whatever
source obtainable. Then, when almost none came, he got ready to die
where he stood, using all the soldier gift he had to put courage into
the last-ditch loyalists who offered to die with him. He had counted
most on aid from Cunningham and Mahommed Gunga, but that source seemed
to have failed him; and he gave up hope of their arrival when a body
of several thousand rebels took up position on his flank and cut off
approach from the direction whence Cunningham should come.

The sun blazed down like molten hell on sick and wounded. Rotting
carcasses of horses and cattle, killed by the rebels' artillery-fire,
lay stenching here and there, and there was no possibility of disposing
of them. A day came very soon, indeed, when horse, or occasional
transport bullock, was all there was to eat, and a night came when
Govind Singh, the leader of the Sikhs, came to him and remonstrated.

The old man had to be carried to Byng's tent, for a round shot had
disabled him, and he had himself set down by the tent-door, where the
General sat on a camp-stool.

"General-sahib, I have not been asked for advice; I am here to offer
it."

The huge black dome of heaven was punctuated by a billion dots of steely
white that looked like pin-pricks. All the light there was came from the
fitful watch-fires, where even the wagons were being burned now that
the meagre supply of rough timber was giving out. The rebels, too, were
burning everything on which they could lay their hands, and from between
the spaced-out glow of their bonfires came ever and again the spurt of
cannon-flame.

"Speak, Govind Singh!"

"Sahib, we have no artillery with which to answer them. We have no food;
and the supply of ammunition wanes. Shall we die here like cattle in a
slaughter-house?"

"This is as good as any other place" said Byng.

"Nay, sahib!" "How, then?"

"In their lines is a better place! Here is nothing better than a
shambles, with none but our men falling. They know that our food is
giving out--they know that we lose heavily--they wait. They will wait
for days yet before they close in to finish what their guns have but
begun, and--then--how many will there be to die desperately, as is
fitting?"

"We might get reinforcements in the morning, Govind Singh."

"And again, we might not, sahib!"

"I sent a number of messengers before we were shut in."

"Yes, sahib--and to whom? To men who would ask you to reinforce them if
they could get word to