acuate the fort, and retreat in that direction;
the main force tarried at Shorpore, where they had been in quarters,
until the 13th, the sappers, pioneers, and labourers being engaged
in making a practicable road through an exceedingly difficult country
consisting of defiles and "ghauts." This road was laid for about seven
miles, as far as the village of Cote on the course of the Ravee, about
three miles distant from Ram Singh's position. On the 14th, the little
army of General Wheeler took up ground under the Dullah heights. That
day and the next was occupied in cutting roads, transporting guns and
mortars upon elephants, and making arrangements for storming the fort.
On the morning of the latter day, Captain Hicks, of the 3rd native
infantry, was dispatched with four companies of that regiment, and Mr.
Hodgson, with two companies of the Guide corps, to take post west of the
Dullah heights, on the opposite bank of the Ravee. The precautions taken
by detaching these bodies of men were necessary from the topographical
character of the neighbourhood. The Ravee, debouching from the
mountainous region in which it has its birth, flows through a beautiful
valley, where a series of hills runs from east to west, presenting an
unequal ridge; on this ridge, overlooking the river, the little village
of Dullah was situated, in which Ram Singh had so cleverly fortified
himself. In every direction from the village the rock dipped almost
perpendicularly, beside being protected by the river, which wound partly
around it. Access was by paths, partly lying in hollows formed by former
streams, and partly cut through the rock. These paths were circuitous,
and nearly covered with brushwood, admitting only by single file of an
approach to the platform on which the village rested. On either side
of the path were precipices from twenty to eighty feet deep, and huge
boulders lay profusely across the way. A few men could defend such
a position against very many. The 4th native regiment was to advance
against the face of this defence, from the direction where it had taken
post some days, and the signal was to be the firing of a gun from the
British camp. The 3rd and the Guides were at the same moment ordered to
advance, at the same signal, against the west of the ridge, and crown
a height visible from head-quarters. As soon as the success of this
detachment was ascertained, the remainder of the 3rd regiment, and two
hundred men of the 2nd irregular