In the previous November Colin Campbell had rescued the garrison of the Residency; but he was compelled to surrender Lucknow itself to the rebels. With great wisdom and audacity, however, he clung to the Alumbagh, planting Outram there, with a force of about 4000 men. The Alumbagh, thus held, was a sort of pistol levelled at the head of Lucknow, or a spear threatening its heart. It was a perpetual menace; a sign that the British still kept their hold of the revolted city, and, on some bloody errand of revenge, would speedily return to it. The task of holding a position so perilous exactly suited Outram’s cool brain and serene courage. He had nothing of Nicholson’s tempestuous valour, or of Hodson’s audacious daring. He lacked initiative. The temper which made Nelson, at Copenhagen, put the telescope to his blind eye, when his admiral was trying to call him off from the fight, was one which Outram could hardly have understood; and it was a temper which certainly never stirred in his own blood. But, given a definite task, Outram might be trusted to do it with perfect intelligence, and, if necessary, to die cheerfully in the doing of it. For three months he held that perilous post in front of Lucknow, a tiny handful of troops bearding a great revolted city, with a garrison of 100,000 fighting men. He was attacked on front and rear and flank, and, more than once, with a force of over 60,000 men. No less than six great attacks, indeed, can be counted. But Outram held his post with exquisite skill and unshaken valour. His troops were veterans; his officers were fighters of unsurpassed quality. Brasyer commanded his Sikhs; Barrow and Wale led his scanty squadrons of horse; Vincent Eyre, Olpherts, and Maude, commanded his guns. With such troops, and such leaders, Outram, for more than three months, held his daring post in front of Lucknow, and beat back, with vast loss of life, the attacks hurled upon him. And the Alumbagh, thus victoriously held, served as a screen, behind which Campbell’s forces gathered for the leap on Lucknow. Colin Campbell was happily delivered from the evil condition which had hitherto fettered all the operations of the British. He was not required to attempt, with a handful of men, the task of a great army. He had under his hands the finest fighting force any British general in India had yet commanded, an army of 31,000 men, with 164 guns. Of these, 9000 were Ghoorkas—the Nepaulese contingent under Jung Bahadur. It was late in reaching the field, and Campbell doubted whether he ought to wait for the Ghoorkas. But here, again, the civilian proved wiser than the soldier. “I am sure,” wrote Lord Canning, “we ought to wait for the Jung Bahadur, who would be driven wild to find himself deprived of a share in the work.” It was a political gain of the first order to show the greatest fighting prince in India arrayed under the British flag against the Mutiny. [Illustration: LIEUTENANT-GENERAL SIR JAMES OUTRAM, BART., G.C.B.