You will see by the newspapers that even the best guides of public opinion are now delighted with your arrangements, and give you credit for biding your time and doing the right thing at the right moment.'
These last words embody the principles by which Lord Hardinge was always guided in his dealings with the Punjab. His policy varied from time to time, but only with the circumstances of the case. While deliberately averse to annexation, he never disguised from himself that such a contingency might be forced upon him. A writer in the Calcutta Review, defending the Treaty of December 1846, thus expressed the alternative that was present to the Governor-General's mind: 'If the time arrives when the Darbár and the army grow weary of our honesty, then no voice will be louder than ours for punishing the State by complete annexation.' When that time did arrive, Lord Hardinge's voice joined in approving the policy which was forced upon his successor. In a letter from England to Sir Henry Lawrence, dated March 24th, 1849, he wrote: — 'The energy and turbulent spirit of the Sikhs are stated by one section [of politicians here] as ground for not annexing. In my judgment, this is the argument which would dispose me, if I were on the spot, to annex. ... I should be ashamed of myself if I would not depart from a line of policy which was right at the time, because I might be charged with inconsistency.'
