tory warfare, hovered round, making continual efforts to support the besieged, and to annoy their outposts.
But in spite of all Tippoo's efforts, the only serious disaster which the British experienced was occasioned by the too forward valour of Colonel Floyd, when despatched with the cavalry to cover a reconnoissance. Being about to retire, he saw the enemy's rear in a position exposed to an advantageous attack, and could not resist the temptation. He pushed on, and, though soon entangled in broken and irregular ground, drove successive detachments before him; when suddenly a musket-ball entered his cheek, passed through both jaws, and he fell down, apparently dead. The second in command being on the extreme left, there was no one to give orders or encourage the troops at this critical moment. They began a retreat, which, as the different corps of the enemy rallied, and a cross-fire was opened from the fort, was soon changed into a confused flight. The overthrow might have been very serious, had not Colonel Gowdie come up with a body of infantry, and checked the advance of the pursuers. The loss of the British in men was only seventy-one, but the destruction of nearly three hundred horses was very severely felt.
Another enterprise which proved somewhat hazardous was the carrying of the town, or pettah, of Bangalore, a place of very considerable extent and importance. It was surrounded with an indifferent wall, but the ditch was good, and the gate was covered by a "bound-hedge" or very close thicket of bamboos, aloes, and prickly-pear, which forms an impenetrable barrier – at least, to cavalry.[1] The attack, also, was made without any due knowledge of the ground; and the storming-party, when advancing and endeavouring to force an entrance, was exposed to a destructive fire from turrets lined with musketry. The
- ↑ Bound-hedge. A broad strong belt of planting, chiefly the bamboo-tree, the prickly-pear, and such other trees and shrubs as form the closest fence. Most of the forts and villages are surrounded with such a hedge; and the large forts have a bound-hedge that inclose a circuit of several miles, as a place of refuge to the inhabitants of the adjoining country against the incursions of horse. – Dirom.
