fancied that you had all gone down. I am glad;" and he shook hands
enthusiastically with his friends; while two of the officers, coming up,
joined in the hearty greeting.

"Do those two men belong to your regiment?" Captain Sibbold asked. "If so,
they are wonders; for I don't know a case as yet where any of the men
proved true when the rest mutinied."

"They are my sons," Major Warrener answered.

"What?" exclaimed the other, laughing--believing that the major was
joking.

"It's a fact, as you will see when they have got rid of the stains on
their faces," he replied; while Captain Dunlop added, "and two as fine
young fellows as ever stepped. Do you know that we three were prisoners,
and that these lads rescued us from the middle of a pandy regiment. If
they hadn't we should have been dead men before now. And now have you got
anything to eat at Meerut, for we are famishing? In the next place, I have
got a bullet in my shoulder, and shall enjoy my food all the more after it
has been taken out. Our stories are long and will keep. How go things
here?"

"Not very brightly, Dunlop; however, that will keep, too; now let us be
off. Have we any casualties, sergeant?" he asked a non-commissioned
officer who came up for orders.

"None, sir."

"What is the enemy's loss?"