With MM. Ninth Lancers during the Indian Mutiny. Letters of
Brevet-Major 0. H. S. G. Anson. (W. H. Allen and Co.)— Major Anson's letters, addressed to his wife, stretch over a period of about ten months, from June 1st, 1857, to March 25th, 1858. He was then invalided, having gone through a very bard time culminating in a day's fighting near Lucknow on March 6th, of which he writes : "Yesterday's promenade and fight knocked me up entirely." We never tire of stories of the great Indian struggle. These letters also reveal an interesting personality. Major Anson, a soldier who had already seen some hard fighting in the two Sikh campaigns, was a man of strong religious feeling. This does not hinder him from expressing himself with a certain savagery. "lam so glad Mrs. Grant sent me back 'Christian
Retirement.' It is the greatest possible comfort to me The Goojurs have been very cruel and mischievous. Reed, with his Deyra regiment, is giving a handsome account of them with fire and sword." But when he comes to see "a handsome account" with his own eyes he is much shocked, as in the letter on pp. 177-78. He does not mince his words about the causes of the Mutiny. "Such utter and intense selfishness and crime as we have shown in India can only be paralleled by the present state of affairs in France, where wickedness reigns supreme." The "present state of affairs" was the Second Empire, which most of us greatly admired, while it stood.
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