Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/127

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Mutinies at Alígarh and Bulandshahr.
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spectful in their demeanour and assiduous in the performance of their duties. But, on the 20th, a parade had been ordered to witness the infliction of the punishment of death on a man caught in the act of endeavouring to seduce the men from their allegiance. The man had been awarded this sentence by a court-martial composed entirely of native officers. It was carried out in the presence of the sipáhís, on that eventful morning, without a murmur or sign of disapproval from them. But as they were marching from the ground there arrived a detachment of men of their own regiment, one of whom, on seeing the dangling corpse, exclaimed, pointing to it, 'Behold a martyr to our religion.' These few words were sufficient to light a flame which had lain repressed in the bosoms of the sipáhís. They broke into open insurrection, and though they inflicted no injury on their officers, they plundered the treasury, released the prisoners from the gaol, and went off bodily to Dehlí.

The detachments of the same regiment at Bulandshahr, forty miles from Alígarh; at Itáwah, in the Agra Division, seventy-three miles from the city of that name; at Mainpurí, seventy-one miles from the same place, followed the example of their comrades at headquarters. The outbreak at Bulandshahr was unaccompanied by violence, though the men plundered the treasury; that at Mainpurí was chiefly remarkable for the courage, coolness, and presence of mind displayed by the officer second in command of the sipáhís, Lieutenant De Kantzow.

Information of the revolt of the 20th at Alígarh had reached Mainpurí on the evening of the 22d. The magistrate, Mr Power, at once held a consultation with Mr Arthur Cocks, the Commissioner, as to the course to be pursued. It was resolved to despatch the ladies and children into Agra, and to march the sipáhís to a village