On taking up our several stations on piquet, the weather, which had been clear became suddenly dark and cloudy, and a thick, drizzling rain began to fall, which, towards evening, increased to a heavy shower. Colonel P., Colonel Drummond, and some more of us, were congregated in a hut, anything but rain-tight; Colonel Drummond left the hut, where we were smoking and talking, and stowed himself away in a rocket case, where he soon fell fast asleep. About midnight we were summoned to fall in without noise, and a party of sailors forming the forlorn hope, headed by a midshipman taking the lead, our corps followed close in their rear. When we were yet three hundred yards from the fort their videttes fired on us and immediately retired; soon after the guns of the Fort opened, but with little or no effect. About 200 yards from the fort Drummond halted, and turning to me unbuckled his sword, which he gave to me, telling me to keep it for his sake. It was a regulation sword in a steel scabbard. Thinking that he had no great faith in it, I offered him mine, which was a Ferrara of admirable temper and edge; but he said he had got a boarding pike from the sailors whom he was going to join. He told me to stand where I was and not expose myself; and these were the last words I ever heard him utter. The sailors and our corps dashed on and made good their lodgment in fine style, and after standing till the last of the attacking columns was past, I began to feel my situation most particularly unpleasant. A man must possess more courage than I can pretend to, who can stand perfectly cool, while, having nothing to do, he is shot at like a target. Accordingly, I determined to advance at all hazards, and at least have the pleasure of seeing what was doing for my risk of being shot. I had not proceeded many yards when I stumbled over a body, and on feeling, for I could not see, I discovered he was wounded in the arm and the blood flowing copiously. He had fainted and fallen in attempting to get to the rear. I fixed a field tourniquet on his arm, and throwing him over my shoulder like a sack, carried him to a ravine in rear, and delivered him to the care of a Naval Surgeon I met with there. He proved to be Major R. of the Royals, who, but for my lucky stumble, would most probably have given promotion to the senior Captain of that distinguished Regiment.