means a young man, and had already served for two and a-half years in the country and taken part in numerous actions. All through the defence he displayed considerable want of initiative, allowing his forage-parties to be driven in every day, to the great detriment of his animal establishment and to the discontent of his officers.

February dragged on, with the news that Lord Ellenborough, the new Governor-General, had arrived, and that Pollock was at Peshawur, but gave no sign. On February 19 occurred the great earthquake. The earth rolled and heaved like the ocean, and the whole of the rebuilt walls and bastions were shattered completely, and, what was perhaps worse, a number of sheep killed. Nothing daunted, however, Broadfoot and his wonderful corps of fighting sappers set to work with the regimental working-parties to rebuild. Happily, the Afghans failed to seize their opportunity. As a matter of fact that failure was due to the extraordinary promptitude with which Broadfoot repaired the apparently appalling disaster to his works. The mud walls at which he had worked so hard lay in heaps! Probably by the next morning the more visible parts were standing again, complete in their front face, so that to the Afghan reconnoitrers it appeared that they had never fallen. A miracle had happened! Providence seemed to be on the side of the unbelievers. That alone was enough to destroy the élan of the superstitious besiegers. In all Ningrahar and Lughman the walls of Jellalabad alone stood! Well might they say with the Jews on Holy Cross day: 'Thou art the Judge. We are bruised thus.

But, the Judgment over, join sides with us.'

It was after this loss of sheep that the 35th offered to give up their share of a fresh capture of sheep to the Europeans.

Towards the end of March it was believed that the Afghans were undermining the walls from the shelter of some of the old enclosures, and a sortie was made in which Broadfoot was severely wounded. All during March, Pollock was at Peshawur, heartening up and re-disciplining the demoralised sepoys of Wild's Brigade, of whom he found 1,800 in hospital. In vain did the garrison look for Pollock's arrival. With the best intention in the world he could not face the forcing of the Khyber till his European reinforcements came up. At last the garrison took matters into its own hands and sallied forth to attack Akhbar Khan. The immediate provocation was the firing of a salute by the latter in honour of a defeat of Pollock, said to have just occurred. The garrison, then and there, demanded to be led

VOL. XXXVII.-NO 217, N.S.

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against the enemy. It was sick of a passive defence, sick of rarely even being allowed to issue to seize the enemy's flocks which grazed almost within musket-shot of the defences. Sale, who resisted the demand for a sortie, finally gave way. The British emerged from their defences and drove the Afghans from various forts and enclosures, finally capturing Akhbar Khan's camp three miles distant from the town and recovering two of the guns lost by Elphinstone's column. Colonel Dennie, commanding the 13th, a stout old fighting man, was killed, and the 13th lost considerably. The garrison thus achieved its own immediate relief and had no difficulty in getting supplies. When, on April 16, Pollock's force arrived they found a free garrison waiting to receive them, with their bands playing 'Oh, but you've been long a-coming!' with a pretty irony.

From November to April, Sale's force had succeeded in keeping the flag flying, despite the croaking on the part of many that seems so inseparable from any of our ventures in the Afghan hills. Faraway on the south, Nott, at Kandahar, had been doing the same, but being away from the hampering control of Macnaghten and Elphinstone he had not felt the evil influence of their folly and their appalling end. It is now universally recognised that to George Broadfoot of all others did the garrison owe the fame that it achieved, though naturally all who had counselled capitulation were only too anxious to forget their share in opposing a policy that had stood them in such stead. Sale, of course, received full measure of praise, but it was not grudged to his subordinates, Broadfoot receiving a brevet and a C.B.

The story of the Illustrious Garrison 'is now told, and it is not necessary to follow Pollock in his avenging career, nor the rescue of the prisoners, nor to mourn the loss of Ghuzni, nor rejoice with stout old Nott at Kandahar.

There are many striking side-lights in the history of this war that are still of great interest. It is on record that the 44th Foot had been notorious for the contempt with which it had regarded its comrades, both officers and men, of the Company's Army, and indeed the natives of India generally. It was always on bad terms with its own native establishment, and it was pleased to call the native troops of the Company' black regiments '-which was bad manners and extremely shortsighted. Now the 13th, as we have seen, was on very good terms with natives generally, and the Sepoy army in particular. Bitterly had the 44th reaped the crop it had sown, and cheerfully had the 13th's chickens come home to roost. The

same has been noticed often enough in Indian wars, the success that attended the operations of British and Sepoy units when camaraderie was rife, and the ill success when it has been conspicuous by its absence. At one time it was the fashion of certain corps to talk of black regiments.' The habit is dead, or almost dead. The intense good feeling that pervaded the relationship between the two troops in the Afghan war of 1878-80 killed it for good and all.

