Scotchman failed on this particular occasion, his boldness and daring
are to be cited in support of the position that energy in war is not the
exclusive property of youth.

Some of the best of the English second-class generals were old men. Lord
Clyde began his memorable Indian campaigns at sixty-six, and certainly
showed no want of talent and activity in their course. He restored, to
all appearance, British supremacy in the East. Sir C.J. Napier was in
his sixty-second year when he conquered Sinde, winning the great Battles
of Meanee and Doobah; and six years later he was sent out to India, as
Commander-in-chief, at the suggestion of Wellington, who said, that, if
Napier would not go, he should go himself. He reached India too late to
fight the Sikhs, but showed great vigor in governing the Indian army. He
died in 1853; had he lived until the next spring, he would
unquestionably have been placed at the head of that force which England
sent first to Turkey and then to Southern Russia. Lord Raglan was almost
sixty-six when he was appointed to his first command, and though his
conduct has been severely criticized, and much misrepresented by many
writers, the opinion is now becoming common that he discharged well the
duties of a very difficult position. Mr. Kinglake's brilliant work is
obtaining justice for the services and memory of his illustrious friend.
Lord Hardinge and Lord Gough were old men when they carried on some of
the fiercest hostilities ever known to the English in India. Sir Ralph
Abercromby was sixty-three when he defeated the French in Egypt, in
1801. Lord Cornwallis was fifty-two when he broke the power of Tippoo
Saib, and prepared the way for his ultimate overthrow. Lord Peterborough
was forty-seven, and had never before held a command or seen much
service, when he set out on that series of extraordinary campaigns which
came so near replacing the Austrian house in possession of Spain and the
Indies. Peterborough has been called the last of the knights-errant;