The whole story shows what is possible to clear judgment and resolute courage; but where these failed, or where some old Bengal officer retained his blind and fond credulity as to the “staunchness” of his men, then great tragedies became possible. Thus at Futteghur, some seventy miles from Cawnpore, the 10th Native Infantry, with some irregular troops, held the cantonments. General Goldie was divisional commander; Colonel Smith held command of the 10th, and cherished a piously confident belief in the loyalty of his Sepoys. The civilians, with a shrewder insight into the state of affairs, believed mutiny certain, and murder highly probable, and determined to leave the station. On June 4 a little fleet of boats, laden with almost the entire English colony in the place—merchants, shopkeepers, missionaries, with their wives and children—started down the river, to the huge disgust of Colonel Smith, who thought their departure a libel on his beloved Sepoys. Part of the company found refuge with a friendly Zemindar, while three boats, containing nearly seventy persons—of whom forty-nine were women and children—pushed on to Cawnpore. In Cawnpore, however, though they were in ignorance of the fact, Wheeler and his gallant few were already fighting for life against overwhelming odds. News soon reached the Sepoy lines at Cawnpore that three boat-loads of Sahibs were on the river, and a rush was made for them. The poor victims had pulled in to the bank and were enjoying “afternoon tea” when the horde of mutineers burst upon them. Some tried to hide in the long grass, which was set on fire above them. The rest, scorched, wounded, half-naked, with bleeding feet—mothers trying to shelter or carry their children—were dragged to the presence of Nana Sahib. The ladies and children were ordered to sit on the ground; their husbands, with their hands tied, were arranged in careful order behind them. Being thus picturesquely arranged for easy murder, some files of the 2nd Cavalry were marched up to kill the whole. The process was lengthy, wives clinging to their husbands, mothers trying to shelter their little ones with their own bodies from the keen cavalry swords. Nana Sahib watched the whole process with the leisurely and discriminating interest of a connoisseur. On June 18 Colonel Smith’s trusted Sepoys broke into open revolt at the station, whence these poor fugitives had fled. The little British garrison, consisting of thirty fighting men, with sixty ladies and children, took refuge in a low mud fort, and held it for nearly three weeks. Then they fought their way to their boats and fled. They were fiercely pursued. One boat grounded, and its miserable passengers were summarily murdered. Death by bullets, by sunstroke, by drowning, pursued the rest. One boat-load escaped, but escaped only to reach Cawnpore, and to perish amid the horrors of the slaughter-house there.