left flank of the French battalion. The men received the order with loud cheers, and the troops stepped off, the drums of the British beating the Grenadiers' March, the gunners advancing with lighted port-fires on the flanks of the divisions, and the Sepoys making wild music on their native instruments in rear. The Mysoreans fled in all directions before the din, and the Sepoys kept up a constant fire on the swarms of fugitives before them; but the British, disdaining such ignoble game, marched proudly on with recovered arms and bayonets fixed. But the formation of the British was soon broken by the obstacles that confronted them in that dark march through the Mysorean camp; and presently the grenadiers, who kept the right of the line, were striding away in their old place in the front, having out-marched the second division, while the second division in its turn out-marched the third. The Sepoys having clear ground before them also came forward from their places in rear, and the artillery being unable to keep up was left to toil along as it might. Then broad spurts of flame flashed out from the darkness in the front, and the round shot from the French guns flew humming overhead far away to the west, where wild yells told that they had fallen among the hapless Mysoreans, their own allies. Onward marched the British, and soon the gleam of port-fires showed them more clearly where their enemy stood. Meanwhile Astruc, perceiving by the flight of the fugitives from what quarter the attack was coming, was busy changing front to his left. His French battalion had already been drawn up with its face to the west, and two divisions, each of two thousand Sepoys, were hastening into their positions to support it on either flank; but in the darkness and confusion the division designed for his right flank mistook its direction and took post on the Sugar-loaf Rock. And now the dawn flushed up in the east and showed the white coats of the French battalion conspicuous in their line of battle, and the scarlet of the British, not, as they should have been, in line, but broken into echelon. The rear divisions quickened their pace to align themselves with their comrades in front, but before the formation could be completed the Sepoys on their right came into action and swept the Sepoys opposed to them off the ground with their very first volley. Then at last, when within twenty yards of the enemy, the British battalion got into line, while Astruc, galloping backward and forward, repeated again and again the order that not a French musket must be discharged until the red-coats had fired. In the volleys that followed, Captain Kilpatrick, who commanded the grenadiers on the right, was desperately wounded; but Caillaud, instantly taking his place, wheeled the grenadiers round and fell upon the left flank of the French, which had been uncovered by the flight of their Sepoys. A crushing volley on this flank, followed by a charge with the bayonet, drove the French