On the very next day (30th December) Colonel Somerset’s column, consisting of 4 guns of the Royal Horse Artillery, 100 of the Seventeenth under Major White, and 150 of the 92nd Highlanders on camels, arrived likewise at Zeerapore. Major White had just missed Colonel Benson at Dug by three hours; and had then been summoned to join Colonel Somerset at Soosneer. In consequence of information as to a junction between Tantia Topee and Feroz Shah, Colonel Somerset decided to push on at once. He had marched forty miles on the 29th, [Sidenote: 30th Dec.] and started at 3 A.M. on the morning of the 30th, but he hurried on none the less, and reached Kulcheepore at 5.30 P.M. At midnight (12.5 A.M. 31st December) he started again and [Sidenote: 31st Dec.] marched on without a rest, except of an hour and a half to feed the horses, until 6.15 P.M., when he reached Satul after a forty-mile march. The rebels were now reported to be seven miles ahead, and it was determined, somewhat unfortunately, to march up to their encampment at once. As the British approached they were fired on by a rebel picquet; so that they could then do nothing more than lie down and wait till daylight. A small picquet of infantry, who had been riding on camels at the head of the column, was posted by the staff officer, and the Seventeenth then lay down on the ground, with their bridles in their hands. In a few moments every man was sound asleep. The staff-officer, waking an hour before daylight, found the bivouac like a camp of the dead--every soul so exhausted as to be overcome with sleep. The force was awakened without noise, and just at daylight the advance was resumed, but too late to overtake the rebels, who had moved off some time before. The British column, disregarding some dismounted soldiers and followers in the rebel camp, pushed on with all haste. The only track was of the worst possible description, and was necessarily allotted to the artillery, two troops of the Seventeenth trotting along, one on each flank of the guns, over the open. After thus traversing some seven miles, in the course of which the camels were left far in rear, the column came upon a village. [Sidenote: 1858.] The ground on each side thereof became impassable, so that the cavalry was compelled to bend outwards; and thus it came about that the guns, without escort, were actually the first to pass through a village with high walls, and with only just sufficient roadway to enable the guns to move. Fortunately the rebels made no effort to defend it; and it was only on debouching from the village that the gunners found, five hundred yards before them, three or four thousand rebel cavalry drawn up in line. Brigadier Somerset quietly turned to Major Paget, who commanded the half battery, and said “Gallop out towards them”; and so with the word “Leading gun, gallop,” the formation of the British line began. The other guns then followed, and a staff officer galloped back to hurry forward the camel corps.