the argument that Dulip Singh, being a minor, could not justly be held responsible for the misdeeds of his subjects, by granting him a generous pension of £50,000 a year. The child was given an English education, ultimately embraced Christianity, and lived the life of an English landlord on an estate in Norfolk. The Sikhs submitted to their lot more quietly than any one had anticipated, and as regards the material result the policy of the annexation was abundantly justified.

To settle the new province a Board of three commissioners was set up, consisting of Sir Henry Lawrence as President, his brother John, and Charles Mansel, who was replaced in 1851 by Robert Montgomery. Dalhousie would have preferred a single head, but he felt himself bound not to pass over Sir Henry Lawrence, and though he appreciated his fine and chivalrous character he did not consider him competent to take sole charge. To him was especially entrusted the 'political' work, i.e. negotiations with the chiefs, the disarming of the country, and the levying of the new Sikh regiment. To his brother John was given the settlement of the land revenue, while the third commissioner was mainly concerned with judicial matters. Fifty-six subordinates, the pick of the services, civil and military, formed the staff of the new province, and helped to carry out the settlement of the Punjab, which was destined to be one of the most brilliant administrative achievements of Englishmen in the East. The people were disarmed. A line of fortresses was carried along the north-west frontier. Roads were constructed throughout the province, the most notable being that which connected Lahore with Peshawar-atriumph of engineering skill. Canals were made both for transport and irrigation. The land tax was reduced from a half of the value of the produce to about a quarter. All internal imposts on the transport of goods were swept away. Slavery, thuggee, and dacoity were finally stamped out, and a clear

and simple code of criminal and civil procedure, suited to a primitive political organization, instead of the cumbrous and complicated regulations of the older provinces, was drawn up. The most wonderful tribute to the success of these measures was the material prosperity and the contentment of the people. Within three years of the desperate valour and grim carnage of Chilianwala, Sikh soldiers were fighting for the Company in Burma of their own free will, and, when a little later the Mutiny threatened the existence of British dominions in India and offered to all subject peoples an unequalled opportunity for vengeance on their conquerors, the Punjab never faltered in its loyalty.

The credit for these splendid results must be shared between Lord Dalhousie and his subordinates, but the Governor-General played perhaps the predominant part. Though the plan of a Board was not adopted for that purpose, as was once erroneously supposed, it yet enabled him to inspire the policy of the commissioners and control their work. This was especially the case since there early appeared a cleavage of opinion between the brothers Lawrence. The elder was inclined to favour the Sirdars, or Sikh aristocracy, who were devoted to him personally, and to press on with material improvements regardless of the cost to the revenue. John Lawrence had more sympathy with the peasants than the chieftains, and as guardian of the public purse brought forward many practical objections to his brother's pet schemes. Not till nearly three years had elapsed did these differences prove a serious bar to administration. But early in 1853 the two brothers mutually agreed that it would be better for one of them to go. Dalhousie believing, in spite of Henry's many fine qualities, that John, 'take him all in all', was 'the better man', removed the elder brother, to his deep chagrin, to Rajputana as agent for the GovernorGeneral, abolished the Board that had served its purpose, and made John Lawrence Chief Commissioner of the Punjab.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SECOND BURMESE WAR. LORD DALHOUSIE. THE DOCTRINE OF LAPSE

THE second war of Dalhousie's administration was waged on the far eastern frontier. It arose out of his determination to protect the interests of the merchants who, trusting to the Treaty of 1826, had settled on the southern coast of Burma. For some time they had been subject to petty persecutions at the hands of the Governor of Rangoon, who did everything possible to impede their trade, and in 1851 they applied for redress to Calcutta. Dalhousie sent a frigate to Rangoon to demand compensation. Many considered this action needlessly provocative, and even John Lawrence wrote meaningly, 'Why did you send a commodore to Burma if you wanted peace?' while Dalhousie himself afterwards admitted these commodores are too combustible for negotiations'. But since the British government had long ceased to maintain a Resident at the court of Ava, owing to the insults to which they were subjected, there was perhaps no other means of showing the Burmese authorities that the matter was one of urgency. Even as it was, they ignored the representations of the commodore and his demands for compensation and fired upon him, when he rather injudiciously detained a royal vessel and proclaimed the blockade of the ports. They thus brought upon themselves the vigorous action of the Governor-General; an

Life of the Marquis of Dalhousie, Sir William Lee-Warner, vol. i, pp. 417-18.

ultimatum was sent to the Court of Ava, demanding compensation and an indemnity of £100,000 under threat of war. The home authorities considered the tone of this dispatch too peremptory; but Dalhousie defended it on the ground that no Indian potentate would attend to any command conveyed as a European power would word it', and there seems little doubt that he would gladly have avoided what he called the 'mortification of war'. At the same time he was determined, if war should come, that it should be waged before the rains set in. No answer having been vouchsafed to the British ultimatum, Dalhousie pressed on preparations for war with extraordinary energy and thorough

ness.

He superintended nearly every detail himself, for he was determined that the mistakes and blunders of the first war should not be repeated. The commissariat and transport were thoroughly well organized. Every precaution to ensure the comfort and health of the troops was elaborately thought out. Within eight weeks from the commencement of warlike preparations, the flotilla appeared off Rangoon. Martaban was quickly captured. The great pagoda of Rangoon was stormed on April 14: Bassein fell a month later. The Commander-in-Chief, General Godwin, sent a force to reconnoitre Prome but did not advance thither, fearing to endanger his communications. The GovernorGeneral himself proceeded to Rangoon in September, and determined that Prome should be taken. It was occupied in October; Pegu, already captured but besieged by the Burmese, was finally relieved in November, and military operations were thus concluded. Dalhousie pressed upon the Court of Directors the necessity of annexing the province of Pegu, partly because we could hardly abandon those of the inhabitants of that province, who had gladly welcomed British protection, to the fiendish cruelties of the Burmese. The Court accepted this suggestion, but put him in a difficulty by requiring either that the cession of Pegu

should be regularly made in a treaty, or else that an advance should be made to Ava and the whole country subjugated.

Dalhousie realized that an advance to Ava 600 miles from our base was a chimerical scheme, even had the requisite transport and supplies been forthcoming, which they were not. On the other hand, any treaty with the barbaric court of Ava would be as 'flimsy as the paper on which it is traced'; he therefore took his own strong line, and when his overtures for a treaty produced no response, proclaimed the annexation of Pegu, or Lower Burma, on December 20, 1852. The results completely justified his bold action. Though the Burmese never formally recognized the cession of territory, they were too cowed to resent it in arms. The administration of the new province under Major Arthur Phayre was highly successful; but it was clearly proved that the ceded territory was large enough to tax his energies fully for many years. Granted that Burma was destined ultimately to pass under British sway, it was better, as Dalhousie declared, to take a second bite of the cherry. Dalhousie indeed experienced the usual fate of statesmen in being attacked from either side; for while some thought he had not gone far enough, others con sidered he had gone much too far; and he and the Court of Directors were roundly trounced for their love of territorial aggrandizement; but all the evidence goes to show that neither the Governor-General nor the home authorities desired annexation for its own sake. The new province extended as far north as Myede fifty miles beyond Prome. Westward it was bounded by the hills of Arakan and eastward roughly by the river Salwen. Independent Burma was now shut off altogether from the sea, and the whole coast-line of the Bay of Bengal from Cape Comorin to the Malay Peninsula passed under British control.

Sir William Lee-Warner has noticed three epochs in British relations with native states, first that of the 'ring