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The fort was ringed with
the enemy. The Malakand, too, was assailed. Perhaps it was the same
elsewhere. The whole British Raj seemed passing away in a single
cataclysm. The officers encouraged them. The Government of the Queen-
Empress would never desert them. If they could hold out, they would be
relieved. If not, they would be avenged. Trust in the young white men
who led them, and perhaps some dim half-idolatrous faith in a mysterious
Sovereign across the seas, whose soldiers they were, and who would
surely protect them, restored their fainting strength. The fighting
continued.
During the whole time of the siege the difficulty of maintaining
signalling communication with the Malakand was extreme. But for the
heroism of the signallers, it would have been insuperable. One man in
particular, Sepoy Prem Singh, used every day at the risk of his life to
come out through a porthole of the tower, establish his heliograph, and,
under a terrible fire from short range, flash urgent messages to the
main force.


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