Page:The Sikhs (Gordon).djvu/258

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THE SIKHS.

ment, and for three days the bodies of the king's sons lay on the spot foretold, close to the place where four months previously they had ordered and witnessed the massacre of forty-nine Christian captives, nearly all women and children.

The effect of the capture of Delhi was felt far and wide in the north, within and beyond the border. The Punjab had weathered the storm, and British prestige stood higher than ever. There was genuine rejoicing throughout the province, emphasised when the spoils of war from captured Delhi began to reach the villages. The pick of their men, old and young, came in crowds to join the new regiments, which were marched down as fast as they were raised to aid in restoring British power beyond Delhi. Upwards of 70,000 men were enlisted from the various races in the Punjab—Sikhs, Dogras, Pathans, and other Mahomedans, all differing in creed and customs, having little in common but a desire to fight for the English Sarkar, over one-