1 50 SECRET HISTORY OF THE LAHORE DURBAR.
2 the garden back to his former quarters in the barracks of Meva
3 Sing-, and he thought it prudent to keep himself out of harms-
4 way during' the remainder of the siege.
5 While all this was passing in the Hazooree Bagh, the eastern
6 gateway was attacked in a similar manner, but by only
7 six guns instead of twelve. The first fire beat down the gate
8 and killed eleven men inside, but the return fire of the two
9 guns within and the musketry of the Dogras on the ramparts
10 above, quickly silenced the assailing battery, killing all the men
11 and horses attached to it. The gmns were thus left, as in the
12 Hazooree Bagh, under the fire of the garrison.
13 Thus repulsed in their first attempts, the Khalsa opened
14 a heavy and general fire from their artillery all round the
15 place, at a distance of not more than sixty or a hundred
16 yards. This fire was continued with such vigour and
17 rapidity that it threatened the destruction of the old walls,
18 which seemed likely to crumble away before it. But the artillery-
19 men being within the range of small arms, and quite imshel-
20 tered, fell so fast under the well-directed fire of the garrison
21 on the walls, that in about an hour the whole of the formidable
22 line was silenced and deserted. The Dogras on the ramparts
23 could now count no less than one hundred and forty-six guns
24 with none but dead and wounded men, horses, and bullocks
25 around them, and so completely commanded by their fire that
26 none dared to approach them. This sight had the effect of in-
27 spiriting and encouraging the besieged ; and the besiegers
28 retired to a more respectful distance, sheltering themselves
29 behind and in the houses of the city. Thirty-six guns of large
30 calibre belonging to the division of Sultan Mahomed were
31 the last to be silenced by the fire from the fort, the artillery-
32 men having hit upon an ingenious but barbarous method
33 of protecting themselves. They had seized and taken by
34 force many women of the city, courtezans and others, and com-
35 pelling them to stand in front of and around their guns, some