Outram remained in a fortified position at the Alumbagh not far from Lucknow: and after disposing of other duties Campbell returned to make a final end of the Lucknow rebels. This time the forces available were large, the operations could be conducted in a methodical way without undue waste of life, and the work was done effectually. More important in its moral effect, more remarkable as an instance both of political and military audacity, was the reconquest of Delhi. The imperial city had but a small force of sepoys stationed in it, when the mutiny broke out at Meerut, forty miles off. Many of the mutineers hastened to Delhi, flying, it would seem, from the expected vengeance of the English troops at Meerut, who however were detained inactive by the hopeless incapacity of their general. The Delhi sepoys rose at the news, and slaughtered all the English in the city: those who lived outside fled as best they could. Lieutenant Willoughby, in charge of the great magazine, defended it for some time, aided by eight men only; and then blew it up, and a thousand rebels with it. The ancient capital, with all its resources, was for the time lost: and the mutineers proclaimed the restoration of the Mogul emperor, who, old and blind, resided in the palace, though this did not mean his assumption of any authority. The supreme importance of recovering Delhi was obvious, but it was not till three weeks after the outbreak that General Barnard, who had become commander-in-chief by the death of General Anson, marched for Delhi, ordering all that could be spared from Meerut to join him. Wilson with the Meerut force had to fight his way, and after his junction with Barnard a considerable battle had to be fought; but on June 8 the army established itself in the old garrison cantonments, on a long ridge which looks down on the city from the west and north-west. It was obviously far too small to besiege Delhi in any real sense. It could furnish visible evidence that England had not abandoned the idea of reconquest, but it could do no more without reinforcements and a siege train, unless by a direct and immediate assault. Some of the ardent spirits in the army strongly urged General Barnard to hazard an assault; and if he had done so, he might very possibly have succeeded; for the odds against him were not much greater than when Delhi was taken three months later, and the moral effect of prompt audacity is always great, especially in India. He however thought the consequences of failure too disastrous to be risked without a greater chance of success. Consequently Delhi became more and more the focus of the mutiny, to which streamed all rebels not already in organised bodies: and its fall was a greater material blow to their cause. This however can hardly be set against the value of an early proof that the British could and would re-establish their power. It requires an extraordinary man to realise that the risk of