By this time my eyes had become accustomed to the darkness of the mosque, and I took in my position and my danger at a glance. Here I was up to my knees in powder,--in the very bowels of a magazine with a naked light! My hair literally stood on end; I felt the skin of my head lifting my feather bonnet off my scalp; my knees knocked together, and despite the chilly night air the cold perspiration burst out all over me and ran down my face and legs. I had neither cloth nor handkerchief in my pocket, and there was not a moment to be lost, as already the overhanging wick of the _chirâg_ was threatening to shed its smouldering red tip into the live magazine at my feet with consequences too frightful to contemplate. Quick as thought I put my left hand under the down-dropping flame, and clasped it with a grasp of determination; holding it firmly I slowly turned to the door, and walked out with my knees knocking one against the other! Fear had so overcome all other feeling that I am confident I never felt the least pain from grasping the burning wick till after I was outside the building and once again in the open air; but when I opened my hand I felt the smart acutely enough. I poured the oil out of the lamp into the burnt hand, and kneeling down thanked God for having saved myself and all the men lying around me from horrible destruction. I then got up and, staggering rather than walking to the place where Captain Dawson was sleeping, and shaking him by the shoulder till he awoke, I told him of my discovery and the fright I had got.
At first he either did not believe me, or did not comprehend the danger. "Bah! Corporal Mitchell," was all his answer, "you have woke up out of your sleep, and have got frightened at a shadow," for my heart was still thumping against my ribs worse than it was when I first discovered my danger, and my voice was trembling. I turned my smarting hand to the light of the fire and showed the captain how it was scorched; and then, feeling my pride hurt at being told I had got frightened at a shadow, I said: "Sir, you're not a Highlander or you would know the Gaelic proverb '_The heart of one who can look death in the face will not start at a shadow_,' and you, sir, can yourself bear witness that I have not shirked to look death in the face more than once since daylight this morning." He replied, "Pardon me, I did not mean that; but calm yourself and explain what it is that has frightened you." I then told him that I had gone into the mosque with a naked lamp burning, and had found it half full of loose gunpowder piled in a great heap on the floor and a large number of loaded shells. "Are you sure you're not dreaming from the excitement of this terrible day?" said the captain. With that I looked down to my feet and my gaiters, which were still covered with blood from the slaughter in the Secundrabâgh; the wet grass had softened it again, and on this the powder was sticking nearly an inch thick. I scraped some of it off, throwing it into the fire, and said, "There is positive proof for you that I'm not dreaming, nor my vision a shadow!" On that the captain became almost as alarmed as I was, and a sentry was posted near the door of the mosque to prevent any one from entering it. The sleeping men were aroused, and the fire smothered out with as great care as possible, using for the purpose several earthen _ghurrahs_, or jars of water, which the enemy had left under the trees near where we were lying.