But here the few Europeans were prepared for the trial that now came upon them. The women and children being sent out of danger, a small house belonging to Mr. Wake, the magistrate, had been put in a state of defence, and stored with food and ammunition. It was an isolated building of one large room, used as a billiard-room, with cellars and arches below, and a flat roof protected by a parapet. Into this, the Englishmen, not twenty in number, betook themselves, with some fifty faithful Sikhs; and, almost all the former being sportsmen, if not soldiers, they kept up such a fire as taught the enemy to be very careful how they came too near their little stronghold.
The siege, however, was hotly pushed. A rain of balls fell, day and night, on the defences, behind which, strange to say, only a single man was seriously wounded, though the Sepoys fired from a wall not twenty yards off, and from the surrounding trees and the ditch of the compound. Two small cannon were brought to bear on the house, one from the roof of a bungalow which commanded it. An attempt had first been made to carry it by storm, but the defenders were so active at their loop-holes that the assailants did not care to try again. Other means failing, they set fire to a heap of red pepper on the windward side, hoping to smoke out the garrison. A not less serious annoyance was the stench of dead horses shot underneath the walls. But Wake and his brave band held out doggedly, and would not listen to any proposal for surrender.
Meanwhile, their friends at Dinapore were eager to make an effort for their relief. With some difficulty, the consent of the sluggish General was won, and over four hundred men steamed down the Ganges to land at the nearest point to Arrah. By bright moonlight they struck out over the flooded country. But the night-march was too hurried and careless. The relieving force, fired on from an ambush, fell into disastrous confusion, turned back, fighting their way into the boats, and got away with the loss of half their number. Yet, in that scene of panic and slaughter, some fugitives so distinguished themselves that two Victoria Crosses were earned on the retreat.
The besieged soon learned how their hopes of succour had been dashed down, and might well have given themselves up to despair. When the siege had lasted a week, it appeared not far from an end. The enemy were found to be running a mine against them. Water had luckily been dug down to under the house, but their food began to fail. Then, looking out on the morning of August 3, expecting perhaps to see the sun rise for the last time, to their astonishment they discovered no one to prevent them from sallying forth and capturing the sheep which had been feeding in the compound under their hungry eyes. The beleaguering Sepoys had unaccountably vanished.
Help was indeed at hand from another side. Vincent Eyre, a hero of the Afghan war, had been moving to their relief with not two hundred men and three guns. Though on the way he heard of the repulse of the Dinapore detachment, more than twice his own strength, he did not turn back. Making for an unfinished railway embankment as the best road to Arrah, he encountered Koer Singh's whole force of two or three thousand Sepoys and an unnumbered rabble, who crowded upon the little band, and must soon have swept them away by the mere weight of bullets. But the Englishmen charged into the thick of the crowd, and this time it was the enemy's turn to fly in dismay. Next day, the garrison of that billiard-room joyfully hailed the friends who had thus marvellously relieved them; and it is hard to say which had more right to be proud of their feat of arms. Koer Singh, beaten away from Arrah, nevertheless long held the field, and did his side good service by keeping the country in disorder, that helped to delay the advance of our troops to the fields on which they were so urgently needed.
Now has to be recorded a curious trait, very characteristic of Englishmen in India. While Havelock was waiting on the scene of that woeful massacre, till he should be able to advance, with such saddening memories fresh about them, with such deadly trials still before them, the officers kept up their spirits by organizing the "Cawnpore Autumn Race Meeting," which their pious General thought right to attend. The fawning or scowling natives, who now were fain at least to make some show of loyalty, must have thought the ways of Englishmen more unaccountable than ever.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] It is only fair to say that an attempt has been made so far to whitewash this hated name by representing the Nana as a dull, feeble tyrant, who, in this as in other actions, was the servant rather than the master of his ferocious soldiery.