Obituary Notices, 
xlvii 
return of the latter, after its victorious campaign, the army of 
reserve was broken up, and Maclagan was transferred first to Kurnal, 
and afterwards to Karachi, the port of the recently annexed province 
of Sind. There, under the energetic Sir Charles Kapier, he acted 
for a short time as Executive Engineer until the outbreak of the 
Sikh war in December 1845, when, along with his chief, he started 
for the Punjab. He arrived at Lahore in time to take part in the 
grand review of the British forces on March 5, 1846, by the Com- 
mander-in-Chief, Sir Hugh Gough, and the Governor-General, Sir 
Henry Hardinge. In the course of the war he was placed in charge 
of the works for the defence of Lahore, a most responsible post for 
so young an officer. The choice of Maclagan for such a post is, in 
itself, ample evidence of the fact that at this early period of his 
career he had already gained the confidence of his superior officers. 
After a few months’ service at Lahore, which, contrary to expecta- 
tion, was not attacked by the Sikh army, he was prostrated by fever, 
and sent to Simla. While there he was in the following year 
selected for the position with which his name was afterwards to he 
so thoroughly identified, that, namely, of Principal of the Civil 
Engineering College about to he established at Eurki. 
The idea of training young Europeans, Eurasians, and natives in 
different branches of civil engineering, so as to fit them for useful 
employment in the Public Works Department, was a new one, and 
the means adopted for carrying it into effect were, consequently, ex- 
perimental. On the selection of the first Principal and Organiser 
of the new College depended the success or failure of the experiment. 
That, under such circumstances, the Government should have chosen 
a subaltern little more than twenty-six years of age, shows clearly 
how young Maclagan’s capacity, character, and personality had im- 
pressed themselves on his contemporaries. 
The result showed that the confidence of the Indian Government 
in the young Principal was not misplaced. From the first he dis- 
played an extraordinary talent for organisation, and an indefatigable 
habit of taking pains. These qualities, combined with a remarkably 
genial and kindly disposition, made his reign at Eurki an eminent 
success. 
When the Mutiny broke out in 1857, measures, in which Mac- 
lagan took a prominent part, were at once taken by Colonel Baird 
VOL. XX. 2 P 
