eleven o'clock. At their apparition the enemy offered upon certain conditions to surrender their guns, and retire. Lake, anxious to stop the effusion of blood, granted the conditions proposed; but, seeing that they hesitated, he gave them an hour to decide whether they would accept the terms or fight him.

The hour expired and then the battle began.

On the side of the British the brunt was borne by the King's 76th Regiment, which, with a battalion, and five companies of sepoys, had to sustain a tremendous fire of canister-shot, and a massive charge of cavalry. "This handful of heroes," as Lake called them, though thinned by the enemy's artillery, stood firm, and repulsed the horse. Then Major Griffiths was sent, at the head of the 29th Dragoons, to sweep away that numerous cavalry, a duty which he performed completely, though not without losing his own life, being struck by a cannon ball. Then followed the terrible bayonet charge of the British infantry, the right wing of which was led by Major-General Ware, who was killed, his head being carried off by another cannon-shot. He was an excellent officer, and his loss was severely felt and deeply lamented by the whole army. After his death the command of the column devolved upon Colonel Macdonald, who, though wounded, continued in the exercise of the important trust with the utmost activity, judgment, and intrepidity, till the close of the action."

For a time the enemy seemed determined to defend their position to the last, disputing every point inch by inch, and only giving way when the bayonets were at their breast, and their own artillery turned against them. Every where their situation had become altogether desperate, yet they continned to manifest the same dogged courage: their left wing endeavoured to effect a retreat in good order; but this attempt was frustrated by a brilliant charge, made by the 27th regiment of dragoons and a regiment of native cavalry. And presently the mass of the

Memoirs of the War in India, conducted by General Lord Lake, Commander-in-Chief, and Major-General Sir Arthur Wellesley (Duke of Wellington), from its commencement in 1803 to its termination in 1806, on the banks of the Hyphasis, &c. By Major William Thorn, Captain 25th Light Dragoons.

enemy either fled from the field, or cried for quarter, and surrendered; and all the artillery, all the baggage, and everything belonging to them, fell into the hands of the victors.

With the exception of 2,000 who surrendered, the whole of their seventeen battalions were destroyed. It was calculated that the dead alone on the field could hardly have been less than 7,000. Though some of their cavalry were enabled, by the fleetness of their horses, and local knowledge, to escape destruction, the rest, excepting those who had the good fortune to conceal themselves among the bazar people, were numbered with the slain. The English loss amounted to 172 killed, and 652 wounded. General Lake, who had personally led the charge of cavalry in the morning, who had afterwards led on the 76th, and who had conducted nearly every operation of the day, had two horses shot under him, and saw his son, who was acting as his aide-de-camp, badly wounded by his side.

But the battle of Laswaree most honourably terminated the mission which had been entrusted to this active and gallant officer.

"The seventeen battalions annihilated at Laswaree were called the Deccan Invincibles, and were considered as the flower of Scindiah's army, which altogether had made immense and rapid strides towards the point of perfection of the best of European troops. Throughout this eventful Mahratta war, every conflict gave evidence of this improvement, which was attributable to the connection of the natives with the French, whose energies, address, and abilities, were exerted to the utmost in exasperating the chiefs against the English, and in forming their subjects into hardy and disciplined soldiers, with the view of thereby overthrowing our dominions in the East." Lake had defeated, routed, annihilated that army of Perron, which had caused the Governor-General such great and reasonable alarm, and had placed in the hands of the English all the extensive territory watered by the Jumna; and between him and General Wellesley the power of Scindiah and all the most perilous part of the Mahratta confederacy was utterly shattered before the end of the year.

Major Thorn, Memoir of the War in India, &c.

ARGAUM.

A. D. 1803. November 29.

SCINDIAH entreated for and obtained a truce from General Wellesley at the beginning of November; but his powerful ally, the Rajah of Berar, would not negociate, and still kept the field; and when the English commander, after one of the most extraordinary marches upon record, came up with this rajah in the plains of Argaum, about twenty miles north of the Poorna river, he found Scindiah's numerous cavalry drawn up with him-no uncommon instance of the faith with which these Indian chiefs observed truces and treaties. The plain fact was, they were never to be trusted. The only security to our Indian empire lay in absolute conquest.

