"Gentlemen," called out Trafford, "mount this snow bank here with me, and you will see a sight that will more than recompense you for a ruined game and the possible loss of your curling-stones!" So saying, Trafford himself mounted the snow bank at the commencement of the bob-sleigh run. The curlers followed, one or two grumbling still, others with a belated interest in the fortunes of the day. "Now, then," cried Trafford in German, to his command, "when I say 'go,' hurl those stones down the toboggan-run! All together, now--one, two, three,--go!" The men swung back their granite burdens and then hurled them with all their force on to the shining surface of the icy track. Swiftly the stones glided down the sharp incline, gathering pace at every yard of their downward course. Round the first bend they swept, banging against each other in a jostling rush of irresistible momentum. "That's one way of enfilading a trench," said Trafford to the Major, as the last stone,--a pink one with a blue ribbon,--swept out of sight. "Shrapnel's not in it with--Aberdeen granite;" and raising his bugle to his lips he sounded the "charge," clear and true. Then it was that the curlers had compensation for their spoiled sport. The whole line of the attack, Guides, Sharpshooters, and Guards, seemed to spring into being out of the snow, and hurl themselves in a parallel rush towards the Marienkastel. Bugles blew wild music from their brazen throats; "Forwards!" cried officers with drawn swords to their men, and "Forwards!" the men cried back to them with the deep-throated joy of battle. "Forwards!" shouted Bernhardt, pressing with the van, reckless of personal danger, conscious only of the possible fear of others, and of the supreme importance of pushing home the present attack at all costs. A spluttering volley rang out from the enemy's entrenchment, but scarce a man of the attack dropped. Nor was this to be wondered at: Saunders' men were in confusion. A curling-stone weighs about sixteen pounds, and when it is travelling at a rate of forty miles an hour is almost as deadly as a cannon-ball; nay, they were more alarming than ordinary shot or shell, for they were visible, and the men who might have faced the unseen death struggled frantically to avoid the visual peril of the granite avalanche. There was much breaking of bones and crushing of ribs, cries of agony and groans of tribulation. Rifles went off at various angles, friends grappled with friends, and many, pushed on by the weight of the accumulated stones and the press of writhing limbs, began to slither down the toboggan track,--even as Frau von Bilderbaum and Von Hügelweiler had done two days before. It was a moment of torment and confusion, a moment when loyalty and discipline were helpless and unavailing, a moment, indeed, when a much less determined attack would have prevailed against such twisted chaos and dismay.