Two
guns, neither then nor now, could face the open within a hundred yards
of armed infantry who could freely use their weapons. But here was a
different case. Driven by the storm of fire all round into rooms without
loopholes, and incapable of affording either offensive or defensive
fire, the Guides could only get snapshots here and there as occasion
offered.
By a curious coincidence the story of those newly-arrived guns was told
with almost faithful accuracy, in the brief testimony of a witness who
was nearly three miles away. He said: "We heard the big guns fire twice,
and then there was silence for some time; then they fired once or twice
more; and then, after a long interval, one or two more shots. Perchance,
seven or eight shots altogether were fired." What to the distant hearer
were impressive, unaccountable pauses, were on the scene of action
filled with the bravest incidents. Cooped up as they were with a
murderous artillery firing point blank into them at one hundred yards
range, and spreading not only death and destruction amongst wounded and
unwounded alike, but still further aiding the conflagration, which had
by now taken well hold of the buildings, yet still stout of heart the
Guides girded up their loins to meet the new encounter.
Dr. Kelly left his wounded, and Jenkyns, the young civilian, took again
a sword and pistol, and with the boy Hamilton as their leader, and with
twelve staunch and true men of the Guides behind them, they opened the
door.
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