POSTSCRIPT.
SATURDAY NIGHT.
The overland Indian mail has arrived ; having left Bombay on the 1st of December. It brings_ intelligence from China to the 13th of October ; but in that quarter things remained altogether in data quo. The news from India, which is important, is given in a second edition of the Times; whose rapid summary we further condense— The return of all the British troops through the hostile defiles of the Khyber was fully concluded on the 7th of November. The first division, under General Pollock, succeeded in effecting their march without much difficulty.. The second, commanded by General M'Caskill, was not equally fortunate, in con- sequence, as report states, of the neglect of crowning the heights over a most dangerous part of the defile. The plunder-loving mountaineers were on the watch, and, finding this division embarrassed in its movements near Ali:Mnsjid, during the night of the 3d, made an attack on the baggage, a considerable quantity of which is said to have fallen into their hands. Lieutenant Christie, of the Artillery, and Ensign Nicholson, of the Thirtieth Bengal Native Infan- try, were killed, as well as upwards of one hundred Sepoys killed and wounded, besides a number of camp-followers. Two cannon were also taken by them ; but one of the guns was retaken on the following morning, as well as the car- riage of the other; the Khyberees having found means of concealing the gun itself. The third division, under General Nat, which formed the last one of the army, arrived at Jumrood, the frontier station of the Sikh territory, on the 6th.
Before the troops left Cabul, the Bazaar, the principal scene of the indigni- ties to Sir William Macuaghteu's body, and a mosque, built a year back to commemorate the triumph of the Afghans over the Infidels, were destroyed.
Akbbar Khan had lost his influence among his countrymen, and had retired to Balk, as if in di-grace. Shah Poore, a son of Shah Sujah, sixteen years of age had been acknowleged as Sovereign by the principal chiefs ; and the British Generals agreed to leave the Bala-Hissar intact, in order to allow him that citadel as a place of refuge in case of danger. Futteh Jung, who had at one time taken possession of the sovereignty, retired with the British to the protection of the Coinnany's territories. Softer Jung remained in possession of sovereign power at danatitar. Jellalabad, Ali Musjid, and other f9rts through the Khyber, had been de- molished. Trophies of various kinds had :.zzaitti brought from Cabul ; among them more than twenty cannons. The Governor-General, with his body-guard, had reached 11:!!aellicajra on the 14th of November, in his progress to Ferozepore ; where fbtes were id !.'a given on the arrival of the troops from Cabul. It was expected that inter- views would take place near Ferozepore between his Lordship and the Maha- rajah, Shere Singh ; who, it was supposed, was about to agree to accept the protection of the British Government.
Some apprehension appeared to have been entertained of a collision between the Sikhs and the Britian troops near Pesbawur. An order bad been published by Lord Ellenborough, declaring that all the Afghan chiefs detained in India should be liberated ; but requiring, that pre- viously to their obtaining permission to return to their own country, they should attend his levee at Ferozepore. It was supposed that at the levee some terms would be offered to Dost Maliornmed which would induce him to ac- knowledge the supremacy of Shah Sujuh's sons: it seems to be hinted, that the Dost was to be offered a restoration of his subordinate rank as Ameer. The same order contains also the remarkable statement that Akhbar Khan, before the late advance of the British armies, had refused to exchange the British prisoners in his custody, even for his father and his own family. The Governor-General had made public his intention "to station per- manently a large British force of Europeans and natives between the Sutledge and Murkunda ; " to facilitate the navigation of the Indus and its tributary rivers; and to improve the state of the roads between the Sutledge and the Ganges and Jumna. He had also abolished the Political Agencies in Scinde plating the whole of the districts under the care of Sir Charles Napier, now; commanding the Bombay army stationed there.
Bundelcund was still the only unquiet part of India. The burning within the year of five merchant-ships from Bombay, which were stated publicly to have been doomed, bad produced a strict examination into the facts on the part of the underwriters. Some traces of a conspiracy for the purism had been discovered.
Previous page
