My hand trembled as he spoke; but the next instant it was of a piece with my gunstock. There was the hot square, with the sun shining on the two guns that must have been hot behind the poor prisoners; there, too, stood the two gunners in white, with their smoking linstocks, leaning against the wheels; for discipline was slack; and there, thirty or forty yards behind, were the mutineers, lounging about, and smoking many of them. For all firing had ceased; and judging that we should not risk having the prisoners blown away from the guns, the mutineers came boldly up within range, as if defying us; and it was pretty safe practice at some of them now. I saw all this at a glance, and while it seemed as if the order would never come; but come it did at last. "Fire!" Bang! the two rifles going off like one; and the gunner behind Captain Dyer leaped into the air; while the one I aimed at seemed to sink down suddenly beside the wheel he had leaned upon. Then the gate flew open, and with a rush and a cheer we, ten of us, raced down for the guns. Double-quick time? I tell you it was a hard race; and being without my gun now--only my bayonet stuck in my trousers waistband--I was there first, and had driven my spike into the touch-hole before Lieutenant Leigh reached his; but the next moment his was done, the cords were cut, and the prisoners loose from the guns. But now we had to get back. The first inkling I had of the difficulty of this was seeing Captain Dyer and Harry Lant stagger and fall forward; but they were saved by the men, and we saw directly that they must be carried. No sooner thought of than done. "Hoist Harry on my back," says Grainger; and he took him like a sack; Bantem acting the same part by Captain Dyer; and those two ran off, while we tried to cover them. For don't you imagine that the mutineers were idle all this while; not a bit of it. They were completely taken by surprise, though, at first, and gave us time nearly to get to the guns before they could understand what we meant; but the next moment some shouted and ran at us, and some began firing; while by the time the prisoners were cast loose, they were down upon us in a hand-to-hand fight.