Nothing was to be done now but to wait patiently for the arrival of General Pollock and the reinforcements which were marching up through the Punjaub. It was obvious that, without cavalry and without guns, every effort to relieve Jellalabad must be a disastrous failure. The want of guns was now severely commented upon. Everybody had something to say about the remissness of those in high places, who had suffered the advanced brigade sent for the relief of our beleaguered troops to appear at the mouth of the Khybur Pass without a single piece of British artillery. Brigadier Wild lamented the want of artillery: Colonel Moseley lamented the want of artillery: Captain Mackeson lamented the want of artillery. All were certain that the first effort at retrieval would not have been a new calamity and a new disgrace, if a proper complement of British guns had been sent on with the Sepoy regiments. The omission was a great one, but it appears to have been more the result of circumstances than of any culpable negligence on the part of the military authorities. The four Sepoy regiments, forming Wild’s brigade, were sent forward by Mr. George Clerk, on a requisition from Captain Mackeson. Mackeson wrote for the immediate despatch of the troops which, before the outbreak at Caubul, had been warned for the ordinary relief. The regiments under orders for Afghanistan were therefore hurried forward, and another regiment, which was on the frontier, ordered to march with them. Expedition rather than efficiency was then sought; and to have got artillery ready for service would have delayed the despatch of the infantry corps. Captain Lawrence, himself an artillery officer, saw the expediency of despatching artillery to Peshawur, and did not omit to throw out suggestions regarding the preparation of this important arm; but Mr. George Clerk, who was Captain Lawrence’s official chief, and subject only to whose confirmation that officer had any authority to call for the despatch of troops, did not follow up the intimation of his subordinate. “Your Excellency will have observed,” wrote Mr. Clerk to the Commander-in-Chief,[23] “that I have limited the requisitions, which I have presumed to make upon the commanding officers of Loodhianah and Ferozepore, to the three infantry regiments which were already preparing to march to Afghanistan. I consider that this is what Captain Mackeson means in his urgent request for the despatch of the brigade warned for the Caubul relief. I therefore have not followed up the intimation made by Captain Lawrence to the commanding officer at Ferozepore regarding artillery and cavalry, by requesting that a detachment of either should move forward.”[24]