He even judged himself strong enough, or was unluckily persuaded, to strike a blow outside his defences. Hearing that the vanguard of a Sepoy army had reached Chinhut, a few miles from Lucknow, on the last day of June, he marched out against them with some seven hundred men, hoping to scatter the mutineers before they could enter the city. But, unexpectedly, he found himself assailed by overwhelming numbers, for he had been deceived through false information, and it was a whole army, not their mere advance guard, with which he had to do. The European soldiers could not long hold out under a burning sun, when the native cavalry and gunners either fled or went over to the enemy. The retreat became a shameful rout. The broken band was almost surrounded, and owed its escape to the gallant charge made by a handful of mounted volunteers, most of whom here saw their first battle. The water-carriers, such indispensable attendants in this climate, having deserted, our men suffered agonies from thirst, and many more might have perished if the inhabitants had not come out to offer them water, showing that we had still some friends left. But as Lawrence galloped on, heavy-hearted, to break the bad news to those left behind in the Residency, already he found the native population in hasty flight; and soon an ominous silence made the streets outside our entrenchments like a city of the dead. It grew lively enough later in the day, when the victorious Sepoys came pouring in, and then began the long misery of the defence of Lucknow. But that renowned episode shall be treated of in a chapter apart. For the present we pass on to Cawnpore, where another wretched crowd were already undergoing the horrors of a siege, and had earnestly begged from Lucknow the help it could not spare. Their sufferings and fate should be fully told, as an epitome of the Mutiny's most painful features.