who could not walk were necessarily left behind. They were now going down a long steep descent from the Huft Kohtul, or summit of a lofty eminence, to the bed of the Tazeen Nullah, and at this dip the scene was horrible; the ground was covered with all those who had gone forward, dead and dying, and amongst them were several officers. They had been suddenly attacked and overpowered by the enemy, who now crowded from the tops of the hills in all directions down the bed of the Nullah, through which the route lay for three miles. Our men continued their progress through an incessant fire from the heights on both sides, until their arrival about half-past four P.M. in the Tazeen valley, and here they lost the snow.
Negotiations were again renewed with Akbar Khan, who made the same proposal as before, but it was again rejected by the British general. Their only hope then appeared to be in making a night march of twenty-two miles to Jugduluk; when under cover of the darkness, they might penetrate safely through that terrible pass, which is about two miles long, very narrow, and commanded on both sides by high and precipitous hills. On moving off, the last gun was abandoned; and the same fate befel the wounded and the exhausted.
The march commenced at seven o'clock P.M., but the hope that Jugduluk might be reached under cover of the night was not accomplished; for it was not till dawn of day on the 11th that the advance arrived at Kutter Sung, a place ten miles short of Jugduluk, and the junction of the rear did not take place till eight o'clock. The march had not been without annoyance from the enemy; but the darkness rendered their fire comparatively harmless, except by the alarm it excited. The panic-stricken camp-followers now resembled a herd of deer, and fluctuated backwards and forwards en masse at every shot, blocking up the entire road, and fatally retarding the progress of the little body of soldiers who, under Brigader Shelton, brought up the rear. They had now been marching for twenty-four hours consecutively, and had still ten miles
