"Our blood was up after the abuse we had received, and we pounded them with big guns, pom-poms, Maxims and rifles, but still they came, and quickly forming, marched up the valley of the shadow of death until a shrill whistle rang out, when they turned square toward our position, another whistle and they doubled files, and came on with splendid precision. Their colonel, a grey-haired veteran, stood on a spur, and heedless of shrieking missiles, had only one thought, and that was of 203. It is true the hill had been assaulted before, while it is equally true that the enemy had been beaten back with frightful carnage. Now, however, something seemed to say that the end was near, as old Teleda, the veteran of twenty-seven engagements, stood as if on parade, directing the attack. His men sank to mother earth singly and in mangled heaps, but he had no eye for their dead or ear for the moaning of their wounded; 203 was the game, and anything smaller, such as noting the mutilated forms upon the blood-drenched sands in the valley, was beneath contempt. A battery of six guns came up to the foot of the hill at a gallop, the gunners setting them at an angle of many degrees, so as to rake our works, but though they concealed themselves as best they could, our sharpshooters frequently got a bead, and an artilleryman would throw up his hands with a shriek and tumble in a heap. "After a rest the enemy opened again, the hills in front spouting flame, and the battery at the foot of our position vomiting death. Between the explosions, however, and they came thick and fast, we saw the figures of men as numerous as ants swarming up the base of the hill. Our machine guns were soon angled upon them, and our rifles sent rattling volleys among them, but the explosions in our position now come so frequently that we are soon choked in clouds of dust, and battered by splinters of gun carriages and even falling sand bags. The signal now rang out to fix bayonets, and this was no sooner done than hand grenades were hurled in upon us, the explosions of which tore the heads off some of our men, the legs and arms off others, but the most sickening sight to me was that of a man not three yards away who had the fore part of his chest clean torn away, leaving his mangled lungs exposed to view. At this stage observation was cut short by a whole battalion of Japanese infantry tumbling over the parapet, followed by swarms of reserves. We sprang upon them with the steel, and a frightful conflict ensued, men fell dead in twos, often with their bayonets buried in one another's bodies. For two or three minutes nothing could be heard but shots, and imprecations, and shrieks, and rattling steel, and then all was over, 203 Metre Hill was taken, but after we got out--that is, all that was left of us--it was turned into a smoking volcano by the shells from our forts around, and the enemy nearly shared our fate in being ejected." CHAPTER V.