incessantly.

The enemy now fought desperately. Our fire overpowered that of the guns at
the bastions opposed to them; but from guns placed out in the open, on our
flank, they played upon our batteries, while from the walls a storm of
musketry fire and rockets was poured upon us. But our gunners worked away
unceasingly. Piece by piece the massive walls crumbled under our fire,
until, on the 13th, yawning gaps were torn through the walls of the
Cashmere and Water bastions. That night four engineer officers--Medley,
Long, Greathead, and Home--crept forward and examined the breaches, and
returned, reporting that it would be possible to climb the heaps of
rubbish and enter at the gaps in the wall. Orders were at once issued for
the assault to take place at daybreak next morning.

The assaulting force was divided into four columns; the first, composed of
three hundred men of the Seventy-fifth Regiment, two hundred and fifty men
of the First Bengal Fusiliers, and four hundred and fifty men of the
Second Punjaub Infantry--in all one thousand men, under Brigadier-General
Nicholson, were to storm the breach near the Cashmere bastion. The second
column, consisting of two hundred and fifty men of the Eighth Regiment,
two hundred and fifty men of the Second Bengal Fusiliers, and three
hundred and fifty men of the Fourth Sikh Infantry, under Colonel Jones,
Q.B., were to storm the breach in the Water bastion. The third column,
consisting of two hundred men of the Fifty-second Regiment, two hundred
and fifty men of the Ghoorka Kumaan battalion, and five hundred men of the
First Punjaub Infantry, under Colonel Campbell, were to assault by the
Cashmere gate, which was to be blown open by the engineers. The fourth
column, eight hundred and sixty strong, was made up of detachments of
European regiments, the Sirmoor battalion of Ghoorkas, and the Guides. It
was commanded by Major Reed, and was to carry the suburb outside the