Tempo:
HISTORY OF THE SIKHS
19J
1837.
CHAP. VII
would no longer be embarrassing, but, on the contrary,! highly advantageous to schemes of peaceful trade and It was made known that the beneficial intercourse. British rulers would be glad to be the means of negotiating a peace honourable to both parties, yet the scale was turned in favour of the Afghan, by the simultaneous admission that Peshawar was a place to which Dost Muhammad could scarcely be expected to resign Nevertheless, it was said, the wishes of all claim. Ranjit Singh could be ascertained by Capt. Wade, and Capt. Burnes could similarly inquire about the views of the Amir. The latter officer was formally invested with diplomatic powers,- and the idle designs or restless intrigues, of Persians and Russians, soon caused the disputes of Sikhs and Afghans to merge in the British scheme of reseating Shah Shuja on the throne of Kabul. At the end of a generation the repose of the English masters of India was again disturbed by the *
^
the more especially as they are
apprehensive of Russia,
rumoured march of European armies,*^ and their suswere further roused by the conduct of the French General, Allard. That officer, after a residence of several years in the Punjab, had been enabled to visit his native country, and he returned by way of Calcutta in the year 1836. While in France he had induced his Government to give him a document, accrediting him to Ranjit Singh, in case his life should picions
and are lurther dissatisfied
with the proceedings of General Allard.
be endangered, or in case he should be refused permission to quit the Lahore dominions. It was understood by the English that the paper was only to be produced to the Maharaja in an extremity of the kind me'ntioned; but General Allard himself considered that it was only to be so laid in form before the English authorities, in support of a demand for aid when he might chance to be straitened. He at once delivered his credentials to the Sikh ruler; it was rumoured that General Allard had become a French ambassador, and it was some time before the British authorities forgave the fancied deceit, or the vain effrontery of their guest
•*
Government to Capt. Wade, 31st July 1837. Government to Capt. Wade, 11th Sept. 1837. ^ The idea of Russian designs on India engaged the atten1
2
tion of the British viceroy in 1831 (see Murray, Ranjit Singh, p. 168), and it at the same time possessed the inquiring but sanguine mind of Capt. Burnes, who afterwards gave the notion so much notoriety. (See Capt. Wade to Government, 3rd Aug. 1831.) 4 The author gives what the French officers held to be the intended use of the credentials, on the competent authority of
by Prinsep,
General Ventura, with whom he formerly had conversations on the subject. The Enghsh view, however, is that which was
19J
1837.
CHAP. VII
would no longer be embarrassing, but, on the contrary,! highly advantageous to schemes of peaceful trade and It was made known that the beneficial intercourse. British rulers would be glad to be the means of negotiating a peace honourable to both parties, yet the scale was turned in favour of the Afghan, by the simultaneous admission that Peshawar was a place to which Dost Muhammad could scarcely be expected to resign Nevertheless, it was said, the wishes of all claim. Ranjit Singh could be ascertained by Capt. Wade, and Capt. Burnes could similarly inquire about the views of the Amir. The latter officer was formally invested with diplomatic powers,- and the idle designs or restless intrigues, of Persians and Russians, soon caused the disputes of Sikhs and Afghans to merge in the British scheme of reseating Shah Shuja on the throne of Kabul. At the end of a generation the repose of the English masters of India was again disturbed by the *
^
the more especially as they are
apprehensive of Russia,
rumoured march of European armies,*^ and their suswere further roused by the conduct of the French General, Allard. That officer, after a residence of several years in the Punjab, had been enabled to visit his native country, and he returned by way of Calcutta in the year 1836. While in France he had induced his Government to give him a document, accrediting him to Ranjit Singh, in case his life should picions
and are lurther dissatisfied
with the proceedings of General Allard.
be endangered, or in case he should be refused permission to quit the Lahore dominions. It was understood by the English that the paper was only to be produced to the Maharaja in an extremity of the kind me'ntioned; but General Allard himself considered that it was only to be so laid in form before the English authorities, in support of a demand for aid when he might chance to be straitened. He at once delivered his credentials to the Sikh ruler; it was rumoured that General Allard had become a French ambassador, and it was some time before the British authorities forgave the fancied deceit, or the vain effrontery of their guest
•*
Government to Capt. Wade, 31st July 1837. Government to Capt. Wade, 11th Sept. 1837. ^ The idea of Russian designs on India engaged the atten1
2
tion of the British viceroy in 1831 (see Murray, Ranjit Singh, p. 168), and it at the same time possessed the inquiring but sanguine mind of Capt. Burnes, who afterwards gave the notion so much notoriety. (See Capt. Wade to Government, 3rd Aug. 1831.) 4 The author gives what the French officers held to be the intended use of the credentials, on the competent authority of
by Prinsep,
General Ventura, with whom he formerly had conversations on the subject. The Enghsh view, however, is that which was
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