1 INTRODUCTION. XX1IT
2 my opinion is that we had none, and I have heard one high
3 in the political department on the north western frontier
4 state, that no treaty existed with the new Government. If
5 then no treaty existed how can we call the Seiks the break-
6 ers of treaties? But if on the other hand the treaty of
7 1809 is said to have been binding between the two Govern-
8 ments, then the simple question is, who first departed from
9 the " rules of friendship ? " I am decidedly of opinion that
10 we did ; but as I am also of opinion that no treaty existed,
11 I think, as I have before said, we ought long ago to have
12 adopted coercive measures with the Seiks; and the reason
13 assigned for our not doing so, " the helpless state of the
14 young Maharajh,"* won't exactly go down with the public.
15 The real cause must be apparent to all, and it was this,
16 " what will they say at home if we interfere with the Seiks ?"
17 This " what will they say at home," is the great bugbear
18 in the present day ; and we certainly should not have been
19 in India now, if Lord Wellesley had troubled his head about
20 what they would say at home.
21 With the Seiks for several years past, in fact ever since
22 the death of Runjeet Sing, we have been playing the fable
23 of the " Shepherd Boy and the Wolf." The Papers and the
24 Politicals had constantly been crying out " The Seiks are
25 coming ! " until at last we would not believe them ; con-
26 sequently the Seiks came, and we were, as events proved,
27 quite unprepared to receive them. And yet, surely, defensive
28 measures might have been adopted, and every thing might
29 have been ready at Umballa, if not at Ferozepore, without
30 disturbing the " perpetual friendship," which, I suppose, it was
31 expected would last, like Paddy's love, u to the end of the
32 * " He (the Governor General) has shown on every occasion the utmost forbear-
33 ance from consideration to the helpless state of the infant Maharajh, Dulleep Sing,
34 whom the British Government had recognised as the successor to the late Maha-
35 rajh, Shere Sing."— Proclamatcd \3th December, 1845.