But in course of time the idea came to the ruling authorities in India that great advantage would accrue if the sipáhí regiments were to be remodelled on the system then prevailing in the British army. Just before the great Marquess Wellesley, then Lord Mornington, arrived in India, such a scheme was carried into effect (1796). The dress of the sipáhís was assimilated to that of his European comrades. The native officers, though maintained, were relegated to an inferior position. The English system, with its list of captains, lieutenants, and ensigns, supervised by a colonel, a lieutenant-colonel, and a major, was introduced into the native army, and that army was brought more completely than it had ever been before into the European centralising system.
Fortunately for the tranquillity of British India it was only gradually, almost imperceptibly, that the great powers of the commanding officer were interfered with. Under the new system the sipáhís fought well against Típu Sáhib, against the Maráthás, against the Pindárís, and against the Peshwá. They conducted themselves with their accustomed courage and resolution in the first war with Burma, 1825-6. Then came a period of peace, to be broken only in 1838 by the first invasion of Afghánistán.
That the disasters of the first Afghán war had an effect on the feelings with which the sipáhí had until then regarded his English master is undeniable. During that war he had behaved with remarkable courage, self-denial, and devotion. A distinguished officer who served in it declared on a public occasion, after the return of the troops, that his personal experience had convinced him that, properly led, the sipáhí would follow his English officer anywhere, and would bear uncomplainingly any amount of hardships. But the imagination exercises upon the mind of an oriental an influence which is often not at
