III. GENERAL AVITABILE.

In marked contrast to Allard was Avitabile, the third of Ranjit Singh's white generals, who is even better known to us than are Ventura and Allard, as it fell to his lot to occupy a position for many years in which he was able. to render signal services to the British Indian Government. This position was that of governor of Peshawar, which city and province were ruled by Avitabile with remorseless cruelty, shameless rapacity, and signal skill and success.

Of the early life which fitted a Neapolitan peasant for such a position but little can be ascertained with certainty, but that little discloses a very remarkable personality. "Paolo di Bartolomeo Avitabile-a general in the armies of the Panjab and of France; Chevalier of the Legion of Honour; of the Orders of Merit and of Saint Ferdinand (of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies); Commander of the Durani Order (of Afghanistan); Grand Commander of the Lion and Sun and of the Two Lions and Crown (of Persia); and of the Star of the Panjab"-was born at Agerolo in the kingdom of Naples on the 25th October 1791, and served in the local levies of his native State during the years 1807 to 1809.

Avitabile then entered the artillery of the army of King Joseph Buonaparte, and served that sovereign and his successor Murat. Avitabile served several campaigns under Murat in the Italian contingent of the imperial army, and rose to the rank of lieutenant, receiving also the command of the 15th Battery.

When the kingdom of Naples was restored to the Bourbons by the fall of Napoleon, Avitabile retained his rank

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and command, and served under the Austrian General Delaver at the siege of Gaeta. On this occasion he showed distinguished gallantry, and was twice wounded. General Delaver recommended him for promotion to the rank of captain and for a decoration, but for some unexplained reason Avitabile was removed in the same rank of lieutenant to a light infantry regiment. Disgusted by this treatment, Avitabile determined to seek his fortunes abroad, and embarked for Philadelphia: his voyage was, however, disastrous, and ended in a shipwreck near Marseilles. Here Avitabile was kindly treated, and advised to turn his steps eastward rather than westward: he accordingly took ship for Constantinople, where he found an envoy of Futteh Ali Shah of Persia charged with the duty of obtaining European officers for the Persian army.

Avitabile arrived at Teheran in the year 1820, and served the Shah and his heir-apparent for a period of six years, during which he performed signal services, and was rewarded with the rank of "khan" and the grade of colonel. He also received two of the highest Persian decorations. Discontented with his remuneration, and hearing favourable reports from Ventura of his service in the Panjab, Avitabile and Court (a brother-officer of the Napoleonic army who was in Persia with him) set out for India. After an adventurous journey through Afghanistan, they arrived in the Panjab and were quickly given employment. Ranjit Singh soon discovered that Avitabile's talents lay in the direction of civil government,

1 This statement is derived from an account of General Avitabile in the 'Livre des Célébrités Contemporaines,' published in 1846. It must, however, be mentioned that Sir George Russell Clerk, who knew Avitabile well, mentions in his Diary that the latter held no military rank in Persia, and, in fact, made his living in that country as a pedlar.

and made him governor of the town and province of Wazirabad.

Avitabile showed great ability in this office, and ruled his subjects, Sikhs and Muhammadans alike, with impartial severity. In so doing he undoubtedly pleased Ranjit Singh, who had all the instincts of a great ruler, but gave great dissatisfaction to the Sikhs, who desired and expected to be treated as the ruling race. In addition to his duties as governor, Avitabile exercised military command over the troops at Wazirabad, and succeeded in impressing something of his own stern character on his infantry regiment.

The Rev. Joseph Wolff, on his arrival in the Panjab (in 1832), found Avitabile at Wazirabad, and gives the following interesting account of him:

"This famous Neapolitan spoke Italian, French, Persian, and Hindustani with equal facility. He had improved the town of Wazirabad to a remarkable extent. He kept the streets of the city clean, and had a fine palace and a beautiful carriage for himself. He was a clever, cheerful man, and full of fun. He told Wolff at once that he would show to him his angeli custodes, and then took him to his bedroom, the walls of which were covered with pictures of dancing-girls.

"He and Wolff one day rode out together on elephants, and he said to him, 'Now I will show you the marks of the civilisation which I have introduced into this country.' They rode outside the town, and there Wolff saw before him about six gibbets, upon which a great number of malefactors were hanging. Though Avitabile was full of fun, yet whenever the conversation was directed to important subjects, he became most serious. Though he had

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amassed in India a fortune of £50,000, he was always panting after a return to his native country, Naples; and he said to Wolff, For the love of God, help me to leave this place!""

Avitabile continued to govern Wazirabad wisely, and on the whole well, until he was removed in the year 1834 to Peshawar. The government of this new conquest of the Maharaja's had proved too arduous a task for the various Sikh princes and sardars who had tried their hands at it.

Peshawar is, as has been well said, a fragment of Central Asia that has accidentally become, geographically and politically, part of India. Of all the cities of the plains its inhabitants have been and are the most savage and unruly. The ruthless Avitabile was the first man who ever held Peshawar in subjection. In the opinion of Sir Henry Lawrence, a man who must have held Avitabile's methods in horror, "the most lenient view of him that can be taken is, to consider him as set in authority over savage animals not as a ruler over reasonable beings as one appointed to grind down a race, who bear the yoke with about as good a grace as 'a wild bull in a net,' and who, catching the ruler for one moment asleep, would soon cease to be governed. But the ground of complaint alleged against him is that he acts as a savage among savage men, instead of showing them that a Christian can wield the iron sceptre without staining it by needless cruelty,-without following some of the worst fashions of his worst neighbours. Under his rule summary hangings have been added to the native catalogue of punishments, and not a bad one either, when properly used; but the ostentation of adding two or three to the

string suspended from the gibbet, on special days and festivals, added to a very evident habitual carelessness of life, lead one to fear that small pains are taken to distinguish between innocence and guilt, and that many a man, ignorant of the alleged crime, pays for it with his blood.

"Still, General Avitabile has many of the attributes of a good ruler: he is bold, active, and intelligent, seeing everything with his own eyes; up early and late. He has, at the expense of his own character for humanity, by the terror of his name, saved much life. It is but just to state that the peaceful and well-disposed inhabitants of Peshawar, both Hindu and Muhammadan, united in praise of his administration, though all with one voice declared that mercy seldom mingled in his decrees. Believed to fear neither man nor devil, Avitabile keeps down by grim fear what nothing else would keep down, the unruly spirits around him, who, if let slip, would riot in carnage: his severity may therefore be extenuated as the least of two evils."

This is not an unfavourable picture, and it is worth studying, for Avitabile was one of the very few Europeans who has governed an Eastern province on oriental principles.

Avitabile was in appearance" a tall stout man, of sensual countenance, with large nose and lips, something of the Jewish type, and well whiskered and bearded. He wore a laced blue jacket, not unlike that of our horse-artillery, capacious crimson trousers of the Turkish fashion, and a rich sword." The blade of this sword had belonged to the Emperor Akbar, and was a superb one: it cost Avitabile 2000 rupees, and the setting cost him another thousand.