Lucknow stands on the right bank of the Gumti River, in the form of a parallelogram from west to east. It is nearly five miles long, and its greatest width on the west side is about one and one half miles. The east side is not over one mile in width. Over the Gumti there are two bridges, one of iron and the other of masonry, which bring the business of the country from the north side of the river into the centre of the city. On the east and south sides of Lucknow there is a canal deeply cut into the earth. It bends around in a southwesterly direction, leaving the country on the western side of the city quite open. It is intersected with ravines toward the northeast, near the point where it unites with the Gumti; the banks of the canal slope gently and are passable for footmen and cavalry.
At the time of Sir Colin Campbell's advance upon Lucknow, the principal positions inside the city were the Kaiser Bagh, the Residency, the ruins of the Machi Bawan, which commanded the masonry bridge, the Musa Bagh, the Imambara, and a series of palaces which extend towards the canal from the Kaiser Bagh. On the east side of the city and beyond the canal was the Martinière, a curious palace, or collection of palaces, built by a Frenchman formerly in the employ of the old King of Oude, and occupying a commanding position in full view of the city. Still higher than the Martinière, on the edge of a stretch of table-land, was the Dilkusha Palace.
Learning wisdom by their experience of the previous year, the rebels had gradually strengthened their defences by means of breastworks which showed that they did not stint their labor. Believing that the English would advance by the same line as before, they had flanked with strong bastions the former route which Sir Colin took across the canal where its banks were sloping. The rebels had no less than three lines of defence at the juncture of three principal roads. The outer line of de-
