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Updated: May 16, 2025
The trying thing was that even now Charteris could not venture to loose his Darwanis on the foe, for the accession of the Granthis to Chand Singh's ranks might turn the tide in the enemy's favour, and he was not sanguine enough to hope that they would consent to remain neutral.
A letter to Nisbet and Cowper, assuring them that immediate help was on its way, and adjuring them in no circumstances to surrender themselves to Sher Singh; a report addressed to James Antony, detailing the alarming news, and adding that Charteris was on the point of crossing the Tindar with a relieving force, and had requested support from Habshiabad; a formal invitation to Sadiq Ali to allow his troops to co-operate in the rescue of the Englishmen, and to Gerrard to accompany them; a proclamation to be made throughout Darwan, announcing the treachery of Sher Singh, and inviting suitable men to enlist for the purpose of punishing it; orders to the subordinate officials in various parts of the province to be on their guard against Agpuri emissaries, and to enrol and train any native Darwanis who applied to them; and though these, indeed, were despatched first of all directions to the troops Charteris intended to take with him to be ready to start at any hour.
You go first, with your own Granthis, whom you have well in hand, I suppose? at any rate, they won't fire unless you give the word. Then Rukn-ud-din, with the guns and hotties and incidentally the women and then your humble servant with the Darwanis.
His voice rang out, and the Darwanis nearest him looked to see if he had gone mad, that he should bid them turn away from watching their champions' ride. But as his whistle reinforced the order, the chiefs whose minds he had prepared rushed among their followers, and by voice and blows forced them to obey.
Chand Singh's cannon-balls fell as impartially among them as among their fellows, perhaps as a gentle hint that if they were going to change sides they might as well do it at once, but the distance that separated the armies was sufficient to account for a good many of them if they were exposed to Charteris's fire. Yes, the Granthis deserved all they got, but his heart bled for his Darwanis.
"All right; have it your own way. We'll start to-night." "Give your secret orders to that effect to Badan Hazari, then. You'll find that my Darwanis have been already tipped the wink, and the women too, and the fires are being kept low so as not to shed too much light upon our movements."
You think we can't do better with the guns than keep them where they are until we advance? All right, then. Warner will lead the Darwanis, and the doctor will gallop for us."
You'll allow that I know something of the country through which I came two days ago? Two marches will take us well into Darwan, where Sher Singh don't dare follow us, or he will have the Darwanis up round him like a hive of bees. The place where he will try to stop us is a rough jungly bit about half-way one of the disputed boundary districts. We must get through it by daylight.
A Granthi army had made periodic inroads into Darwan, sweeping off all the cattle it could find, by way of collecting the revenue, and the Darwanis retorted by incursions across the Granthi border, designed to assert their independence.
This necessity was not to be made public, either to the unsatisfactory Granthis or to the dispirited Darwanis, who were perpetually entreating to be let loose against Chand Singh's array, which they were quite certain they could drive away, if not destroy.
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