guns, a mortar battery, sappers and miners, and Major Napier to head them, are all we want,' he wrote, to lay siege to Múltán. In July he fairly cooped up Múlráj in that great warehouse-fortress. But Lord Gough was still calmly planning on the cool heights of Simla a regulation campaign for the winter. 'As if the rebellion,' so runs an indignant letter from Ḿúltán, 'could be put off like a champagne tiffin with a three-cornered note to Múlráj, to name a date more agreeable.'
It could not be put off. Lahore, the capital of the Punjab, was seething with rebellion; the frontier tracts of Hazára were in open revolt. The Afghans entered into an alliance with the Sikhs, and poured through the Khaibar Pass to sweep the English out of the Land of Five Rivers. Sir Frederick Currie, the Resident at Lahore, felt himself compelled, civilian though he was, to despatch on his own authority, and from his own slender battalions, a relief force to Edwardes at Múltán. Then at length Lord Gough, the Commander-in-Chief, realized the situation. To the brigade which Sir Frederick Currie determined to send from Lahore, Lord Gough added a siege-train and column from Firozpur. On the 19th of August the forces met before Múltán, and on the 4th of September the heavy guns arrived, amid the cheers of the British troops.
It is impossible not to feel enthusiasm for the
