CHAPTER XI.
CALCUTTA IN JUNE AND JULY.
I left Lord Canning and his councillors, at the end of May, endeavouring, by the despatch of troops by driblets from the capital to the North-west, to strengthen that weak middle piece upon the security of which, until reinforcements should arrive in sufficient strength, or until Dehlí should fall, the safety of the Empire seemed to depend. For a moment the opinion prevailed that the second of these contingencies would happen first. For, as I have had occasion more than once to mention, the strength of Dehlí was greatly underrated, and the majority of British residents, military as well as civil, believed that the appearance of General Anson before the gates of the city would suffice to induce the rebels to surrender it. That was certainly the opinion of Lord Canning and his councillors. It was under the influence of this conviction that the Home Secretary had disdained the offers of the Englishmen and foreigners who had volunteered to enrol themselves, telling them that 'the mischief caused by a passing and groundless panic had been already arrested.'
But the first week of June saw the hopes of the Government rudely shattered. Thick as hail, post by post, came tidings of disaster. Accounts of the mutinies at Kánhpur, at Allahábád, at Lakhnao, of the defection of Oudh, related in the last chapter, of revolts and murders at
