1 CHAPTER XIII.
2 THE SECOND SIKH WAR.
3 Thanks in no small measure to the efforts of the
4 Rani Jindan, the " untoward circumstance " did arise.
5 In the month of March 1848, while Lord Dalhousie
6 was still being congratulated on having assumed office
7 "at a time when the last obstacle to the complete,
8 and apparently final, pacification of India has been
9 removed," there was seen from the walls of Lahore a
10 cloud, far away to the south-west, no bigger than a
11 man's hand. Before a month had passed, it had
12 grown into a big, angry -looking cloud ; and by the
13 end of six months the horizon on every side was
14 black with the oncoming storm. For the full story
15 of the second Sikh war, the reader must again be
16 referred to the works mentioned on page 171, with
17 the addition to the list of A Year on the Punjab
18 Frontier, in 18 4,8-9, by Major Herbert Edwardes;
19 one of the most interesting of the many books dealing
20 with the Punjab wars. As in the case of the earlier
21 campaign, we shall do no more than indicate the chief
22 events in the last and gallant struggle of the Sikhs
23 for national independence.
24 It will be remembered that during the short min-