blood under circumstances of signal barbarity.
They saw their wives and children murdered before their faces, while
those who escaped the fury of the sepoys wandered in helpless flight
through jungles and plains, suffering incredible privations. Some few
there were who reached a friendly station, or were succoured and hidden
by loyal natives. But the greater number fell by the hands of the
wretches who in these times of outrage and anarchy swarmed out of the
low quarters of the cities, and swept unchecked over the whole country
in hundreds and thousands.

The officers had taken up their quarters in the barracks in one or the
centre buildings, which was reserved entirely for their use. Here we
endeavoured to make ourselves as comfortable as possible under the
circumstances, the large apartment serving at once as mess-house
sitting-room and bedroom for us all. The Colonel alone lived apart,
while the married ladies and their families for the present occupied the
main guard bungalow pending arrangements for more suitable quarters.

The poor ladies, as was natural, were in a state of great agitation, and
would not be comforted. We did our best to quiet their fears, telling
them there was not the slightest danger as regarded their safety; that,
even were we attacked by the rebels, they need have no dread of the
result, for we were more than a match for double our number of sepoys.
Still, it pained us much to see their distress, and we could only be
thankful that, come what might, they were under the protection of
British soldiers.

On the evening of May 14, at sunset, I was sitting smoking and chatting
in the barrack-room with some of our officers when, quite unexpectedly,
I was again called to the orderly-room, and directed to march with the
Grenadier company on outlying picket to the left rear of the cantonment,
and close to the lines of the disarmed sepoys. Two guns of the Light
Field Battery, under a subaltern, were also placed under my orders, and
I took with me a young ensign to assist me in my duties.

The Brigadier said he had received intelligence that an attack by the
mutineers was expected from the direction of Lahore; and I was told to
keep a sharp lookout, in case the enemy made during the night a flank
movement on the station. I was also constantly to patrol the lines of
the native regiments, to confine the sepoys to their huts, and to take
prisoner any who ventured outside.

The short Indian twilight was