‘Some scheme of the grain-merchants to raise the price of grain, I have no doubt. But here is Jaffar Sahib, the faithful fellow to whom we owe much of our success, and who would be the first to give this information if it were true: ask him, if you please, Mr. Wheeler, what he thinks.’
Wheeler put the question, and the man laughed confidently.
‘It is a lie,—it is a lie! Look you, sir, as you speak my language so well, perhaps you can read it also. Here are letters which I have daily received from Seringapatam, through a friend, who thus risks his life in the service of the brave English. They contain the daily records of the bazaar there, and the movements of the troops.’
‘We will have them read by a scribe, if you please, general,’ said Wheeler. ‘If thou art faithless, as I suspect,’ he continued to the man, ‘thou shalt hang on the highest tree in the fort!’
‘My life is in your hands,’ he replied in his usual subdued tone; ‘I am not afraid that you should read.’
The letters were read, and were, as he described them to be, daily accounts from the capital, where the army was said to be quiet. The last letter was only four days old, the time which the post usually occupied.
‘Now, gentlemen, are you satisfied?’ cried the general in triumph. ‘Have I not always told you that I possessed the most exact information through this my faithful servant? Contradict, I pray you, this absurd rumour, and believe me that there is no danger.’
But the next morning, as the day broke, a cloud of irregular cavalry was seen by those on the look-out, advancing from the southward; and amidst the confusion and alarm which followed, no efforts were made to check them—none to defend the outer lines of fortification, which would have enabled the English to have strengthened their position within. A few skirmishes occurred, in ineffectual attempts to retain their ground, and before noon the place was formally invested by the regular infantry and very efficient artillery of Tippoo’s army.
Herbert and Wheeler made every search for Jaffar Sahib, but he was nowhere to be found. In the confusion, he and the general’s servant, who had been his confidant and associate, had escaped.
Then only broke upon the unfortunate general a bitter prospect, and a sense of the misery he had brought upon himself and others. But instead of yielding to any despair, the courage and discipline of the army rose with the danger which threatened its very existence: animosities were forgotten: and while the siege of the fort was vigorously pressed by Tippoo, and with the most efficient means, its defenders exerted themselves with the intrepidity and spirit of English soldiers to repel their assailants.