Page:Final French Struggles in India and on the Indian Seas.djvu/237

Rh follow my retreat I cannot say, for if he had continued the pursuit I must have lost all my guns, and my party would have been completely destroyed."

After raising the siege Thomas threw himself into Georgegarh, the defences of which he strengthened. Here he was attacked on the 20th September by Bourquin's troops, who had marched seventy miles in the thirty-six hours almost immediately preceding the assault. "Bourquin," writes Major Smith, "did not lead the attack himself, but prudently remained with the cavalry, 2000 yards in rear of George Thomas's line. The seven battalions of de Boigne, with calm intrepidity advanced with their guns through heavy sand, exposed to a dreadful and well-directed fire of fifty-four pieces of cannon, and attacked Thomas's ten battalions in their intrenchments; but they were repulsed with the severe loss of 1100 men killed and wounded, which was nearly one-third of their number. * * Thomas's loss was not so great, as the guns of de Boigne's battalions were mostly dismounted by their recoil on the sand, when fired, which snapt their axle-trees."

"Had Thomas," adds Major Smith, "taken advantage of Bourquin's ignorance and folly, and sallied out on the beaten troops of Perron, he would have overturned his power, but Thomas at this critical moment was confused and confounded." Thomas indeed, took no advantage of their repulse. He remained shut up in Georgegarh waiting for the reinforcements promised