nd the Boundary Commission were enabled to proceed with the
work of delimitation.

[Footnote 1: A Native corruption of the word 'English.']

* * * * *

CHAPTER LXV.
1885-1886

The Burma expedition--The Camp of Exercise at Delhi
--Defence of the North-West Frontier--Quetta and Peshawar
--Communications _versus_ fortifications--Sir George Chesney

We only remained three months at 'Ooty,' for on the 8th July a
telegram arrived from Lord Dufferin announcing the Queen's approval of
my being appointed to succeed Sir Donald Stewart as Commander-in-Chief
in India, and granting me leave to visit England before taking up the
appointment.

At the end of a fortnight all our preparations for departure had been
made, and on the 18th August we left Bombay, in the teeth of the
monsoon.

Our boy, whose holidays had just commenced, met us at Venice, and we
loitered in Italy and Switzerland on our way home. I spent but six
weeks in England, returning to the East at the end of November, to
join my new command. I met Lord Dufferin at Agra, and accompanied him
to Gwalior, whither his Excellency went for the purpose of formally
restoring to the Maharaja Sindhia the much coveted fortress of
Gwalior, which had been occupied by us since 1858--an act of sound
policy, enabling us to withdraw a brigade which could be far more
usefully employed elsewhere.

At Gwalior we received the news of the capture of Mandalay, and I sent
a telegram to Lieutenant-General Prendergast,[1] to congratulate him
on the successful conduct of the Burma Expedition.

Affairs in Burma had been going from bad to worse from the time King
Thebaw came to the throne in 1878. Wholesale murders were of constant
occurrence within the precincts of the palace; dacoity was rife
throughout the country, and British officers were insulted to such
an extent that the Resident had to be withdrawn. In 1883 a special
Mission was sent by the King of Burma to Paris, with a view to making
such a treaty with the French Government as would enable him to appeal
to France for assistance, in the event of his being involved in
difficulties with England. The Mission remained eighteen months in
Paris, and succeeded in ratifying what the French called a 'Commercial
Convention,' under the terms of which a French Consul was located at
Mandalay, who soon gained sufficient ascendancy over King Thebaw
to enable him to arrange for the construction of