Dread not though singly he contend with multitudes,
To such as he--odds are of little moment--
He needs no succour but his own right arm,
Resistless as the lion, when delightedly
He rings his clashing claws, and cleaves asunder
The elephant’s broad temples.
HINDOO DRAMA.
The three days of truce demanded, and unhappily obtained by the
imperialists, under the pretext of burning their dead, for which as
many hours would have been sufficient, were not intended to be spent
in idleness. Finding that in Afkun they had no ordinary foe to contend
against, that the inhabitants were determined in their resistance, that
supplies of provisions did not reach the camp adequate to the wants of
so large an army, and that they would be soon under the necessity of
raising the siege, unless some extraordinary measures were adopted,
Bochari arranged with omrahs, resident within the walls, with whom he
carried on intercourse by means of spies, the several attempts upon
Afkun’s life, which, however, the indomitable strength and valour of
the Turcomanian had defeated.
It is but justice to Jehangire to observe, that when these mean
stratagems were hinted or talked of in the council, for they were
not made the subject of any discussion or resolution in that body,
both he and Auzeem uniformly discountenanced them. But Bochari took
every thing upon himself. Whenever he discovered that any plan which
he had conceived was likely to meet with resistance, he immediately
avoided any further show of carrying it on. Regardless of personal
responsibility, he persevered in his own course, whatever it was,
acting nevertheless in the name of the emperor, as if he had obtained
the assent of Jehangire to all his schemes.
Auzeem felt as strongly as Bochari the necessity of reducing Lahore,
or of abandoning the siege, with all possible expedition. The idea of
taking it by storm, after the specimen of resistance the imperialists
had already encountered, seemed hazardous in the extreme. Observing,
however, that the river Rawee, upon which the inhabitants almost
entirely depended for their supply of water, might be diverted from
its natural channel, by excavating a passage for it, partly in the
forest above the town, partly behind the lines of the beseigers, and
permitting it again to enter its own bed at some distance below the
walls, Auzeem proposed that during the truce twenty thousand men
should be employed in forming a canal for that purpose. The idea was
a bold one, and upon a survey of the ground being made, it was found
so practicable, that the men were set to work upon it without delay.
Their labours having been carried on day and night, not only without
interruption, but even without suspicion, on the part of the besieged,
the excavation was completed during the night of the third day of the
truce.
A canal was formed sufficiently wide and deep to receive the whole
volume of the Rawee, nearly a league above Lahore, and to convey it to
one of its own tributaries, which entered the old channel at about
the same distance below the town where the descent was so rapid that
no danger existed of any part of the water finding its way upwards. It
became necessary, however, to throw a dam across the ordinary bed of
the river, which was effected by driving stakes into it, and filling
the interstices with rocks and hard clay, so as to prevent any portion
of the water from making its escape in its wonted direction. This
latter operation, however, occupied the besiegers some hours beyond the
period of the truce.
The vigilance of Afkun suffered nothing connected with the defence of
the town to escape his attention. His preparations for meeting a fresh
assault were fully arranged on the morning after the three days had
elapsed. As he was crossing the wooden bridge, however, which led over
the Rawee, in the middle of Lahore, he observed that the river had
fallen considerably below its margin. He mentioned the circumstance to
a group of the inhabitants, who happened to be standing on the bridge;
but as they did not attach any great importance to the circumstance,
attributing it to the heats which had already set in with great
violence, he passed on to the ramparts. His eyes were directed on all
sides to the lines of the besiegers; he found them strongly occupied,
but exhibiting no symptoms of a renewal of any thing like a general,
or even a partial assault. Nevertheless, he imagined, from the bustle
which he occasionally detected beyond the lines, and from the numerous
parties which he saw in motion here and there, that operations were in
progress either for raising the siege, or for carrying into effect some
other purpose, which he could not at the moment divine.
Afkun’s suspicions having been excited, he sent for the prince, and,
accompanied by him, walked back to the bridge, where he ascertained
that the river was still lower than when he first observed it. He
immediately ordered the Rawee to be sounded, and having convinced
himself that the volume of its waters was rapidly failing, he apprized
the people of their danger, and directed them forthwith to bring every
vessel they could lay their hands upon, to fill all the reservoirs
of the town and citadel, and to be as frugal as possible in their
consumption of the vital element, until measures could be taken for
frustrating this new attempt upon the part of the enemy to compel the
town to surrender.
