Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/200

174 had to wade ankle-deep in the water before they could be pulled on board. The embarkation lasted about an hour; then some of the Englishmen began to push off. Two or three boats only had just moved, when suddenly, from the platform of a Hindu temple from which the ghaut takes its name, on which sat enthroned Tantiá Topi, the military adviser of the Náná, there issued a bugle note. Instantly the boatmen hurried from the boats, climbing over their sides, whilst upon the European passengers the assembled sipáhís opened a concentrated fire of grape and musketry. Vainly did the men on board exert themselves to push off. Some, whose boats were under weigh, managed to reach the opposite bank, only to find there the mutinied sipáhís of the 17th N. I. and the rebel cavalry of Oudh. The sipáhís on the Kánhpur side, meanwhile, were running along the bank and pouring in shot after shot. There was no escape; defence was impossible. In many cases the fire kindled the thatch which formed a covering to the boats. Then all was over. Those who took to the water were shot. All the males, in fact, were massacred. The women, reserved for a worse fate, were dragged on shore and lodged in a brick building near the bungalow which for many years had served as the residence and office of the commissariat officer of the division.

Of the forty boats so treacherously provided thirty-nine were now in the hands of the rebels. One, however, had managed to run the gauntlet. On board of this were Moore, Vibart, Whiting, Mowbray Thomson, Ashe, Delafosse, Bolton, and others. The thatch of this boat had fortunately escaped ignition, and, vigorously propelled by its English crew, it for a short time escaped the notice of the murderers, busily intent upon the other thirty-nine. Not for long, however. Soon sipáhís were discerned running along the bank in pursuit, whilst others, embark-