from scarlet. My eyes are bright blue, overshadowed
by bushy eyebrows of the color of my hair, and a terrific
gash of the deepest purple, which goes over the forehead,
the eyelid, and the cheek, and finishes at the ear,
gives my face a more strictly military appearance
than can be conceived. When I have been drinking
(as is pretty often the case) this gash becomes ruby
bright, and as I have another which took off a piece
of my under-lip, and shows five of my front teeth,
I leave you to imagine that ‘seldom lighted on
the earth’ (as the monster Burke remarked of
one of his unhappy victims), ’a more extraordinary
vision.’ I improved these natural advantages;
and, while in cantonment during the hot winds at Chittybobbary,
allowed my hair to grow very long, as did my beard,
which reached to my waist. It took me two hours
daily to curl my hair in ten thousand little cork-screw
ringlets, which waved over my shoulders, and to get
my moustaches well round to the corners of my eyelids.
I dressed in loose scarlet trousers and red morocco
boots, a scarlet jacket, and a shawl of the same color
round my waist; a scarlet turban three feet high, and
decorated with a tuft of the scarlet feathers of the
flamingo, formed my head-dress, and I did not allow
myself a single ornament, except a small silver skull
and crossbones in front of my turban. Two brace
of pistols, a Malay creese, and a tulwar, sharp on
both sides, and very nearly six feet in length, completed
this elegant costume. My two flags were each
surmounted with a red skull and cross-bones, and ornamented,
one with a black, and the other with a red beard (of
enormous length, taken from men slain in battle by
me). On one flag were of course the arms of John
Company; on the other, an image of myself bestriding
a prostrate elephant, with the simple word, ‘Gujputi’
written underneath in the Nagaree, Persian, and Sanscrit
characters. I rode my black horse, and looked,
by the immortal gods, like Mars. To me might be
applied the words which were written concerning handsome
General Webb, in Marlborough’s time:—
“’To noble
danger he conducts the way,
His great example all
his troop obey,
Before the front the
Major sternly rides,
With such an air as
Mars to battle strides.
Propitious heaven must
sure a hero save
Like Paris handsome,
and like Hector brave!’
“My officers (Captains Biggs and Mackanulty,
Lieutenants Glogger, Pappendick, Stuffle, &c., &c.)
were dressed exactly in the same way, but in yellow;
and the men were similarly equipped, but in black.
I have seen many regiments since, and many ferocious-looking
men, but the Ahmednuggar Irregulars were more dreadful
to the view than any set of ruffians on which I ever
set eyes. I would to heaven that the Czar of
Muscovy had passed through Cabool and Lahore, and that
I with my old Ahmednuggars stood on a fair field to
meet him! Bless you, bless you, my swart companions
in victory! through the mist of twenty years I hear
the booming of your war-cry, and mark the glitter
of your scimitars as ye rage in the thickest of the
battle!*