Part 14 (1/2)

Young Havelock, as still under twenty-one, erly to all he could tell of the Punjaub, where Sed to take part in such deeds! But his turn was slow in coland, while the nation was recovering as best it could froru to do,' but this was never Havelock's way, for if he could not 'do' what he wanted, he did soht, with the long face and eyes which looked as if they saw things that were hidden fro all that belonged to his profession For hours he would pore over books on fortification and tactics, and try to find for hiood, turned out when tried a hopeless failure He had always a pile of memoirs of celebrated soldiers round hi in talking of the cah or Frederick the Great, instead of discussing the balls or races that filled their h he made the best of the circumstances in which he found hi to India, where Williaet to India it was needful to exchange into another regiht Infantry The process took some time, but as usual he found some work for hi lessons in Persian and Hindostanee

Now there is no better way of learning a language than to teach it to soe out to Calcutta, which then took four ed hies Havelock had passed in London the exaree of a qualified Moonshee, or native tutor, and his Persian was so good that regularly throughout his life, when his superior officers wished to mark their appreciation of his services, they reco those tedious four months, when land was seldoreat captive had not been two years dead, to the Cape of Good Hope and the island of Ceylon, the little band of students ues, and by the time the shi+p _General Kyd_ arrived at Calcutta in May 1823, Havelock's pupils could all talk a little, and read tolerably

At first it see to be as quiet as life in England, but in 1824 the king of Ava, a Buriven up to him, or ould be instantly declared The answer sent to the 'Lord of the Great White Elephant' was a declaration of war on the part of our viceroy in India Sir Archibald Ca force, and he appointed Havelock to be his deputy-assistant adjutant-general

It was the young man's first taste of warfare, and a very bitter one it proved to be The experiences of Marlborough and Frederick on the battlefields of Europe were of little use in the jungle, where the Burlish, who had the unhealthy cliainst as well At last Havelock fell ill like the rest, and was sent to his brother, then stationed at Poonah, not far from Bombay, to recover his health

Havelock went very unwillingly; he was doing his work to the satisfaction of the general, and he knew it; besides, he could not help thinking that before he got better the warhis place However, there was no help for it, and as soon as he was on board shi+p he began to feel for the first time how ill he had really been Once at Poonah he soon recovered, and in June was able to return to the ca while it had been Havelock's habit to hold a sort of Bible class for any of the men whoive the, but he made thehteously, and Godly,' as the Catechism says They were not to quarrel, or to drink too much, or to do as little work as possible They were to tell the truth, even if it got them into trouble, and they were to bear the hardshi+ps that fall to the lot of every soldier--hunger and thirst, heat and cold--without gru, and tried to act up to it, because they saw that Havelock asked nothing of them that he did not practise hi the rest of the camp, but sometimes even their enemies were forced to adht sir Archibald Campbell ordered a sudden attack to be er or orderly as sent with the order returned saying that the men were too drunk to be fit for duty

'Then call out Havelock's Saints,' said the commander-in-chief; '_they_ are always sober and to be depended upon, and Havelock hiht attack was made by the 'Saints,' and the position carried

At the end of the Buri friend All he had gained in Burmah, except experience, was the rank of a Bur' on account of his services inthe treaty of peace This cost the 'Lord of the White Elephant'

nothing, and did no good to Havelock; and six lad to accept the adjutancy of a regiment in a pleasant part of India, near soed to be hter of a -day was soon fixed Early that o up at once to Calcutta in order to attend a court- way from Chinsurah, and as he was bound to be present at the e till the following day But Havelock was different froer to order the fastest boat on the river to be in waiting, and another to inforet ready as quickly as possible

The ceremony was performed without delay, and as soon as it was over Havelock ran down to his boat For several hours he sat in the stifling court, hearing witnesses and asking thee and no bride, and when the proceedings were ended, and the sentence passed, he stepped on board the boat again, and arrived at Chinsurah in ti dinner

After he had been at Chinsurah for four years the Governht they could do without an adjutant, and thus save money This fell hardly on Havelock, as very poor, and when he went back to his regiment his wife and child had to live in two tiny rooms on the ramparts Mrs

Havelock never complained, but in a hot climate like India plenty of space and air are necessary for health, and both father and mother were terrified lest the baby should suffer However, very soon the new governor-general gave his grew brighter His days were passed in drilling and looking after his ht for their welfare in their spare hours, and et soaht keep them out of mischief

Now at this date, and for lish army that the officers should _buy_ their promotion, unless a vacancy occurred by death Havelock was a poor man, and like many well-known Indian soldiers had to depend for luck on his 'steps,' or advanceiments, they were put back to the bottoain

Besides this there were _two_ arn, and the other to the East India Company's Service, under which near a hundred years before Clive had won his battles It was the officers serving under 'John Company,' as it was called, who had all the 'plue provinces, ave orders even to the general himself Outram, who afterwards entered Lucknow side by side with Havelock; sir Henry Lawrence, who died defending the city before Outraht their way in; John Nicholson, as killed in the siege of Delhi, and hundreds of other well-known men, all wore the Company's colours and received rewards For the officers of the royal ar for a eneral, as lord Roberts's father waited; so, although it was very disheartening for Havelock to see young men, with not half his brains but with ten times his income, become captains and majors and colonels over his head, he knehat he had to expect, and also that he possessed thousands of companions in misfortune

By-and-by the Company's army was done aith, and India is now ruled in an entirely different way

It was in the autumn of 1836 that Havelock sent up his wife and little children for a change to a hill station called Landour The cool air and quiet were very restful after the heat of the summer, and at last they were all able to sleep, instead of tossing to and fro through the dark hours, longing for the dawn

One night the htly, and Mrs Havelock had stepped out on her verandah before she went to bed, and thought how beautiful and peaceful everything looked A few hours later she akened by a dense s up found that the house was on fire all round her She snatched up her baby and opened the door to get to the roo with their ayah, or nurse, but such a rush of flaered back and fell In an instant her thin nightdress was on fire, and she was so blinded by the glare and the smoke that she did not knohich way to turn Happily one of the native servants heard the noise, and, wrapping a wet blanket about hied to crawl over the floor and drag her through the verandah to a place of safety He then ran back and succeeded in reaching the two boys and putting them beside their mother, but not before the eldest had been badly burnt

[Illustration: He ed to crawl over the floor]