BOOK VII. Chapter II. 1857. June 19. The principal conspirators. Mr. Tayler arrests them the inhabitants of Patná by depriving them of their weapons, but he could disarm their counsels of wisdom by apprehending and confining their trusted leaders. It was a bold and daring idea, requiring strength of nerve and resolution to carry through; but the necessities were pressing, the dangers were threatening, a general rising in Patná might be fatal. Mr. Tayler resolved to anticipate those dangers, to render impossible or fruitless that rising, by acting in the manner I have indicated. Accordingly he struck. Private information had satisfied Mr. Tayler that the chiefs of the disaffected natives were the Wáhábí Múlvís. These men were the leaders of the most bigoted Mahomedan party in the world, and as such commanded implicit obedience from the mass of Patná Mahomedans, holding in their hands the strings of the contemplated movement. Prominent amongst these Múlvís were three men, Sháh Mahomed Hussén, Ahmad U'llá, and Waiz-úl-Haqq. To seize these men openly would have provoked the outbreak which Mr. Tayler was careful to avoid. But it was necessary for the public peace that they should be secured. Mr. Tayler, therefore, requested their presence, and the presence of others, to consult on the state of affairs. When the conference was over he allowed the others to depart, but detained the three men I have named, informing them that in the then existing state of affairs it was necessary that they should remain under supervision. They politely acquiesced, and were conducted to a comfortable house near the SHALLOW CRITICISM ON HIS CONDUCT. 53 Sikh encampment where suitable accommodation had been provided for them. The act of Mr. Tayler in arresting, without warning them that he intended to arrest themin a word by enticing them to his house-men of whose guilt he had evidence amounting, in his mind, to certainty, and who, if left at large, would have so organized the outbreak that it should coincide with the rise of the sepoys-has been compared, in principle, to "the treacherous assassination of Sir William Macnaghten by Sirdar Mahomed Akbar Khan."* It is difficult to apprehend how the writer could have mistaken the striking difference between the two occurrences. Mahomed Akbar and Sir William Macnaghten were representatives of two nations, the one at war with the other: at the conference at which they met, Mahomed Akbar had guaranteed in the most solemn and sacred manner the life of his guest. Yet Mahomed Akbar shot Sir William Macnaghten dead. Mr. Tayler, on the other hand, represented the governing power of the land; the Múlvís were the avowed subjects of that power; they were not Mr. Tayler's guests; they went to his house to hear the voice of the Government they served; and that voice ordered them to remain in honorary confinement so long as the crisis might last. They were subjected to no humiliation to no disgrace. Simply the power of endangering the lives of others was taken away from them. This act occurred on the 19th of June. It was Follows up Sir John Kaye, vol. iii. p. 84. the blow. BOOK VII. Chapter II. 1857. June 20. Success of his bold action. Fresh discoveries of treason. The chief criminal es followed up by the arrest of Múlví Méhdi, the arms, These several measures were to a great extent successful. The disaffected were deprived of their most trusted leaders; several thousand stand of arms were peaceably delivered up; nightly meetings of the conspirators ceased. As a first practical result, the judge, Mr. Farquharson, the opium agent, Mr. Garrett, and others, left their refuge at the opium godown, and returned to their houses. The second was the sudden diminution of the symptoms of disaffection throughout the districts under Mr. Tayler's orders. But the crisis was not over. Three days later a corporal of the native police, Wáris Ali by name, was arrested at his own station, in Tirhút, under most suspicious circumstances. Upon his person was found a bundle of letters implicating in the rebellious movement one Ali Karím, an influential Mahomedan gentleman, residing nine miles from Patná. Mr. Tayler at once despatched the magistrate capes-how? of Patná, Mr. Lowis, to arrest this gentleman, placing at his disposal a party of Sikh cavalry. But Mr. Lowis, listening to the voice of the native official who was to accompany him, resolved to act without the cavalry. The same friendly voice which had proffered this advice, warned Ali Karím of the magistrate's approach. When Mr. Lowis came in sight of his intended victim, the latter was mounted on an elephant. Mr. Lowis had at his disposal a small pony gig-and his legs. As Ali Karim turned at once into the fields, he was enabled easily to baffle his pursuer, and to escape. The order which Mr. Tayler's hold measures had thus restored was maintained without interruption till the 3rd of July. The disaffected had been thoroughly cowed. In the interval, however, reports of the massacre at Shahjahanpúr, of the fall of Kánhpúr, of Fathpúr, and of Farrakhábád, came to reanimate their hopes. The attitude of the sepoy regiments continued doubtful. BOOK VII. Chapter II. 1857. June 23. rising. But on the evening of the 3rd of July the The Patná long threatened Patná rising occurred. Thanks, however, to the energetic measures already taken by Mr. Tayler, it occurred in a form so diluted that a continuation of the same daring and resolute policy sufficed to repress it. It happened in this wise. At the period on the 3rd already indicated, some two hundred Mahomedan fanatics, led by one Pír Ali, a bookseller, noted for his enthusiasm for his religion and his hatred of the English, unfurled the green flag, and summoning by beat of drum others to join them rushed, calling upon Allah, towards the Roman Catholic Church, situate in the very heart of the city. On the news of this movement reaching BOOK VII. Chapter II. 1857. July 3. Murder of The rising suppressed. Mr. Tayler, that gentleman directed Captain Rattray, attended by the magistrate, to march down with 150 Sikhs, whilst for the protection of the residents he put into operation the same precautions which had been adopted on the 7th of June, he himself going in person to the houses nearest to his own. Meanwhile, and before the Sikhs had reached the spot, Dr. Lyall, the assistant to the opium agent, hearing the uproar, and thinking that his presence might overawe the rioters, had galloped to the scene of action. As he approached the crowd several shots were fired at him. By one of these he was killed.* The sight of a fallen European stimulated the fanaticism of the crowd, and produced on them the effect which the taste of blood arouses in a hungry tiger. They pushed onwards with renewed enthusiasm, their numbers being augmented at every step. In a very few minutes, however, they found themselves face to face with Rattray's 150 Sikhs. Between the opposing parties, far from sympathy, there was the hatred of race, the hatred of religion; on the one side the newly aroused fanaticism, on the other the longed for opportunity to repay many a covert insult. It can well be imagined what followed. There was not a moment of parley. The rival parties instantaneously clashed, and, in a few seconds, the discipline and bayonets of the Sikhs suppressed the long threatened Patná rising. *His face was at once so mutilated that it could not afterwards be recognised. |