In the year 1819 I was encamped near a village in marching through Oudh, when the landlord, a very cheerful old man, came up to me with his youngest son, a lad of eighteen years of age, and requested me to allow him (the son) to show me the best shooting grounds in the neighbourhood.  I took my ‘Joe Manton’ and went out.  The youth showed me some very good ground, and I found him an agreeable companion, and an excellent shot with his matchlock.  On our return we found the old man waiting for us.  He told me that he had four sons, all by God’s blessing tall enough for the Company’s service, in which one had attained the rank of ‘havildar’ (sergeant), and two were still sepoys.  Their wives and children lived with him; and they sent home every month two-thirds of their pay, which enabled him to pay all the rent of the estate and appropriate the whole of the annual returns to the subsistence and comfort of the numerous family.  He was, he said, now growing old, and wished his eldest son, the sergeant, to resign the service and come home to take upon him the management of the estate; that as soon as he could be prevailed upon to do so, his old wife would permit my sporting companion, her youngest son, to enlist, but not before.

I was on my way to visit Fyzabad, the old metropolis of Oudh,[2] and on returning a month afterwards in the latter end of January, I found that the wheat, which was all then in ear, had been destroyed by a severe frost.  The old man wept bitterly, and he and his old wife yielded to the wishes of their youngest son to accompany me and enlist in my regiment, which was then stationed at Partabgarh.[3]

We set out, but were overtaken at the third stage by the poor old man, who told me that his wife had not eaten or slept since the boy left her, and that he must go back and wait for the return of his eldest brother, or she certainly would not live.  The lad obeyed the call of his parents, and I never saw or heard of the family again.

There is hardly a village in the kingdom of Oudh without families like this depending upon the good conduct and liberal pay of sepoys in our infantry regiments, and revering the name of the government they serve, or have served.  Similar villages are to be found scattered over the provinces of Bihar and Benares, the districts between the Ganges and Jumna, and other parts where Rajputs and the other classes from which we draw our recruits have been long established as proprietors and cultivators of the soil.

These are the feelings on which the spirit of discipline in our native army chiefly depends, and which we shall, I hope, continue to cultivate, as we have always hitherto done, with care; and a commander must take a great deal of pains to make his men miserable, before he can render them, like the soldiers of Frederick, ’the irreconcilable enemies of their officers and their government’.