1 The bearers
2 desert the
3 wounded,
4 Their miser-
5 able prospect.
6 120 HISTORY OF THE SIKHS.-
7 of living beings which crowds the rear of an army
8 was in flight to Feerozpore. The whole ground
9 between Feerozshuhur and the latter place ap-
10 peared, indeed, covered with men; some running,
11 others looking behind them with terrror depicted
12 in their faces, the dread of the Sikhs,at their heels
13 almost depriving them of the power of motion.
14 The latter effect, amounting to paralysis, when cer~-
15 tain death seems inevitable, is not unfrequently
16 witnessed on the field of battle; and a gallant field-
17 officer related his own case at Feerozshuhur, when
18 in front of the enemy’s guns—He saw the gunner
19 apply his match three successive times, but without
20 effect. The sight of instant destruction so ab-
21 sorbed his attention, however, that he stood for the
22 moment unable to move to either side to avoid the
23 shot. He was rooted to the spot by some inde+
24 scribable fascination.. When the panic spread to
25 the rear of the army, the bearers of the doolies
26 threw down the wounded men, and fled. No threat
27 could induce them to rem4in, and to add to the
28 confusion, the doolies containing the surgical in-
29 struments were in many instance deserted and up-
30 set. The ground was strewed with bedding and
31 other clothing, and the wounded men were left on
32 the road with little power or prospect of reaching
33 Feerozpore before the darkness of night overtook
34 them.
35 Fortunately Feerozpore was not more than eight
36 or nine miles from the scene of action, and the
37 authorities there, in the commissariat and executive