An interesting episode was the display at Ferozepore in 1838, where the army of the Indus met the Sikh army, and Lord Auckland, the then Governor-General, and Ranjeet Singh, reviewed their respective armies. From the officers' diaries that are extant we have references to the European freelances in the service of Ranjeet Singh. These varied from the Generals, such as Avitabile, Allard, and Ventura, to the lesser lights who commanded corps, the latter rather ragamuffin people dressed in the borrowed trappings of Europe. Avitabile, it may be remembered, was governor of Peshawur, just a governor after its own heart, who always had a corpse a-swinging on the open gallows outside the fort, and his own house to show all comers that he understood first principles. Among these gentlemen must be remembered Colonel Gardner, the famous Gordana Sahib, who, an American, came into India from Central Asia after an exciting period in the Khanates. He ended his life at Jammoo, where he had long been commandant of Ghulab Singh's and Ranbir Singh's artillery, and chief caster of cannon to the State of Kashmir. He could never eat or drink without clamping together the severed sinews of his throat, due to a sword slash, and in his old age always received visitors in a complete suit of the tartan of Cameron of Erracht, in which he was presented to our late King on his visit to Jammoo. His letters from Brahminy Bull' to 'John Bull,' at the time of the Mutiny, are models of shrewd comment.

Another interesting incident was the Institution of The Order of the Dourannie Empire,' an order of Knights and Companions with which Shah Shoojah inaugurated his re-ascent of the throne of his fathers, and with which many of the senior soldiers and all the political officers were decorated at Kabul, while the Army scoffed once again. When the Dourannie Empire proper perished by the sword two years later, the Government of India recalled the decoration from the recipients. Several of them, however, had passed to widows and heirs and are still extant. The badge of the order consisted of a gold Maltese cross with crossed swords between the ends of

the cross. The centre consisted of green and blue enamel surrounded by a circle of pearls and the Persian inscription ‘Dur-i-Dauran,` 'Pearls of the Age,' in reference to the supposed derivation of Dourannie. Tancred's Historical Record of Medals' contains an engraving of the decoration.

The medals given for the defence of Jellalabad are distinct from those given for the rest of the campaign. The Governor-General issued a medal bearing a mural crown on one side and the inscription 'Jellalabad VII April' on the other. This, however, was disapproved of at Home, and in its place a second issued, having a head of the Queen on the obverse and the inscription Victoria Vindex,' and an effigy of Victory in the air on the reverse. Very few of the recipients returned theirs for exchange, preferring, apparently, the original one. The attribute Vindex' or 'Avenger' should be noticed as differing from the original Regina. This was common to all the medals for the second phase of the campaign after the Kabul massacres. These two medals, as were all the Vindex medals, were worn with a rainbow ribbon, designed by Lord Ellenborough, to represent the rising sun. The triumphal arches at the Ferozepore bridge of boats for Pollock's returning army were decorated with the same colours. This ribbon was revived for the bronze star that commemorated Lord Roberts' famous march from Kabul to Kandahar.

Such in brief is the story of Jellalabad and its 'Illustrious Garrison' which kept the flag flying at a time when it so sorely needed support. Alas! so many of its survivors were in due course to die a soldier's death. The two Sikh wars saw the deaths of many, and those who survived mostly fell in 1857. Gallant George Broadfoot fell at Ferozeshuhr while carrying a message for Lord Harding. Stout old Sir Robert Sale fell at Moodkee. Havelock and Henry Lawrence survived to save India and die at their posts. Sic transit gloria mundi.

G. F. MACMUNN.

CARDINAL BEMBO AND HIS VILLA.

BY JULIA CARTWRIGHT.

PIETRO BEMBO was a typical Italian humanist. His whole life was governed by two ruling passions-the love of letters and of natural beauty. He was ambitious and greedy of gain, never tired of accumulating lucrative posts and rich benefices, but wealth and dignities in his eyes were only means to the end in view, steps in the ladder to the attainment of that blessed leisure which was the most desirable thing on earth. So he undertook hard and distasteful work, and toiled in law-courts and offices, that he might gain the power to be idle and to enjoy Nature and his beloved books in undisturbed peace. And since the only way in which a poor scholar could obtain independence and freedom from care was by entering the service of some noble patron, he went to the Court of Urbino with only forty ducats in his pocket, and, in spite of the remonstrances of his relatives and friends, remained there several years. Let them say what they choose,' he wrote to his brother at Venice, they are fools who think themselves wise and imagine that they can manage the lives of others better than their own. You need not be afraid that the charms of these ladies will make me forget myself. For I am not as great a fool as your Solomons would make out.' 1

The issue proved him to have been right. From Urbino he passed, after Duke Guidobaldo's death, to Rome, and through the influence of his friend Giuliano de Medici became secretary to Pope Leo X. But wherever he was, at Ferrara with Duchess Lucrezia, or at Urbino with Elisabetta Gonzaga and Emilia Pia, young Bembo was never so happy as when he could escape to the country for a few weeks. I write to Your Highness,' he says in a letter to Lucrezia from Ercole Strozzi's villa, sitting at an open window, looking out on the sweet and fresh landscape and commend myself to you as many times as there are leaves in the garden.' In the Council hall at Venice, he confesses that he

1 Lettere, ii. 17. The quotations from Bembo's Letters are taken from the edition published at Verona in 1552.

2 Ibid. iv. 116.