Secretary of State for India, but here the recognition of his services began and ended.' His friends knew well how unjust this was; they knew what the value of his services had been, and they knew, too, that those services received no proper recognition. One letter on this point I will quote, and only one; it is from General Wilde.

and

'I think,' he says, 'both are to blame for not giving you some public mark of a due recognition of your services in that eventful campaign. To my mindand at Lahore I told Sir J. Lawrence so-your march to Mulkah was an extraordinary political success, and on your management on that occasion the question of a war depended, not with Bonair only, but Swat and all the Indus tribes. I think you saved the British Government from this, and held the same opinion.'

'At home,' wrote Reynell Taylor to John Lawrence two years later, 'a public recognition is the only thing one's friends understand. Blue books are not studied, verbal accounts weary and are not fully trusted, so the individual may as well hold his tongue. A public recognition is everything; it can be quoted in a breath, and establishes merit conclusively, the absence of it having the contrary effect, and this even with one's own family.

'Here in my own world I care much more for a little genuine goodwill from comrades, and the good opinion of those whose characters command my own respect, than for any amount of honour my right to which could for a moment be gainsaid.'

The omission is now past remedying. The case is no

1 It was not until three years after this (June 1866) that Taylor received the Order of the Star of India.

isolated one; the loss is not Reynell Taylor's, and the rolls of the higher classes of one of our most cherished Orders is poorer by the name of a great and good man.

Before closing this chapter I cannot refrain from inserting a just tribute paid by Reynell Taylor to the devotion of the native troops during the war. The circumstances attending the Umbeylah campaign were exceptional. The greatest religious authority, both of our hills and of our plains, was present in the ranks of the enemy; but, besides the Akhoond of Swat, the Hadjee of Koonhar, the greatest priest of the Indus tribes of the northern border, came down from his own country for the express purpose of encouraging the tribes against us. The strain which the presence of these religious authorities entailed upon the faith and devotion of our native troops, can best be understood by those who know what an overwhelming weight of opinion is in the East bound up in that one word ' religion.'

The religious cry was tried on this occasion to the utmost, and it was known that every effort was secretly made to tamper with the fidelity of our Mahomedan troops, who, though faithful to their officers and their duty, yet felt painfully the presence of these revered leaders in the ranks of the enemy. But, though these peculiar circumstances 'were enough to depress our native soldiery to the utmost, not one case of misbehaviour occurred. Men worked on and lay hard through an increasing severity of season, and fought bravely and devotedly against the enemy, their fellows in faith, whenever they met them. To reiterate an old opinion, which, however, cannot be too often brought forward, personal influence of officers

will always be found to be the only stand-by for the Government interests when the religious cry is raised and the fidelity of our troops is being tampered with. Pay, pensions, and orders of merit may, and would be, cast to the winds when the honour of the faith was in the scale; but to snap the association of years and turn in the hour of his need against the man whom he has proved to be just and worthy, whom he has noted in the hour of danger and quoted to his family, is just what a Pathan will not do to his honour be it said.'1

Reynell Taylor to the Secretary to Government, Punjab, January 21, 1864.

CHAPTER XI.

THE UMBALLA DIVISION.

1864-1870.

MRS. TAYLOR and her five children had been left at Abbottabad during the Umbeylah war, and as soon as Taylor's duties, in connection with the return of the troops, were at an end he rejoined them there.

His children were now fast growing up around him, and were, moreover, arriving at the age when the climate of India would be most detrimental to their health. Education, for the boys especially, was a necessity; he had no time to devote to it himself, and he therefore determined to return with his family to England.

Nine eventful years had slipped by; two more campaigns had been added to the list, and from a Major Reynell Taylor had become a Colonel and a C.B. It might have been to his advantage to remain in India until he had secured a fresh appointment, but his young family appeared to have the first claim upon him, so he applied for leave.

He arrived in England early in March, but his homecoming on this occasion was very different to the last.

1 Anne, born at Peshawur, March 15, 1863.

2 Taylor was gazetted Colonel April 3, 1863, and C. B. the following month.

Death had made sad havoc in his family during his absence, and there was no gathering of sisters and brothers to welcome him. A happy home was, however, found for his children at Widdicombe, and for the next few years they remained there with his wife's family.

There is little to tell of the few months he spent in England. The details I have been able to collect are of no moment, and relate merely to visits to Compton, to London, and to Boyton in Wiltshire, where his sister, Mrs. Portal, was then living. One incident I may relate, as it is characteristic of him and has a bearing upon a circumstance I must refer to presently. He was rather troubled to know where to leave his children on his return to India, and one day, towards the end of the year, when visiting his sister, Lady Willoughby de Broke, in London, he continued for a while to walk round the room without speaking, as if he had something on his mind. At last he broke the silence with: 'Will you take charge of Flory for me?' His sister answered: 'Yes, if you will trust her to me as if she was my own child!' 'All right,' was the reply, and neither spoke further on the subject; the negotiation was concluded, and when Reynell Taylor left England his eldest daughter went to Compton. It is a small matter to record, but in after years the thought that Florence had had the advantages and happy influences of such a bringing up as Compton afforded, was the chief point he turned to for consolation in the hour of a most bitter grief.

In January 1865 Reynell Taylor returned to India. His wife had intended to accompany him, but when the

1 Besides those mentioned previously, his brother-in-law, Lord Willoughby, had died June 5, 1862.