The number of followers with which Umra Khan had entered Chitral territory had been gradually increasing, as his star appeared to be in the ascendant, and his total strength was now estimated at between 5000 and 8000 men. On the afternoon of the 3rd March Sher Afzul reached the neighbourhood of Chitral at the head of an armed force, and took up a position in some villages about two miles to the south-west of the fort. At 4.15 two hundred men of the Kashmir Rifles were sent out, under Captains Campbell, Townsend and Baird, to check the enemy’s advance. Captain Campbell proposed to attack the position in front, while fifty men under Captain Baird made a flank attack along some high ground to the west. The enemy were found to be well armed and strongly posted; the Kashmir troops were met with a very heavy fire, and the attempts to carry the position by assault failed. It was rapidly getting dark, and Captain Campbell commenced to retire, being followed up closely by the enemy. The main body sustained heavy losses, but gained the fort under cover of the fire of a party of the 14th Sikhs; Captain Baird’s detachment became, however, isolated, Baird himself was mortally wounded, being carried back by Surgeon Captain Whitchurch, and this party only made its way back to the fort after desperate fighting, in which several were killed and many wounded. On this day, out of 150 men actually engaged, twenty-five were killed and thirty wounded. Captain Campbell was severely wounded, and the command of the troops in Chitral fort now devolved upon Captain Townsend. On this day the siege of Chitral fort may be said to have commenced, and for many weeks no news of the garrison reached the outer world. [Sidenote: The Chitral-Gilgit Line] _Events on the Chitral-Gilgit Line._—We may now conveniently describe the events which took place on the line of communications between Chitral and Mastuj, and all that befell the small bodies of reinforcing troops and the convoys, which were struggling westward through a very difficult and actively hostile country.