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156 to lay down their arms. Within the short period of sixty days from the time when the Sikhs crossed the Sutlej so confident of victory, the British force, far inferior in numbers of men and guns, but superior in everything which makes for success, had defeated the flower of the great Khalsa in four well-fought-out pitched battles and wrested from them in action 220 guns, while only 14,000 of that derelict army now remained in the field. The much-plundered city of Lahore was amazed to find that it was spared from pillage, and to hear that the British had committed no outrages during their victorious march and scrupulously paid for everything they took. There was now nothing left to encourage the Sikhs to continue the contest; they had been well and fairly beaten, but they had forgot nothing of their praetorian pride. Their vanity was mortally wounded, so they raised the cry of treachery and turned on their Brahman leaders, to whom they ascribed all their disasters. They had, however,