swords of the soldiers, to the lingering torture which awaited them.
When at length they perceived the dreadful nature of their situation, an offer of a thousand rupees was made to an officer of the guard if he would procure the removal of part of the prisoners to another place. He withdrew, but returned with an answer that it was impossible. The offer was doubled, and the man again withdrew; but he returned only to disappoint the hope of relief, if any hope existed, by declaring that the desired change could not be effected without the orders of the Soubahdar; but that he was asleep, and none dared to wake him.
Of the horrors of the night which succeeded no words can raise an adequate conception. The heat and thirst soon became intolerable; and though resistance to the fate that impended seemed useless, to yield to it calmly was more than could be expected from human nature. The rapidly-sinking strength of the sufferers was exhausted, and their torments aggravated, by frantic struggles with each other to gain a position near the windows, or to obtain a few drops of the water with which their guards, more in mockery than in mercy, scantily supplied them through the grating.
In these dreadful contests some were beaten down and trampled to death; while, in the more remote parts of the room, the work of the destroyer was in fearful progress, through the overpowering heat and the vitiated condition of the air – and happy might they be esteemed whose sufferings were thus shortened. Of the remainder, some were in a state of delirium; others, rapidly advancing to that state, but still retaining a consciousness of the scene and circumstances around them, strove by insult and abuse to provoke the guards to fire on them.
At length the morning came, and with it an order for bringing out the prisoners. The execution of the mandate was impeded by the piles of dead which blocked up the doorway – an obstacle which it required some time to remove. Those in whom the spark of life was not extinct
