On this same 19th of April, the Governor-General addressed another letter to the Commander-in-Chief, relating to the position of General Pollock. “The only question,” wrote the Chief Secretary, “will be, in which position will Major-General Pollock’s force remain during the hot months, with most security to itself, and with the least pressure upon the health of the troops? its ultimate retirement within the Indus being a point determined upon, because the reasons for our first crossing the Indus have ceased to exist.” The Commander-in-Chief was then directed to issue his own instructions to General Pollock; and another letter was immediately afterwards addressed to him (the third despatched to Sir Jasper Nicolls on this prolific 19th of April), in which, after speaking of the withdrawal orders addressed to Pollock and Nott, the Governor-General goes on to say: “It will, however, likewise be for consideration whether our troops, having been redeemed from the state of peril in which they have been placed in Afghanistan, and it may be still hoped not without the infliction of some severe blow upon the Afghan army, it would be justifiable again to push them forward for no other object than that of revenging our losses, and of re-establishing, in all its original brilliancy, our military character.” It was Lord Ellenborough’s often-declared opinion that “India was won by the sword, and must be maintained by the sword.” In his despatch of the 15th of March he had written: “In war, reputation is strength.” And yet we now find him questioning the expediency of undertaking operations beyond the Indus with “no other object than that of re-establishing our military character.” If we hold India by the sword, and reputation is strength, a statesman need hardly look for any object beyond the establishment of that reputation, which is the strength by which alone our empire in India is maintained. But England’s miscarriage at Hykulzye had not only driven all the forward feeling out of Lord Ellenborough, but had blunted his logical acumen and deadened all his feelings of compassion. He seems to have forgotten that at this time there was a party of English prisoners in the hands of the Afghans—that the generals who had commanded our army at Caubul—the widow of the murdered Envoy—the brave-hearted wife of the commander of the illustrious garrison of Jellalabad—the man who had rescued Herat from the grasp of the Persian, and done the only thing that had yet been done to roll back from the gates of India the tide of Western invasion—with many more brave officers and tender women, were captives in the rude fortresses of the Afghan Sirdars. The Governor-General seems to have forgotten that there were prisoners to be rescued; and he doubted the expediency of undertaking operations merely for the re-establishment of our military reputation—although upon that reputation, in his own opinion, our tenure of India depended.