The intelligence that the river was somewhere stopped in its course,
spread with the rapidity of lightning through all parts of Lahore. The
people, alarmed lest they should be deprived of the most essential of
all things, especially at such a season, when the sun was raging in
the sky, and pouring down its fire upon the town as from a glowing
furnace, were seized with an universal panic. Instead of proceeding
methodically, as Afkun had directed them, to secure as much of the
ebbing stream as they could, while any portion of it remained, they
rushed into the channel with their pitchers, and such small earthen
vessels as they could carry in their hands, and rendered the water so
muddy by their improvident haste, that they destroyed the only chance
which they possessed of securing a supply even for the coming night.
By noon the river was completely dried up, and when the sun set, the
channel was as hardened as the footway of the most frequented street in
Lahore.
The slender provision which the inhabitants had thus allowed themselves
to make, of an element without which existence could not go on above
a few hours at the utmost, was quickly exhausted, the very fear of
losing it having even accelerated its consumption beyond the ordinary
proportions. The public fountains were surrounded by multitudes, who,
instead of waiting for the regular supply, such as it was, contended
with each other in breaking down the marble ornaments, in order to get
at the stream within, which was wholly inadequate to their wants.
As the evening advanced, the contests at the wells throughout the town,
whether public or private, became dreadful. Mothers, with infants in
their arms, and followed by troops of children, fainting for the want
of water, fought against each other with a degree of fury which seemed
to belong to the region of condemned spirits, for a portion of water
that would scarcely fill the hollow of the hand. This when obtained,
they gave at once to the infant at the breast, their natural sources
having been dried up by the excitement of the scenes in which they
were engaged. When the cries of the infants were allayed, those of
the other children became still more urgent. They lay upon the earth
in piles, most of them unable to express their wants in any language
save that of mournful and incessant wailings, which drove the mothers,
already miserable and exhausted by their exertions, to madness. Besides
the hostilities which they had to carry on against each other for
precedence at the few wells that still yielded a scanty supply, they
had soon fiercer enemies, even than their own sex to encounter, in the
numerous troops of dogs congregating around them.
Wherever blood was shed, and in many parts of the town it might
have been seen in streams all the night, these unfortunate animals,
possessing no masters, and accustomed to band together for
self-defence, rushed upon the red torrents, which they speedily drank
up. Fired by the taste of the grateful liquid, and by the thirst which,
on that fatal night, and the greater part of the next day, preyed upon
all living creatures within the walls, these rabid outlaws fearlessly
attacked every thing that came in their way. The results were awful.
The howl of insanity was heard in every direction. Men, women, and
children, as if suddenly struck by the sword of the destroying angel,
became simultaneously victims of this new pestilence. They ran up and
down the streets, wild with anguish. The inhuman sounds which they
uttered--now resembling the barking of blood-hounds--now the fierce cry
of the jackall--now the agonizing moan of the wild bull, when stung
to the heart by swarms of the gadfly, gave to the other accumulating
horrors of the scene so painful a character, that captivity, torture,
death itself, seemed preferable to existence in such a place.
Those of the inhabitants who still retained the power to move,
collecting in a body, rushed out through one of the gates, along the
dry bed of the river, until they arrived at the spot, where it again
received the flowing waters. They hastened headlong into the flood.
Many were drowned--many drinking too copiously of the element in the
midst of the fever, which prevented them from knowing what they did,
perished instantly, the vital current being at once repelled from the
heart. Those whom the waters did not destroy, were easily overcome
by the enemy, who, having assembled in force, attacked and slew them
without mercy.
Chusero gave up all hope of retaining the town, under these
circumstances. But the resolution of Afkun was not so to be subdued.
At all events he determined that, if possible, Lahore should not be
given up to the mere mercy of the imperialists. Collecting at night the
principal part of the garrison, he explained to them that the river
must have been intercepted in its course, by a mound thrown across it,
somewhere above the town. The forest which lay in that direction, and
the works raised by the besiegers, prevented him from ascertaining
the precise spot where that mound must have been erected; but the
difficulties of the hour admitted of no deliberation. Military weapons
were now of no further use. Hatchets, pickaxes, spades, torches,
were the only arms of which they stood in need. He appeared himself,
equipped with a massive iron club in one hand, and a lighted flambeau
in the other, and having already collected from the citadel all the
instruments of the kind just mentioned, which it contained, he bade the
soldiers take them up and follow him.
