Sikhs came across on rafts, and passed the night with
them. The force was much exhausted, for they had been more than
forty-eight hours without a meal.

"Working day and night, in forty-eight hours another bridge was
constructed, on the suspension system, with telegraph wires. Until
it was finished, communication was maintained with the other bank
by means of a skin raft, handled by two active boatmen.

"We had only one more fight, and that was a slight one. Then the
news reached us that the position of Chitral was serious, and
General Gatacre was hurried forward with our force."

"You had some tough fighting," the colonel said, "but the number of
your casualties would seem to show that ours was the stiffer task.
At the same time we must admit that, if you hadn't been detained
for six or seven days at that river, you would have beaten us in
the race."

"Yes, we were all mad, as you may well imagine, at being detained
so long there. Our only hope was that your small force would not be
able to fight its way through, until our advance took the spirit
out of the natives. Certainly they fought very pluckily, in their
attacks upon the force that had crossed; and that action came very
close to being a serious disaster.

"The flood that washed away our bridge upset all our calculations.
I almost wonder that the natives, when they found that we could not
cross the river, did not hurry up to the assistance of the force
that was opposing you. If they had done so, it would have been very
awkward."

"It would have gone very hard with us, for they are splendid
skirmishers and, if we had not had guns with us to effectually
prevent them from concentrating anywhere, and had had to depend
upon rifle fire alone, I have some doubts whether our little force
would have been able to make its way through the defiles."

"Well, it has been a good undertaking, altogether; and I hope that
the punishment that has been inflicted will keep the tribes quiet
for some years."

"They will probably be quiet," the officer said, "till trouble
breaks out in some other quarter, and then they will be swarming
out like bees."

"It is their nature to be troublesome," the colonel said. "They are
born fighters, and there is no doubt that the fact that most of
them have got rifles has puffed them up with the idea that, while
they could before hold their passes against all intruders, it would
be now quite impossible for us to force our way in, when the