About a hundred Turkish cavalry were being furiously attacked by sixty or seventy mounted men who looked like Kurds, and who turned out later really to be Kurds.

The Kurds were well mounted, riding recklessly, firing from horseback at full gallop and wasting great quantities of ammunition.
The shooting must have been extremely bad, for I could see neither dead bodies nor empty saddles, but nevertheless the Turks appeared anxious to escape--the more so because Ranjoor Singh with his forty men was heading them off.

As I watched, one of them blew a trumpet and they all retreated helter-skelter toward us--straight toward us.
There was nothing else they could do, now that they had given way.
It was like the letter Y--thus, sahib,--see, I draw in the dust--the Kurds coming this way at an angle--Ranjoor Singh and his forty coming this way--and we advancing toward them all along the bottom stroke of the Y, with hills around forming an arena.

The best the Turks could do would have been to take the higher ground where we were and there reform, except for the fact that we had come on the scene unknown to them.

Now that we had arrived, they were caught in a trap.
There was plenty of time, especially as we were hidden from view, but I worked swiftly, the men obeying readily enough now that a fight seemed certain.