The imperialists were on the watch for a movement of this description.
They were, therefore, prepared to defend the mound, as well as to
take advantage of the opening of the gate in that direction. Their
calculations upon the latter point were foreseen, however, by Afkun.
They might have easily penetrated the town in the opposite quarter, had
they reached the gate in time, during the rush of the populace to the
lower part of the Rawee. But before Afkun quitted the town, he closed
that gate with his own hand, and confided the care of the portal,
through which he was now about to lead his forlorn hope, to the valour
of Chusero.
Out went ten thousand men in the depths of the night, armed only as
the Turcomanian had directed, animated by the sufferings they were
enduring, to a degree that fitted them to meet any perils. When the
last man passed the gate the prince was there to bar it again, and
to encourage, by his presence, his patience, and his gallantry, the
remnants of the guard that still survived the general calamity. Moving
in a solid mass, the followers of Afkun no sooner reached the forest
than they lighted their torches, and set fire to the trees. These were
chiefly pine, and having been rendered particularly inflammable by the
prevalent heats, the whole forest was immediately in conflagration on
both sides of the bed of the Rawee. The men advanced, unflinching,
through the blaze, until they arrived near the mound, whence a hundred
pieces of artillery were discharged upon them. Their ranks, though
ploughed through, still moved on, reckless of all danger. Again the
volley was repeated; but the fevered men heard above its thunder the
rushing of the waters, of which they were in search, and hurrying
onward with a quickened but steady and resolute pace, attacked the
mound with their pick-axes.
In the meantime, the forest burning far and wide, attracted the
attention of the besiegers, and filled them with alarm for the safety
of the camp, should the wind bear the flame in that direction. Their
apprehensions were soon realized. The night breeze from the river
blew along the new channel, and carried with it showers of ignited
fragments, which fell among the tents and bazaars. All hands were
called upon to pull down the tents, many of which were already on
fire, or consumed like a scroll of parchment. The army was thrown
into confusion. The plans, so well arranged by the council for taking
advantage of all probable movements on the part of the besieged when
driven to despair, were rendered of no avail. There was nobody to carry
them into effect--all were occupied in looking to their own safety.
Afkun was the first to ascend the mound. Regardless of the gunners,
whose office soon became useless, as his surviving followers were
already engaged in undermining the dam on which the artillery was
planted, he drove his iron mace between two of the stakes, and
loosening them, until they yielded to his hand, he pulled them out of
the bed of the river as if they were bulrushes. He proceeded, in the
same manner, to remove one stake after another, while the pickaxes,
spades, and hatchets, resounded along the pile incessantly. His next
care was to remove the cannon to the banks of the river, and to point
them against the mound. As soon as he saw, by the flames around him,
that it was sufficiently weakened, he directed his men to withdraw,
and place themselves at the guns which the imperialists had abandoned.
A single discharge of the battery was sufficient to shake the wall to
its foundation, when the whole mass, yielding to the pressure of the
flood, disappeared.
The joy of these brave men, when they beheld the triumphant result of
their labours; the feeling, that to their perishing parents, children,
and relatives--to all their partners in calamity--they had been the
means of restoring existence, and with it new courage and hope--gave
them temperance in the enjoyment of the delicious waters of which
they had been so unexpectedly deprived. Under the direction, and the
example, of their leader, they at first bathed in the stream--a course
by which they found their thirst effectually slaked. They then drank
without danger of excess. Thus refreshed, they hastened back to Lahore,
where they were received at the dawn of day by all the assembled
people, who lavished upon them tokens of admiration for their valour,
and of affection for their services, which no rewards could repay.
The banks of the Rawee, within the town, were crowded all the day
by the aged men, the matrons, and their children, who remained by
its flowing waters, to assure themselves that the intelligence of
its return was no deception. Now that the precaution was no longer
necessary, they felt a pleasure in taking to their homes abundant
supplies of the copious element; when fatigued with their exertions,
they still revisited the stream, carrying with them their mandolins and
tabors, to the sounds of which the youths danced and sang; while their
happy parents sat in circles around them, as if they were celebrating
a festival. When the dance and the song were over, they suspended
their instruments upon the dependent branches of the adjacent trees,
and slumbered beneath the pleasant shade, or sported with the dimpling
tide, until their senses became once more familiarised to its music.
