e animals were overcome. Runty Goss then opened them one by one, our
troops entered, and the victorious standard of my country floated on the
walls of Allyghur!

When the General, accompanied by his staff; entered the last line of
fortifications, the brave old man raised me from the dead rhinoceros
on which I was seated, and pressed me to his breast. But the excitement
which had borne me through the fatigues and perils of that fearful day
failed all of a sudden, and I wept like a child upon his shoulder.

Promotion, in our army, goes unluckily by seniority; nor is it in the
power of the General-in-Chief to advance a Caesar, if he finds him
in the capacity of a subaltern: MY reward for the above exploit was,
therefore, not very rich. His Excellency had a favorite horn snuff-box
(for, though exalted in station, he was in his habits most simple):
of this, and about a quarter of an ounce of high-dried Welsh, which he
always took, he made me a present, saying, in front of the line, "Accept
this, Mr. Gahagan, as a token of respect from the first to the bravest
officer in the army."

Calculating the snuff to be worth a halfpenny, I should say that
fourpence was about the value of this gift: but it has at least this
good effect--it serves to convince any person who doubts my story, that
the facts of it are really true. I have left it at the office of my
publisher, along with the extract from the Bengal Hurkaru, and anybody
may examine both by applying in the counting-house of Mr. Cunningham.*
That once popular expression, or proverb, "are you up to snuff?" arose
out of the above circumstance; for the officers of my corps, none of
whom, except myself, had ventured on the storming-party, used to twit me
about this modest reward for my labors. Never mind! when they want me to
storm a fort AGAIN, I shall know better.

* The Major certainly offered to leave an old snuff-box at
Mr. Cunningham's office; but it contained no extract from a
newspaper, and does not QUITE prove that he killed a
rhinoceros and stormed fourteen intrenchments at the siege
of Allyghur.

Well, immediately after the capture of this important fortress, Perron,
who had been the life and soul of Scindiah's army, came in to us, with
his family and treasure, and was passed over to the French settlements
at Chandernagur. Bourquien took his command, and against him we now
moved. The morning of the 11th of September found us upon the plains