[Illustration: A DARING DEED: BLOWING-UP THE CASHMERE GATE, DELHI In broad daylight, and without a particle of cover, Lieuts. Home and Salkeld, with a few sappers, laid their powder bags and fired them. Salkeld and some of the others were shot before they could escape.] The bugler sounded the advance, and with a cheer our men rushed through the gateway, and met the other columns, who had carried their respective breaches. The Lahore Gate alone defied our attempts, and Nicholson called for volunteers to follow him through the narrow street towards the Lahore Gate. As he strode forward, sword in hand, though there was death in every window and on every house-top, his great stature marked him out as a target for the enemy, and he fell, mortally wounded, the one man England wanted most. The long autumn day was over, and we were in Delhi, but had not taken it. Sixty-six officers and 1,100 men had fallen, while not a sixth part of the city was ours. Many of our men were lying drunk in the shops. Had the sepoys possessed a General, they might have recovered the ridge, and taken our whole camp, defended as it was mainly by the sick and wounded. On the next day, by order of General Wilson, vast quantities of beer, wine, and brandy were destroyed. On the 16th active operations were resumed. By sapping gradually from house to house we managed to avoid street fighting and slowly pressed the rebels back into the ever-narrowing part of the city from which, like rats, they streamed. Whilst Seaton was in the Cashmere Gateway, he saw some artillerymen who were on duty there rummaging about. One of them was looking into a long arm-chest, when all at once he slammed down the lid, sat upon it sharp, and roared out: “Hi! Bill, run! be quick! Here’s a devil of a Pandy in the box!” Bill lost no time in attending to his comrade’s request, and others running up to see what it was, they pulled out of the box a fine powerful sepoy, who was taken at once to the ditch and disposed of without more ceremony. On the 18th, between 9 and 10 a.m., there was an eclipse of the sun. There is little doubt that this had a great effect on the minds of the superstitious natives, for they now began to leave the city in streams. On the morning of the 20th, as the city in the direction of the palace seemed to be deserted, Colonel Jones came down with a column; a powder-bag was applied to the palace gates, a few defenders were slain, and the British flag was hoisted. That night the mess dinner was laid in the celebrated Dewan Khas, the marble building that Moore describes in “Lalla Rookh.” The inner room is the King’s throne-room, and round the walls, inlaid with black marble, are the famous words: “If there be an elysium on earth, it is this.”