Page:The Indian Mutiny of 1857.djvu/218

190 was resting his troops after their early march, at once formed them in order of battle. He placed the guns, eight in number, commanded by Captain Maude, R.A., in front; in the same line with them a body of skirmishers, in loose order, armed with the Enfield rifle, then new in India, ready to open fire on the enemy as soon as he should appear. Behind the guns he disposed the several detachments of infantry, forming a line of quarter-distance columns ready to deploy. The eighteen volunteer-horse guarded the right flank; the bulk of the irregulars the left.

These dispositions had not quite been completed when the enemy's guns, now well within distance, opened fire, whilst their cavalry, galloping round, threatened the flanks of the English. For a few seconds their fire was unanswered. Only, however, for a few seconds. Then Maude, moving his battery to the front, opened fire, and in a second it became a species of duello at a distance of 400 yards between the rival guns, those of the British being backed up by the fire of the Enfield rifles. Very soon this double fire silenced that of the rebels, and Maude, pushing on to within 200 yards of the rebel infantry, poured upon them the fire which had silenced the guns. The English infantry advanced at the same time, and although the rebels seemed as though they would stand to protect their heavy guns, their resolution faded away in the presence of the advancing British, and they turned and fled.

During this time the rebel cavalry had been steadily manœuvring on both flanks. Their efforts on the British left were checked by the handful of volunteers; but on the right where the horsemen were, with the exception of the officers, entirely natives, a disaster threatened. Some eighteen or twenty of the rebel cavalry, advancing at