£1,200
The eight-year journal of the soldier, sportsman, wit and poet, Major Thomas D’Arcy Morris (1792-1835) of the East India Company's 24th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry, whose scandalous Byronic poetry has recently received academic attention.
Major Thomas D’Arcy Morris, of the 24th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry, lately engaged in the campaign against the Bheels in Mahee Khaunta, was an officer of the most brilliant talents, not only as a sportsman, but as a soldier. The Sporting Magazine, first published at Bombay, in 1828, owed all its success to the contributions of Major Morris. As a theatrical amateur, Major Morris occupied, at the earlier portion of his career, a very distinguished place on the Poona and Bombay boards. He was also the arbiter elegantiarium [judge of elegance] of the circle in which he moved. Some years ago he published in the Bombay Gazette, a very clever poem called The Griffin, some passages in which, as they touched the reputation of a female member of the society of Bombay, formed the ground-work of a court-martial. Major Morris’s defence on that occasion was one of the most splendid compositions of the kind we ever met with. Indeed, he was unrivalled in the skill with which he discomfited his own prosecutors or the prosecutors of his friends. His last essay in this way was, we believe, on the occasion of the trial of Major Spiller, of the auxiliary force, for failing to call out a sporting gentleman in the civil service; when such was the effect of his appeal to the sympathies of Major Spiller’s judges, and such the force of his description of the eminent services rendered during the Mahratta war, that every veteran field officer was moved to tears. In other departments of literature, professional and unprofessional, Major Morris was equally fortunate. His plans for a retiring fund were the first which recovered the attention of the Bombay army. His poetry, too, was of an extremely pleasing order. The Englishman (1835 Calcutta)
Fees apply to the hammer price:
Free Registration
25.6% inc VAT*
Flat Fee Registration
22.00% inc VAT*
