But again there was sadness. General Havelock lived long enough to receive the cross of Knight Commander of the Bath, and died amidst the tears of the women and children whom he had done his best to rescue.
§18. Many a soldier grieved over the retirement from Lucknow, but the retreat was a painful necessity. The Gwalior contingent, maintained by Sindia under the treaty of 1843, had broken out in mutiny and joined the forces of Nana Sahib. An army of 20,000 rebels advanced on Cawnpore, defeated Brigadier Wyndham, who had been left in charge, and occupied the town. Sir Colin Campbell shipped the precious convoy from Lucknow on board a flotilla of steamers, and despatched them to Calcutta. He then took the field, and drove the Gwalior rebels out of Cawnpore.
[Sidenote: Calcutta, 30th January, 1858.]
On the 30th of January, 1858, all the Europeans in Calcutta flocked to the banks of the Hughly, to welcome the return of the besieged from Lucknow; but when a procession of widows and orphans appeared in black raiment, with pallid faces and emaciated forms, the acclamations of the crowd died away in a deep and painful silence, and every eye was filled with tears for the sufferings of the survivors of the beleaguered garrison at Lucknow.
§19. Here ends the story of the siege and relief of Lucknow. In 1858 Oudh was conquered, the rebellion was crushed, peace and order were restored, and a compromise with the talukdars was effected on the battle-field. The reconciliation of the people of Oudh with British rule and supremacy will be noted in a future chapter.
[Sidenote: Causes of the revolt in Oudh.]
Greased cartridges were the cause of the sepoy mutinies of 1857, but they were not the cause of the revolt in Oudh; and yet it was impossible for the British government to postpone the deposition of the king of Oudh or the annexation of the kingdom.
Oudh had been drifting into anarchy ever since it had been taken under British protection. Every Governor-General from Lord Wellesley to Lord Dalhousie had denounced the administration of Oudh as tyrannical, oppressive, and corrupt. Every ruler of Oudh had been threatened in turn; but as the Resident was warned not to interfere beyond tendering advice, repeated threats were as unheeded as the old cry of "wolf." Sir James Outram, the Bayard of India, and last British Resident at Lucknow, summed up his views in the following words:--"I have always been the upholder of native states as long as they retained a spark of vitality, and we could recognise them without infringing our treaties or our suzerain power. It is, therefore, most painful for me to have to acknowledge that if we persist in maintaining this feeble and corrupt dynasty, we shall be sacrificing the interests of ten millions of individuals whom we are bound by treaty to protect by ensuring them a good government, capable of defending the life and property of its subjects."