m the
minds of the troops; and the heroism displayed by the sepoys under his
own eye, in the late desperate encounters before Gwalior, must have
brought home to his mind the gratifying conviction that his efforts had
not been in vain. We noticed with satisfaction last year, the
well-deserved honours and rewards distributed to the corps, by whose
exploits the transient cloud thrown over our arms in Affghanistan had
been cleared away; and the same course has been worthily followed up in
the decorations cast from the captured Mahratta cannon, and conferred,
without distinction of officers or men, British or Sepoys, on the
victors of Maharajpoor and Punniar; as well as in the triumphal
monuments to be erected by Bombay for the victories in Scinde, and at
Calcutta for those before Gwalior. But while we render full justice to
the valour, patience, and fidelity of the sepoy infantry, now deservedly
rewarded by participation in those honours from which they have been too
long excluded, the truth remains unchanged of that of which Lake, and
many others since Lake of those who best knew India, have in vain
striven to impress the conviction on the authorities at home--the
paramount importance of a large intermixture of _British_ troops. "I am
convinced that, _without King's troops_, very little is to be expected
... there ought always to be at least one European battalion to four
native ones: this I think necessary." And again, in his despatch to the
Marquis Wellesley, the day after the arduous conflict at Laswarree--"The
action of yesterday has convinced me how impossible it is to do any
thing without British troops; and of them there ought to be a very great
proportion." It is true that the regulation lately promulgated by the
Duke of Wellington, that the heavy cavalry regiments shall in future
take their turn of Indian service, will in some measure remedy the evil
in that branch where it is most felt; and will at once increase their
military strength in India, and diminish the length of absence of the
different corps from Europe. The misconduct of the native regular
cavalry, indeed, on more than one occasion during the late Affghan war,
has shown that they are not much to be depended upon when resolutely
encountered. They are ill at ease in the European saddles, and have no
confidence in the regulation swords when opposed to the trenchant edge
of the native _tulwars_; while, on the other hand, the laurels earned by
Skinner's, He