Sir Hugh Gough--afterwards Lord Gough--had long to wait for promotion to the higher ranks, and he was more than sixty when he commenced the campaigning in China which led to the cession of Hong-Kong. Soon afterwards he won the hard-fought battle of Mahrajpoor, in Gwalior, against that warlike and turbulent race the Mahrattas, whose subjugation had cost so much in the earlier days of the century. Gough won Mahrajpoor by a direct attack, marching right up to the enemy’s position, and trusting to the British bayonet for success. “Nothing,” as he himself wrote in his dispatch, “could withstand the rush of the British soldiers. They drove the enemy from their guns, bayoneting the gunners at their posts.” Two officers--Stopford and Codrington--were found lying wounded just under the muzzles of the Mahratta artillery. The same tactics--for Gough was essentially a forward fighter--served him well at Moodkee, the first of the battles in the Sikh war. The campaign was forced upon us suddenly. Gough was called up to support Lord Hardinge, the Governor-General, who, when making a progress through the Punjaub, found the Sikhs on the point of declaring war. The force which Gough collected numbered only 14,000 men, and it had to traverse 150 miles to reach the scene of action. It was a toilsome march, under an Indian sun; water was scarce; the troops reached Moodkee worn-out with privations and fatigue; but when they heard their enemy was in front of them, they went, without resting, straight into the fight. The Sikhs--splendid soldiers, trained by European officers--were more than double our numbers, with a fine cavalry and many guns; but the British infantry, “trusting to that never-failing weapon the bayonet,” drove the Sikhs out of their positions.