INDIA.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 18, 30 September 1842, Page 3

INDIA.

The annexed rcrap, taken from the Bengdl] Hurkaru , giVes the latest news from JeUrilabadh “ To this day we know not what is doing for our relief, or whether we are to have any assistance, or orders, from Government. * Three months have we been shut up in this fort, and not a single word Or hint has been received from the Governor-General. No circumstance’s can excuse such extreme apathy. The garrison express themselves freely on the subject. We have no doubt we have long since been considered dead, and Government thought it idle to risk the life of one man to save 2000. A note from Captain Mackeson, received last night, tells us of the birth of a Prince of Wales, so this morning we fired a royal salute—even at the risk of alarming the whole country. The reports were not very loud—we used some cburifry powder. Two Madras regiments, the 2d and 41st,

have sailed for China from Madras; Thev embarked cheerfully, in high military spirits, arid with the best military feeling. But it has been a near thing that they did not break into open mutiny; and the authorities of Madras: have been for the last three weeks in a perpetual state of alarm regarding them. The press has been kept quiet . The cause of the discontent has been the reduction of pensions, and one more calciilated to excite angry and apprehensive feelings in the breasts of the men could hardly have been devised. In this instance, it is not too ipuch to say, that, through the judicious management of one or two of the officers of these regiments, the men have been preserved from open mutiny. At Secunderabad, in the recent mutiny, there does not appear to have been one popular officer, one to whom the Sepoys, misguided aiid infatuated as they were, could listen patiently. Matters are far from settled there yet. The corps, or portions of corps. which were to be offered their pay early in the month, received it without batta, but a few days after the 10th regiment refused to dp parade duty, or to go to ball practice, and several men of‘that and other corps went into the artillery lines, to persuade men of that corps not to acf against them should they be called out! This failed, however, of its object. The artillery were, as they ever have been, staunch, and denounced those who had attempted to tamper with them, and who have since been seized and confined. The 10th was ordered out, and, as if by chance, the European regiment and the artillery appeared near their parade about the time. All passed off quietly, in consequence, I am told. But has the,?spirit been checked? Are those corps safer because they have been coerced at the point of the bayonet ? Time 1 will show. Ido not doubt their faithfulness, if led against an enemy. But it is not proper to see aispirit of combination so universal, on every occasion, whatever it may be. What shall be said of the infatuation of the government in attempting a curtailment of the Sepoy’s pay at this moment ? It is not at all a fair argument to say that the pay of the Bengal Sepoy and the Madras should be assimilated. You must first find out the rate at which both 'caii live; and the habits and modes of living of the men. Allowing both the simplest food, if the Bengal sepoy can liye. on four rupees a month at Cawnpore, while it takes six (on ao?ount : of the dearneste* of provisions, batta having been frequently allowed for famine rates) to feed the Madras men at/Hyderabad, should the pay of the latter be reduced to that of the former, merely for the sake of assimilation ? Again, the alteration of the<rate of.exchange from 12 to 21 per cent, between the Hyderabad and the rupee has given the officers, whose batta lias nof been reduced, a considerable increase, while, by the. reduction of the Sepoy’s batta, notwithstanding the 10 per cent, increase in exchange, a loss of a rupee and a half to the first-class Sepoys takes place. Is this fair, is it just, to make a disparity between the officer and the Sepoy* to the injury of the latter ? The saving in the redudtiofiSPf the batta, too, is so miserable a sum (it is stated not more than 3006 rupees a month), that pne can only wonder at the infatuation which , has led any government to attempt ..to risk the attachment of the Sepoys, or to give cause for dissatisfaction in perilous times. - : — (From the Standard.J !C ! Novel Wager.— A person went last week into a public house near Dudley, and after some conversation, offered to,bet a wager of 10s. that he would eat the coat off his back if they Would allow him to cut the buttons off. The wagqr was laid, and the coat was cut to pieces and put in a frying-pan, and after well fryirig it in liqour, he ate every bit of his coat and won the wager. I Cambridge Advertiser. j