Moore would step across with her work, and spend the day beneath a little hut of bamboos covered with canvas, which the garrison of Barrack Number Two had raised for her in their most sheltered corner. Seldom had fair lady a less appropriate bower. The twenty-third of June, 1757, was the date of the great rout that placed Bengal beneath the sway of the foreigner. In 1857 the ringleaders of the mutiny had fixed on the dawning of that day as the signal for a general rebellion over the entire north of India; but the outbreak at Meerut and the massacre of Delhi precipitated and weakened the blow. In that dread year those awful events were to us as saving mercies. At Cawnpore, however, the Nana and his crew, actuated by a partiality for the celebration of centenaries not altogether confined to Asiatics, were bent upon effecting something worthy of the occasion. All through the night of the twenty-second the defenders of the outlying barracks were kept on the alert by sounds which betokened that the sepoys in the adjacent buildings were more than usually numerous and restless. Lieutenant Thomson sent to head-quarters for a reinforcement; but Moore replied that he could spare nobody except himself and Lieutenant Delafosse. In the course of a few minutes the pair arrived, and at once sallied forth armed, one with a sword, and the other with an empty musket. Moore shouted out, "Number one to the front!" and the enemy, taking it for granted that the well-known word of command would bring upon them a full company of Sahibs with fixed bayonets and cocked revolvers, broke cover and ran like rabbits. But towards morning they returned in force, and attacked with such determined ferocity that there remained more dead Hindoos outside the doorway than there were living Europeans within. At the same moment the main fortification was assaulted by the whole strength of the insurrection. Field guns, pulled along by horses and bullocks, were brought up within a few hundred yards, unlimbered, and pointed at our wall. The troopers, who had bound themselves by the most solemn oath of their religion to conquer or to perish, charged at a gallop in one quarter; while in another advanced the dense array of infantry, preceded by a host of skirmishers, who rolled before them great bundles of cotton, proof against our bullets. It was all in vain. Our countrymen, too, had their anniversary to keep. They shot down the teams which tugged the artillery. They fired the bales, drove the sharpshooters back upon the columns, and sent the columns to the right-about in unseemly haste. They taught the men of the Second Cavalry that broken vows, and angered gods, and the waters of Ganges poured fruitlessly on the perjured head were less terrible than British valour in the last extremity. The contest was short but sharp. The defeated combatants retired to brag and to carouse; the victors to brood, to sicken, and to starve. That evening a party of sepoys drew