For a moment his own inherent optimism and resourcefulness, bred in the bone through many generations of fighting men, deserted him. He saw the failure of his scheme, the ruin it would bring to the whole squadron, and the end of poor Helston’s ambitions. Of his own fate he cared nothing at that moment, but cursed himself for leaving the sea to venture a soldier’s job, and for sacrificing, to his own self-assurance, the men who had so willingly followed him. At that moment his vivid brain even pictured the final back-to-back struggle and the sobbing panting of stricken men as one by one they fell. Would he be the last? he wondered. A shell burst on the ridge, and the jagged fragments screaming past him woke him from his nightmare to catch sight of Glover’s scared face as he stood at his side. Putting his hand on the midshipman’s shoulder he said softly: "Glover, I am sorry; get under cover, boy." But before Glover could move away a great burst of cheering came up from below. Williams and Saunderson, with their forty men behind them, were charging into the flank of the unsuspecting Chinamen, and, hardly firing a shot, they were driving them like sheep from Captain Hunter’s path. Yells of pain and shrieks of agony told that they were relying on cold steel. The Martini fire broke out again with a roar, and now the line of smoke began to ascend once more. With a gasp of relief and a funny feeling at the back of his throat, the Commander saw it coming towards him rapidly now, the whole eighty of them cheering madly. They had got the Chinamen "on the run". "Bring a Maxim over here, Glover! Quick, boy! we shall have them when they break into the open." The cheering redoubled. Chinese suddenly appeared among the trees below them, doubling to left and right as Hunter burst through with a dozen or more of his men. Then came the destroyer’s men with their drums of oil, Collins the Sub at their head, a knot of men carrying some mess-mates, and, bringing up the rear, Williams, Saunderson, and the marines fighting slowly, running a few yards, then dropping behind a tree and shooting downhill. Directly the oil-drums were safe and the wounded had burst through, Hunter swung his men round and went down again, his great, joyous, bellowing cheer heard above the noise of Mauser or Martini. The Chinese gave way and fell back down the hill. Some that tried to escape to the left had to pass Sergeant Haig’s redoubt, and his men knocked them over like rabbits; others swept across the right towards Bush Hill, but then the Maxim spoke with its horrid "br-br-br", and brought them down in heaps. In less than a minute not a living Chinaman was to be seen, but a desultory fire commencing again from "Bush Hill" showed that they were still under some control.