CHAPTER VII.
Since when did god take sides against the brave ?--RANJOOR SINGH.
Did the sahib ever chance to hear that Persian proverb--"DUZD NE GIRIFTAH PADSHAH AST"?
No?
It means "The uncaught thief is king." Ho! but thenceforward that was a campaign that suited us! None could catch us, for we could come and go like the night wind, and the Turks are heavy on their feet.

We helped ourselves to what we needed.

And a reputation began to hurry ahead of us that made matters easier, for our numbers multiplied in men's imagination.
The Turks whom we had recently defeated gave Kurds the credit for it, and after the survivors had crawled back home whole Turkish regiments were ordered out by telegraph to hunt for raiding Kurds, not us! We cut all the wires we could find uncut, real Kurds having attended to the business already in most instances, and now, instead of slipping unseen through the land we began to leave our signature, and do deliberate damage.
None can beat Sikhs at such warfare as we waged across the breadth of Asiatic Turkey, and none could beat Ranjoor Singh as leader of it.

We could outride the Turks, outwit them, outfight them, and outdare them.

As the spring advanced the weather improved and our spirits rose; and as we began to take the offensive more and more our confidence increased in Ranjoor Singh until there might never have been any doubt of him, except that Gooja Singh was too conscious of his own faults to dare let matters be.