The force of General Wellesley and that serving under Colonel Stevenson had been separated above three months by a distance of three hundred miles. To deal with the Rajah of Berar a junction of these forces was indispensable; and the junction was effected in a manner which will for ever confer honour on our great captain and excite the admiration of military men-and, most, of those who have served in India and know the difficulties of the country and the oppressiveness of the climate. In his despatch to government General Wellesley modestly says, it was very fortunate that, after so long a separation he should have been enabled to join Colonel Stevenson in the very morning of the day on which the engagement at Argaum took place, and that in order to enable him to join, the colonel had not been obliged to halt more than one day. But such things are not brought about by fortune; they proceeded from science, discipline, and the vast improvements in the means of transport, in the commissariat, and in every department of the service, which were all suggested by the genius of the great commander,

or had been introduced since his first appearance in India. He said himself, at the time, "But the operations of this war have afforded numerous instances of improvement in our means of communication, of obtaining intelligence, and above all, of movement. Marches such as we have made in this war were never known or thought of before." In moving to join Stevenson, he had never marched less than between seventeen and twenty miles a day. The day on which the battle of Argaum was fought the troops had marched twentysix miles! And this day, to use the general's own words, was a very hot day."

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Shortly after our people had halted bodies of horse appeared in their front. Our Mysore cavalry were sent out to skirmish; and when the general went out to push forward the piquets of the infantry to support the Mysore cavalry, and to take up the ground of encampment, he perceived distinctly a long line of infantry, cavalry, and artillery, regularly drawn up on the plains of Argaum, immediately in front of the village of that name, and about six miles from Paterly, the place at which he intended to encamp.

Although it was late in the day, and the men were fatigued with their long march, Wellesley immediately determined to attack this army. Accordingly, he marched on in one column, the British cavalry leading in a direction nearly parallel to that of the enemy's line; covering the rear and the left by the native Mogul and Mysore cavalry."

"The enemy's infantry and guns were in the left of their centre, with a body of cavalry on their left. Scindiah's army, consisting of one very heavy body of cavalry, was on the right, having upon its right a body of Pindarries and other light troops. Their line extended above five miles, having in their rear the village and extensive gardens and enclosures of Argaum; and in their front a plain, which, however, was much cut by watercourses, &c.

"I formed the army in two lines; the infantry in the first, the cavalry in the second, and supporting the right; and the Mogul and Mysore cavalry the left, nearly parallel to that of the enemy; with the right rather advanced in order to press

It appears from the despatch, and from the deputy adjutantgeneral's return of the killed and wounded, that the British cavalry consisted only of his Majesty's 19th Light Dragoons.

upon the enemy's left. Some little time elapsed before the lines could be formed, owing to a part of the infantry of my division which led the column having got into some confusion. When formed, the whole advanced in the greatest order; the 74th and 78th regiments were attacked by a large body (supposed to be Persians), and all these were destroyed. Scindiah's cavalry charged the 1st battalion 6th regiment, which was on the left of our line, and were repulsed; and their whole line retired in disorder before our troops, leaving in our hands thirty-eight pieces of cannon, and all their ammunition.

"The British cavalry then pursued them for several miles, destroyed great numbers, and took many elephants and camels and much baggage. The Mogul and Mysore cavalry also pursued the fugitives, and did them great mischief. Some of the latter are still following them; and I have sent out this morning all of the Mysore, Mcgul, and Mahratta cavalry, in order to secure as many advantages from this victory as can be gained, and complete the enemy's confusion.

"For the reasons stated in the commencement of this letter, the action did not commence till late in the day; and unfortunately sufficient daylight did not remain to do all that I could have wished; but the cavalry continued their pursuit by moonlight, and all the troops were under arms till a late hour in the night.'

The general himself was on horseback from six in the morning until twelve at night.

Our loss consisted only of fifteen Europeans killed and 145 wounded, and thirty-one natives killed, 148 wounded, and five missing. The loss of the enemy, particularly in their flight, was very great. The chief who commanded the Rajah of Berar's cavalry was killed, and the chief who commanded Scindiah's was wounded. "If we had had daylight an hour more not a man would have escaped," said the victorious general, who added-"We should have had that time, if my native infantry had not been panic-struck and got into confusion when the cannonade commenced. What do you think of nearly three entire battalions, who behaved so admirably in the battle of Assye, being broke and running off, when the • Wellington Despatches.