s premature baldness. Sherdil was
rejoicing in the rank of naik, to which Lumsden had promoted him before
leaving the fort. The good fellow was perfectly convinced that he owed
his new dignity not merely to his merits, but to the broad hint he had
given his commander, and suggested that Ahmed should look out for an
opportunity to make a similar suggestion to Daly Sahib.

"I must wait until I have been in the corps as long as you," replied
Ahmed, with a laugh.

Daly had been but a fortnight in his command when he received grave news
in a letter from Colonel Edwardes at Peshawar. Edwardes had heard by
telegraph that on Sunday, the 10th of May, the sepoys at Meerut had
mutinied. Five days before, when cartridges were served out to the men
of the 3rd Native Light Cavalry for the parade ordered for the next
morning, eighty-five troopers refused to receive them. They were tried
for this breach of discipline by a court-martial of native officers, and
condemned to various terms of imprisonment. On the evening of the
following Sunday, when the bells were tolling for church, the sepoys of
the 11th and 20th line regiments and the 3rd Cavalry broke out of their
lines, and while some set fire to the bungalows of the Europeans, others
hastened to the prison, loosened the gratings of the cells, and dragged
out their manacled comrades. Their fetters were struck off; then the
mutineers set off on a mad riot of destruction, burning houses, smashing
furniture, massacring every white man and woman whom they met.

General Hewitt had with him at Meerut a regiment of cavalry, the 60th
Rifles, and a large force of artillery. With incredible lack of
enterprise he kept them at bivouac during the night, allowing the
mutinous sepoys to set off unmolested on the thirty-six miles' march to
Delhi. Horse and foot made all haste through the darkness, reached the
Jumna at sunrise, crossed by the bridge of boats, and entered the gates
of Delhi exultant. Their arrival was the signal for a general rising.
They massacred without mercy all the English people upon whom they could
lay hands, men, women and children, and the streets of the ancient city
were a scene of plunder and butchery.

With this terrible news Daly received orders to march for Delhi with the
Guides. The men had been fasting all day: it was Ramzan, the Mohammedan
Lent; but at six o'clock the same evening they set off, five hundred
strong, a hundred and fifty being cavalry, on their long m