On the 7th, 8th, and 9th the fire against San Christoval was continued with increased vigour, and on the latter day it was resolved that the attack of it should be a second time made that night. A superior number of troops to those which failed on the 6th, but still _inferior_ to the garrison of the fort, were selected for the attack, and the command given to Major Mac Geechy, an English officer in the service of Portugal, who volunteered this duty—Dyas again leading the forlorn hope. As before, the troops advanced under the fire of every gun that could be brought to bear upon them, and with much spirit descended the ditch. A little disorder amongst the men who carried the ladders caused some delay, but the detachment pressed on to the breach without waiting for the reorganisation of the ladder men. The soldiers posted on the glacis, by their determined fire, notwithstanding their exposed situation, forced the enemy to waver, and if ever there was a chance of success, it was at this moment. Dyas and his companions did as much as men could do, but in vain. Their efforts were heroic, though unavailing; the spot was strewed with the dead and dying; the breach was packed with Frenchmen, and the glacis and ditch covered with our dead and disabled soldiers. Major Mac Geechy fell pierced with bullets, and almost all the party shared his fate. Ensign Dyas was struck by a pellet[15] in the forehead, and fell upon his face, but, undismayed by this, he sprang up and rallied his few remaining followers, but in vain. This heroic intrepidity deserved a better fate, but his efforts were paralysed by the obstacles opposed to him, and Dyas was at length reluctantly obliged to abandon an enterprise, on the issue of which he had a second time chivalrously, though unsuccessfully, staked his life. As before, he was the last to leave the ditch, and with much difficulty reached our lines. His mode of escape was as curious as it was novel. One of the ladders that could not be placed upright still hung from the glacis on the pallisadoes; this he sprang up, and in an instant he was upon the glacis, where he flung himself upon his face. The Frenchmen upon the walls, seeing him fall at the moment of their fire, shouted out “_Il est tué, en voila le dernier!_” ----- Footnote 15: A small bullet, larger than a swan drop. Four of them were enclosed in a piece of wood, three inches long, and at the top was placed the musket-ball. This shrapnel in miniature did considerable execution. ----- Dyas, perfectly collected, saw that his only chance of escape was by remaining quiet for a short time, which he did, and then seizing a favourable moment when the garrison were thrown off their guard by the silence that prevailed, he jumped up, and reached our batteries in safety. He and _nineteen_ privates were all that escaped out of _two hundred_, which was the original strength of the storming party and forlorn hope.[16] ----- Footnote 16: