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Panics, against which few brave men are
proof, arise in a moment from such situations. Many a gallant soldier
has lost his head. Many an experienced officer has been borne down
unheeded by a crowd of fugitives. Regiments that have marched
unflinchingly to almost certain death on the battlefield, become in an
instant terrified and useless.
In the attack on the Malakand camp, all the elements of danger and
disorder were displayed. The surprise, the darkness, the confused and
broken nature of the ground; the unknown numbers of the enemy; their
merciless ferocity; every appalling circumstance was present. But there
were men who were equal to the occasion. As soon as the alarm sounded
Lieutenant-Colonel McRae of the 45th Sikhs, a holder of the Gold Medal
of the Royal Humane Society and of long experience in Afghanistan and on
the Indian frontier, ran to the Quarter Guard, and collecting seven or
eight men, sent them under command of Major Taylor, of the same
regiment, down the Buddhist road to try and check the enemy's advance.


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