Fantasy fiction; Imaginary wars and battles -- Fiction; War stories
fired as fast as we could. How long this went on I know not--it could
not have been long; neither side could have lasted many minutes under
such a fire, but it ended by the enemy gradually falling back, and as
soon as we saw this we raised a tremendous shout, and some of us jumped
up on the bank to give them our parting shots. Suddenly the order was
passed down the line to cease firing, and we soon discovered the cause;
a battalion of the Guards was charging obliquely across from our left
across our front. It was, I expect, their flank attack as much as our
fire which had turned back the enemy; and it was a splendid sight to
see their steady line as they advanced slowly across the smooth lawn
below us, firing as they went, but as steady as if on parade. We felt
a great elation at this moment; it seemed as if the battle was won.
Just then somebody called out to look to the wounded, and for the first
time I turned to glance down the rank along the lane. Then I saw that
we had not beaten back the attack without loss. Immediately before me
lay Bob Lawford of my office, dead on his back from a bullet through
his forehead, his hand still grasping his rifle. At every step was
some friend or acquaintance killed or wounded, and a few paces down
the lane I found Travers, sitting with his back against the bank. A
ball had gone through his lungs, and blood was coming from his mouth.
I was lifting him up, but the cry of agony he gave stopped me. I then
saw that this was not his only wound; his thigh was smashed by a bullet
(which must have hit him when standing on the bank), and the blood
streaming down mixed in a muddy puddle with the rainwater under him.
Still he could not be left here, so, lifting him up as well as I could,
I carried him through the gate which led out of the lane at the back
to where our camp hospital was in the rear. The movement must have
caused him awful agony, for I could not support the broken thigh, and
he could not restrain his groans, brave fellow though he was; but how
I carried him at all I cannot make out, for he was a much bigger man
than myself; but I had not gone far, one of a stream of our fellows,
all on the same errand, when a bandsman and Wood met me, bringing a
hurdle as a stretcher, and on this we placed him. Wood had just time to
tell me that he had got a cart down in the hollow, and would endeavour
to take off his master at once to Kingston, when a staff-officer rode
up to call us to the ranks. “You really must not straggle in this way,
gentlemen,” he said; “pray keep your ranks.” “But we can’t leave our
wounded to be trodden down and die,” cried one of our fellows. “Beat
off the enemy first, sir,” he replied. “Gentlemen, do, pray, join your
regiments, or we shall be a regular mob.” And no doubt he did not speak
too soon; for besides our fellows straggling to the rear, lots of
volunteers from the regiments in reserve were running forward to help,
till the whole ground was dotted with groups of men. I hastened back
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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