complaints. His instructions were to observe every form of courteous remonstrance, and only to demand compensation for the ascertained actual losses suffered by the merchants, amounting to about Rs. 9,000; together with the dismissal of the local Burmese Governor of Rangoon.
No redress could be obtained. When the English officer asked for an interview, it was at first refused on the ground that 'the Governor was asleep.' After being kept waiting in the burning sun, the naval envoy urged his studiously moderate requests in vain, and further provocations rendered it clear that the English barbarians would never secure redress except by force of arms. Lord Dalhousie was compelled to accept the only alternative — a Burmese War.
In the conduct of the operations which followed, Lord Dalhousie profited by the lessons taught by the first Burmese War in 1824-6. He realized, first, that the losses incident to a Burmese campaign were due, not so much to the fighting power of the enemy, as to the malaria of the country, and the sickness caused by exposure to sun and rain. In the second place, he clearly perceived that until the Burmese Emperor, in his distant inland capital, was made to feel that the English barbarians had the power to compel redress, no real redress would be given.
To meet the first difficulty Lord Dalhousie
