§8. Meanwhile there were unpleasant reports from Oudh. Sir Henry Lawrence, the new chief commissioner, was anxious to redress the wrongs of the Oudh talukdars, but was vexed by the mutinous spirit of the sepoys. He had a single regiment of Europeans and two batteries of European artillery. He had to deal with four sepoy regiments of the Bengal army--three of infantry, and one of cavalry. Worst of all, he had to deal with irregular regiments of sepoys, who had been in the service of the king of Oudh, but had been taken over by the East India Company. They retained their Asiatic officers, but were drilled and commanded by a limited number of European officers, and hence were termed irregulars. These Oudh irregulars sympathised with the regular Bengal sepoys, and were beginning to manifest a hostile spirit by refusing to accept the cartridges. [Sidenote: Sir Henry Lawrence Chief Commissioner.] In 1857 the province of Oudh was separated from the North-West Provinces by the river Ganges and the town of Cawnpore. The capital was at Lucknow, in the centre or heart of Oudh, about fifty-five miles to the north-east of Cawnpore. Sir Henry Lawrence, the chief commissioner, lived in a large mansion at Lucknow, which was known as the Residency. The city of Lucknow extends four miles along the right bank of the river Goomti, and all the principal buildings, including the royal palaces and gardens, and the Residency, are situated between the city and the river. On the opposite bank were the British cantonments; and two bridges over the river connected the city and Residency on the one bank with the cantonments on the opposite shore. [Sidenote: Mutiny at Lucknow.] On the afternoon of the 3rd of May a startling event occurred in the cantonments. Four sepoys of an irregular regiment entered the bungalow of the European adjutant. They were armed to the teeth, and they told him to prepare for death. They had come to kill him, they said, not because they disliked him, but because he was a European and a Feringhi. The adjutant was unarmed. He promptly replied that it was of no use to kill him, for that the mutiny would be suppressed, they would be hanged, and another adjutant would be appointed in his stead. The would-be murderers were struck by his words, and left the house without doing him any injury. [Sidenote: Suppression by Lawrence.]