Twenty-One Days in India, or, the Tour Of Sir Ali Baba K.C.B.; and, the Teapot SeriesAberigh-Mackay, George
General
Twenty-One Days in India, or, the Tour Of Sir Ali Baba K.C.B.; and, the Teapot Series
Aberigh-Mackay, George
India -- Description and travel; India -- Politics and government -- 1765-1947; India -- Social life and customs
The newspapers of the day eagerly chronicled the records of the
proceedings in which he vigorously combated the vices of intoxication,
gambling, insubordination, and other crimes and misdemeanours, both in
officers and men of the Queen's and Company's forces alike.
It was during his command that separate barrack-room accommodation was
provided for married soldiers. The state of affairs hitherto
prevailing may well be imagined by an inspection of the barrack life
pictures and caricatures of artists such as Ramberg, Gillray,
Rowlandson, and others.
He also founded Soldiers' Institutes, and encouraged soldiers in the
Queen's army to rear such pets as monkeys and parrots by regulations
for their transport on route and transfer marches, which afforded
material for many humorous sketches and paragraphs in the pages of
_The Delhi Punch_. Wise and considerate regulations which are
continued in the existing concessions as to the carriage of "soldiers'
pets" by troop trains and homeward-bound Indian transports.
Colonel R.H. Vetch (_Dictionary of National Biography_) admirably sums
up Napier's character by recording of him that "his disregard of
luxury, simplicity of manner, careful attention to the wants of the
soldiers under his command, and enthusiasm for duty and right won him
the admiration of his men. His journals testify to his religious
convictions, while his life was one long protest against oppression,
injustice and wrongdoing. Generous to a fault, a radical in politics,
yet an autocrat in government, hot-tempered and impetuous, he was a
man to inspire strong affection or the reverse, and his enemies were
as numerous as his friends."
Altogether a very different character from that which all and sundry
are warned to avoid by the--to a great extent--satirical word-picture
recorded by Ali Baba.
No. 4
WITH THE ARCHDEACON
In this article Ali Baba has pourtrayed with infinite skill and
geniality the many-sided character of the late Joseph Baly, M.A., who
was Archdeacon of Calcutta from 1872 until he retired from India in
1883. Appointed to the Bengal Ecclesiastical establishment in 1861,
Mr. Baly served as Chaplain at Sealkote, Simla, and Allahabad until
1870, when, while on furlough in England, he acted as Rector of
Falmouth until 1872. In 1885 he was appointed chaplain at the church
in Windsor Park, built by Queen Victoria, in which appointment he died
in 1909, aged eighty-five.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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