Amidst all the congratulations, however, poured in upon him by the
inhabitants, for rescuing them from the horrors which they had lately
suffered, Afkun could not conceal from himself the impression, that
they were much more apprehensive of a reconstruction of the mound,
than of any other disaster which could befall them. Their fears upon
that subject, when yielded to for a moment, assumed an appearance of
unnatural excitement, blinding all power of judgment, and suppressing
every sentiment of loyalty to him, whose cause now depended chiefly
on their allegiance. Of the ten thousand choice men of the garrison,
who had sallied out to overthrow the dam, scarcely half the number
returned. The havoc made in the garrison, and amongst the able-bodied
of the people, by the want of water, during the dreadful days and
nights they had just passed, was irreparable.
He was not unapprised of the state of the besieging army--of their want
of provisions--of the confusion into which they had been thrown by the
firing of the forest, amidst which they were encamped. But the latter
evil admitted of a speedy remedy--indeed he saw, by the restoration
of the tents, and re-organization of the besieging lines, that the
discipline of the imperialists, though for a while endangered, was soon
re-established. The deficiency of supplies would urge them to desperate
efforts. Should they succeed in capturing the town, their vengeance
would be insatiable--the calamities, which the faithful inhabitants had
just sustained, would only be exchanged for extermination.
The prince was also fully sensible of the difficulties, which any
attempt to hold the town much longer presented. The control which
the imperialists possessed over the Rawee, whenever they might
choose to exercise it, was alone sufficient to destroy his hope of
permanent success, if he were to confine himself within its walls. His
emissaries, moreover, brought him intelligence, that a division of the
enemy had received orders to march for Cashmere--his only remaining
resource. Should they arrive there before Afkun, the consequences
would be fatal. He felt that he owed to the people of Lahore a debt of
gratitude, which he could never repay. They had adhered to him under
circumstances, such as never before had tested the fidelity of a town
besieged. The moment had arrived, he thought, when a capitulation might
be obtained upon the most favourable terms; if so, the interests of the
inhabitants, which he very much preferred to his own, required that
arrangements for that purpose should be made without delay.
Upon communicating with the principal authorities of the town, Chusero
and Afkun had the satisfaction to learn that they, as well as the
leading inhabitants, were prepared to hold out to the last, if such
were the wish of the prince; but that if no real benefits were likely
to arise from a prolongation of their resistance, they would take it
upon themselves to arrange for a surrender, as soon as they should be
assured of the safety of the prince, and of his valiant champion.
“You,” they said, “can never expect to make a capitulation, which will
not include your own submission; and then you would be in the hands of
a man--that odious Persian--from whom you could expect no mercy. Betake
yourselves, therefore, to Cashmere, while yet you may--your presence
there is of infinitely more importance than it can be any longer in
Lahore; and should you ultimately succeed in rescuing the empire from
the sway of that tyrant, be confident that the people of Lahore will be
among the first to hail your triumph, and to rally round your throne.”
Chusero and Afkun were deeply affected by these natural and fervent
expressions of attachment; and being upon further reflection convinced
that the course thus suggested, was the right one, they took an
affectionate farewell of their friends, and at midnight, disguised as
dervishes, passing through a postern door of one of the towers of the
fortifications, bent their footsteps towards Cashmere.
In the afternoon of the next day, the authorities sent a messenger,
with his shield on his back, to the camp of the imperialists, to
announce that they were ready either to capitulate upon honourable
terms, or to defend the town while a handful of rice remained in
their granaries; that they had abundant supplies both of rice and
wheat, which they would place at the emperor’s disposal, but that
there should be a complete amnesty for the past, and that no plunder
should be permitted on any account. Bochari, upon being informed that
the prince and Afkun were no longer in Lahore, refused to listen to a
proposal for a capitulation upon any terms. But on this occasion, the
more prudent councils of Auzeem, supported as they were by the clement
disposition of Jehangire, who felt at all times for the sufferings of
his people, fortunately prevailed; and Auzeem took care that the terms
of the surrender, which were eventually arranged as the authorities had
proposed, should be inviolably observed.