The third letter was written by Mr. Jenkyns, and handed by Hamilton to the Shahzada, a quiet unassuming man, to take to the Amir.  A forlorn hope indeed faced the brave fellow, as he looked forth through a crevice at the yelling, shooting, cursing crowd, surging round on all sides.  To open a door was instant death to himself and others, for a shower of bullets would have greeted his exit.  The postern was now surrounded, and gave no hope of escape.  There remained only the roof, and this means of escape Taimus decided to attempt.  Crawling cautiously up, he found this bullet-swept area temporarily deserted, and creeping along it peered over the end.  There he saw, only some ten feet beneath him, a furious crowd, many hundreds strong, and those nearest the wall busy digging a hole through it into the building.

Well, if he had to die, it was the will of God; he would fight his way through, or fall sword in hand.  Standing up in full view, for a second the observed of all observers, armed to the teeth, he calmly jumped into the jaws of those baying wolves.  The shock of the fall was unwillingly broken by the astonished forms of those on whom he fell, and before they could grapple with him he was pushing boldly through the crowd.  But the odds and press were too great for him, and after a brief close scuffle he was for want of elbow-room overpowered and disarmed.  Many shouted “Kill him!  Kill him! he is a Cavignari-ite!” But above the uproar, holding his hands above his head, Taimus made himself heard.  “Peace! peace!” he cried.  “I undoubtedly eat the salt of the Sirkar, but I am alone and disarmed, a Mahomedan amongst Mahomedans, and the bearer of a letter to the Amir.  Kill me if you like, but yours be the shame and disgrace.”  As he spoke, amidst the crowd of angry, scowling faces he saw a friend, a man of influence and standing; at his word the crowd gave way, and battered, bleeding, and closely guarded, Taimus was taken before the Chief.  But help was now out of the Amir’s power, as he sat bemoaning his fate in the women’s apartments.  He could give no succour he said, but he gave orders for Taimus to be detained in a place of safety.  To finish the story of Shahzada Taimus:  while confined there a havildar of the mutineers was brought in with a bullet in his back, and in his agony he besought Taimus to extract it.  This the Shahzada, though no surgeon, succeeded in doing with a pocket-knife, and so grateful was the mutineer that when night fell he gave him his uniform and helped him to escape; and eventually, after many adventures and by the use of many disguises, the brave fellow reached India in safety.

But to return to the Residency. Jemadar[18] Mehtab Sing, one of the two native officers of the Guides, was now dead, and Kelly’s whole time was occupied in attending as best he could to the wounded, of whom there were now twenty or thirty.  There remained in the fighting line only Hamilton, Jenkyns, Jemadar Jewand Sing, and some thirty of the Guides.  The whole interior of the building was full of dead and dying, enemies and friends, the atmosphere made still more oppressive by the smoke of powder, and by the more deadly peril of creeping incendiarism.