These were, as I have said, at the white squadron of native cavalry, the men whom our people had so carefully trained, with the result that their English officers were slain, and the native officers in command.
I could see for myself that there was very little of the guiding spirit of our generals at work, each commander of a regiment acting according to his own ideas, and I was thinking, young soldier as I was, that if I had had command, I should have sent forward one of the native regiments in skirmishing order to attack us while the two sowar regiments had been sent off right and left to try and cut us off, the result being, I thought, the almost certain routing and capture of our own troops.
But nothing of the kind was done; the officers in command of the cavalry sat watching the sepoy ranks being ploughed up by our grape and canister, till they scattered to shelter, and commenced a useless fire upon us, and then seemed utterly astounded as round shot after round shot plunged in among their squadrons, making terrible gaps, and throwing them into utter confusion.
But they closed up again as well as they could, and sat fast in spite of dozens of the men taking fright and galloping off with riderless horses over the plain; but half a dozen more shots scattered them again, and now for the first time the idea seemed to enter the brains of their leaders that they must act in concert, and after a trooper had dashed across the road from one side to the other, the new columns advanced, and we directed our fire right at the thick masses in which they were formed.
To my mind we had time for one shot, and then I expected the call to limber up and gallop off, but it did not come; and as we loaded again, then, with a roar like that of a tempest, the sowars came on till, as we fired again, we could see their gleaming eyes and the savage rage and hate in their countenances.
I knew that we should have no time to retreat after those six shots, and felt that in a few seconds I should be in the midst of a terrible mêlée.
But our men fired grape and canister now, and as gun after gun sent out its puff of smoke, a perfect tempest of bullets surged through the columns, while as I sat fast, panting and awaiting their charge, I found that Brace knew the enemy better than I, for as the shot tore among them they broke off to right and left, scattering as they went back toward the spots from which they had started on their desperate charge, leaving scores of their men about upon the plain.
“Risky,” said Brace to me, as the men ceased firing, and waited for fresh orders; “but I knew our lads would be steady, and that the scoundrels would never hold together after those last charges of grape.”
“And if they had kept together?”
“If,” he said, smiling. “Well, then they would have cut us all down with their tulwars; but they could not keep together—no sowars could bear such a tempest as that. Some of them were sure to turn tail, and then force of example upsets more, and the rest followed them in such a retreat as you see.”