]
[Footnote 296: It has been, and will probably continue to be, a matter
of dispute whether the first conception and plan of the insurrection
originated with the restless boldness of the Mohammedans or the deeper
fanaticism of the Hindoos. It is notorious that the prophecy that a
century had been assigned by the Almighty as the allotted period of our
supremacy in India had for many years been circulated among both; and,
though the conspiracy was at first generally attributed to the
Mohammedans, the argument that the period from the battle of Plassy, in
1757, to the outbreak in 1857, though an exact century according to the
Hindoo calendar, is three years longer according to the Mohammedan
computation, seems an almost irresistible proof that the Brahmins were
its original authors. Sir John Kaye, in his "History of the Sepoy War,"
at the end of book iii., c. iii., prints the following note, as
furnished to him by Mr. E.A. Reade, a gentleman of long experience in
India: "I do not think I ever met one man in a hundred that did not give
the Mohammedans credit for this prediction. I fully believe that the
notion of change after a century of tenure was general, and I can
testify, with others, to have heard of the prediction at least a quarter
of a century previously. But, call it a prediction or a superstition,
the credit of it must, I think, be given to the Hindoos.
Pages:
687
688
689
690
691
692
693
694
695
696
697
698
699
700
701
702
703
704
705
706
707
708
709
710
711