Now was Sir Colin able to advance without the enormous sacrifice of life which otherwise would have been inevitable. That day the Black Watch stormed the Martinière at the point of the bayonet without firing a shot. The day after, "Banks' House" was seized and promptly fortified; and from this coign of vantage, step by step, deliberately and irresistibly, did our Engineers and Artillery sap and breach the way for our infantry through block after block of buildings, till by the 21st of March every palace, mosque and walled enclosure in Lucknow had been carried, and the entire City was in our hands.
While this was being accomplished, my regiment had formed part of a Brigade under Brigadier W. Campbell, which marched round the City, past the Alumbagh, to a position opposite the Moosabagh, with the view of cutting off the escape of the rebels when they should be driven out of the town by the bayonets of the Infantry. During this movement we met with desultory opposition, and lost several lives; but we came across no large masses of the enemy; and there can be no doubt that thousands of them slipped through our fingers and effected their escape, to re-unite later on and prolong into the rapidly approaching "hot weather" a struggle which, if we had been more fortunate, would have been ended there and then. At the same time, in justice to Brigadier Campbell, it must be remembered that the semi-circle traversed by him was of great extent--probably more than thirty miles--and it needs no great effort of imagination to conceive how difficult was the task of preventing, with a small Brigade of Cavalry and Horse Artillery, so long a line from being penetrated by bodies of fugitives at one point or another, even by day, still more under cover of night.
I was much struck during this march by an instance of heroism on the part of two village matchlockmen which deserves record, and which, if it had been performed by natives of a European country in defence of their homes, would have been sung by poets in patriotic ballads, and would have earned for the brave actors an immortality of applause.
The scouts of the advanced guard were approaching a very broad deep "nullah" which I had been ordered to reconnoitre with the view of finding a practicable way across it for our guns. On the level plain behind us, under the bright sun, moved slowly onwards the strong body of Cavalry, of which we were merely the forerunners. Beyond the "nullah," nestled among its fields and mango groves a small village, from which emerged two tall peasants, clad in their usual white cotton working clothes, each of them carrying a matchlock.