I had to continue hammering and shouting for a long time before they heard and admitted me, thankful to be comparatively safe inside a house.
By morning the worst of the storm was over, but not before great damage had been done.

The Native bazaar was completely wrecked, looking as if it had suffered a furious bombardment, and great havoc had been made amongst the European houses, not a single verandah or outside shutter being left in the station.

As I walked to the mess, I found the road almost impassable from fallen trees; and dead birds, chiefly crows and kites, were so numerous that they had to be carried off in cartloads.

How I had made my way to my bungalow without accident the night before was difficult to imagine.

Even the column against which I had stumbled was levelled by the fury of the blast.
This column had been raised a few years before to the memory of the officers and men of the 1st Troop, 1st Brigade, Bengal Horse Artillery, who were killed in the disastrous retreat from Kabul in 1841.