The machine-gun fire at once died down, only to break out again every time the police attempted to advance by short rushes. By painful degrees they managed to get within eighty yards of the bridge, where the formation of the ground protected them from that horrible enfilade hail of bullets, and gathering themselves together they charged at the reverse slope of the ravine. At once the firing ceased, and when at last they had torn their way through briars and gorse to reach the top, all that they found was small piles of empty cartridges and two ordinary tweed caps—not a sign of a gunman whichever way they looked. They then turned their attention to their comrades on the road, and here a heartrending sight met their eyes. At first it appeared as though all the occupants of the two cars were either dead or wounded, but as they descended towards the bridge a small party of police crawled from underneath it, soaked to the skin. They found Black lying against the front wheel of the leading car with four bullet wounds in his body and his head smashed in by a dum-dum bullet—stone-dead. Blake found out from the survivors that Black had disregarded his orders, and had not pulled up until the cars had passed the bridge, when a hail of bullets swept the cars from the top of both banks of the ravine. Black was wounded by the first volley, was hit twice while getting out of the car to lead his men to the attack, and in the head as his foot touched the ground. The sun had by now gone down, and collecting all his wounded and dead, Blake pushed off for Castleport as fast as he could. Beyond a blown-up culvert half a mile from the ravine, which the cars crossed without difficulty on their own planks, they met with no further trouble. Then followed three feverish days of planning and preparing for the great drive, which it was hoped would put a thousand gunmen out of action for good and all; unless indeed a new Chief Secretary should come to Ireland, perhaps this time from Australia or possibly from India, or even a Jew, who would celebrate his arrival in this unfortunate country by opening wide the gates of the internment camps. The area to be driven was roughly three hundred and sixty square miles, which will give some idea of the magnitude of the task which a handful of police had to tackle with the aid of a battalion of infantry and a company of Auxiliaries. And when it is added that the entire peninsula consisted of mountains (five of them well over two thousand feet, and unclimbable in many places), bogs, lakes, and rivers, with only one decent road which ran _round the coast and at the base_, it will be granted that the task was nearly an impossible one.