

On the 3rd of June, at two A.M., a brigade consisting of the 9th Lancers, two squadrons of the 6th Dragoon Guards, two troops and a half

and one battery of artillery, twenty-one siege-guns and mortars, 60th Rifles, 75th Foot, 1st Bengal Europeans, four companies 2nd Bengal Europeans, the Ghoorkas, one hundred Sappers, and fifty Irregular Horse, marched from the camp of Guznee de Nugger, ten miles from Delhi, where it had been assembled under General Barnard, to avenge the insults and massacres of the Moguls.

Upon the same day, at four P.M., the avenging brigade came upon a line of batteries of the rebels, which were served with the greatest precision. They were only driven from their position after three hours' hard fighting, the brigade suffering very severely. The 75th alone lost about seventy men, Colonel Chester being among the killed. The rebels re

tired from their first line, disputing every inch of ground for eight miles, the brigade following them up. The 60th Rifles did wondrous service on this occasion, expelling them at the sixth mile from a position they had taken up on a range of hills, capturing seventeen guns, and driving them into the city.

Some discussion has naturally arisen as to whether the unfortunate General Barnard should not have followed up his successes by an assault on the city of Delhi. "Caubulee" writes upon this subject: "With a thousand Europeans and a few Sepoys, Clive, at Plassey, attacked and thrashed upwards of forty thousand blacks,' as he calls them, helped and directed as they were by a body of Frenchmen. Barnard, with nearly four thousand Europeans and several regiments of Ghoorkas, &c., all eager for the fray, hesitates to scale what I know to be little better than a huge garden wall. He prefers allowing his men to die of cholera, in the midst of a burning plain, to having a number of them knocked over in the performance of their duty, thereby securing not only victory, but shelter for the rest."

It is to be observed upon this that the "blacks" combated by Clive had not been trained and armed like our Sepoys, nor had they the immense advantage of the heavy guns and profusion of ammunition bestowed upon them with the city of Delhi. So great are these resources, that General Barnard felt at the time of his decease that he had another Sebastopol before him. Opinions vary with circumstances. It is now the more general feeling that it is better not to take Delhi, that the more insurgents that accumulate there, instead of being distributed broadcast over the land, the more effective and condign will be the day of retribution, and that what with dissension among themselves, sickness, famine, and the losses they sustain by their repeated unsuccessful attacks upon the British position, the more the siege is prolonged, the greater will be their sufferings and losses. There is a great deal of complacency in this opinion. It is simply a shred of comfort, where the real thing desirable is unattainable

It is difficult to say what was the exact force of the rebels in Delhi on the approach of the avenging army, but there are said to be now portions of thirty-one Sepoy regiments in that city, besides troops from Oudh and the contingent from Bareilly and Moradabad, which, early in July, was seen streaming across the bridge of boats into the city for two long days, without the British having it in their power to impede or prevent the movement. The subsequent destruction of the bridge of boats had, however, cut off all communication with the Doab.

Oct.-VOL. CXI. NO. CCCCXLII.

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Reinforcements had, to a small extent, reached the avenging army, and General Reed, who had succeeded in command to General Barnard, had, in the camp before Delhi, 5000 native soldiers, two regiments of European cavalry, and about five regiments of infantry, reckoning the wing of her Majesty's 61st, and the six weak companies of the 2nd Fusi liers as one regiment. He had besides about 800 artillerymen. The rebels were, however, still so much superior in numbers, and so much stronger in the number and size of their guns, and in their resources in ammunition, as to successfully bid us defiance. It was not expected that anything decisive could be done till further reinforcements came up, even if the British could hold their own; for in such a position this small body of effective troops was being daily diminished by the frequent sorties of the rebels, and by exposure, fatigue, and disease.

It is not surprising that under such circumstances the siege is progressing but slowly. It is, indeed, much to the credit of the small and heroic band that they have been enabled to hold their own. They have had to repulse further sorties on the 14th, 18th, and 23rd of July, which they did with great loss to the rebels, but at an expense, it is sad to say, of no less than 500 killed and wounded on the side of the English. Brigadier Chamberlain had been severely wounded on the occasion of the first of these sorties. General Reed had also been obliged to relinquish the command on account of illness, and had been succeeded by BrigadierGeneral A. Wilson. The rebels had been reinforced by the Neemuch mutineers, but those from Sealkote had been encountered in their attempt to effect a junction by Brigadier Nicholson at Goordaspoor, and had been routed with signal loss.

On the other hand it is gratifying to be able to state that the same gallant officer was advancing with his formidable column from the Punjab to the relief of the besieging army, and was expected to arrive, after effecting a junction with Van Cortlandt, about the 15th of August. General Havelock, after committing Bhitoor to the flames, and chastising its miscreant owner, Nena Sahib, at Bupeer al Gunge, after meeting with a temporary check in his advance, when close to Lucknow, from the breaking out of sickness, expected to advance with some small reinforcements to the relief of the party shut up in that city, and to proceed thence, if possible, to Delhi. Sir Colin Campbell had also arrived at Calcutta, and hopes were entertained (which he is not the man to disappoint) that he would set out as soon as possible to assume the direction of the siege. Everything tends indeed to show that the rebel city is doomed. Escape for it there is none. And its fate will be a warning to others who may be inclined to repeat the barbarous outrages which have sullied its unholy precincts-not for the first-but let us hope for the last time.

THE ENGAGEMENT OF SUSAN CHASE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "ASHLEY."

I.

A LADY and gentleman were pacing a covered walk one dull day in November. Both were young: he had something of a military air about him; a tall, thin man, very dark. She was fair, with a calm face and pleasant expression. Just now, however, her features were glowing with animation, her cheeks burning, and her eyes cast down; for he, Charles Carnagie, had been telling her that he loved her; and she would rather have his love than that of the whole world.

Lieutenant Carnagie had come on a visit in the neighbourhood. He had accidentally met with Susan Chase the very first day of his arrival, and he had contrived to meet her pretty nearly every day since, now some weeks, so that love had grown up between them. A gossiping letter, received that morning from a brother officer, spoke of a rumour that their regiment was about to be ordered to the West Indies: and this had caused him to speak out.

"You know, Susan," he said, "I cannot go without you."

A deeper blush still, then a troubled expression, and she half raised her eyes. "Mamma will not consent to that she will say I am too

young."

"Susan" laughed Mr. Carnagie.

"Yes.. What?" for he seemed to have found some source of amusement, and laughed still.

"Do you remember the other evening, when the Maitlands came to tea, and the conversation turned on marriage, your mamma informed us she was married at seventeen.. You are eighteen, so she cannot consistently bring forward your youth as an objection."

"Yes, but she also said that early marriages werestopped and blushed.

"Miss Chase

"That early marriages were the incarnation of imprudence and impropriety," said Mr. Carnagie, "laying the foundation for all the ills and disasters that flesh is heir to; from an unconscionable share of children, to a ruined pocket and ruined health. My dearest Susan, we will risk them all, and cite her own example when she holds out against us."

"Look at the rain!" suddenly exclaimed Miss Chase, as they came to an opening in the trees.. "How long can it have begun?"

"It's coming down pretty smartly. There are worse misfortunes at sea, Susan. We can turn back again, and wait its pleasure. You are

under shelter here."

"But indeed. I dare not stay longer. I wonder what the time is. Will you look, please?"

Mr. Carnagie took out his watch.. "It is on the stroke of twelve." "Twelve!" she exclaimed, thunderstruck. "Twelve! Charles, we have been here an hour and a half. What will mamma say ?" "Nothing. When she hears what we have to tell her."