"
The bill was defeated by a majority of nineteen, and Lord Palmerston
again resigned. He was succeeded by Lord Derby, who once more came into
power. Mr. Disraeli again became Chancellor of the Exchequer, and leader
of the House of Commons. The new ministry, which existed largely on
sufferance, passed some good measures.
The one hundredth anniversary of the battle of Plassey was celebrated in
England June 23, 1857, to obtain funds for a monument to Lord Clive, who
secured India to England. The English then felt secure in the government
of that land, yet at that very time one of the most wide-spread,
destructive and cruel rebellions was raging, and shaking to its very
foundations the English rule in Hindostan. Suddenly the news came of the
terrible Indian mutiny and of the indiscriminate slaughter of men, women
and children, filling all hearts with horror, and then of the crushing
out of the rebellion. Lord Canning, Governor-General, issued a
proclamation to the chiefs of Oudh, looking to the confiscation of the
possessions of mutineers who failed to return to the allegiance of
England. It was meant as clemency. But Lord Ellenborough, the officer in
charge of affairs in India, dispatched "a rattling condemnation of the
whole proceeding.
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