On the following day (October 1st) eight hundred marines were landed from the fleet to strengthen the party which was investing Gloucester; and from that time until the 6th both the allies and the enemy vigorously prosecuted their several works of attack or defence, or otherwise prepared for the great struggle which was then inevitable. On the night of October 6th, under the command of General Lincoln, the besiegers opened their trenches within six hundred yards of the enemy's lines, yet with so much silence was it conducted that it appears to have been undiscovered until daylight on the 7th, when the works were so far completed that they afforded ample shelter for the men, and but one officer and sixteen privates were injured. In this attack the enemy appears to have bent his energies chiefly against the French, on the left of the trenches; and the regiments of Bourbonnois, Soissonnois, and Touraine, commanded by the Baron de Viomenil, were most conspicuous in the defence of the lines. The 7th, 8th, and 9th of October were employed in strengthening the first parallel, and in constructing batteries somewhat in advance of it, for the purpose of raking the enemy's works and of battering his shipping. Communications were also made in the rear of the left of the line, in order to secure the greater number of openings. On the night of the 10th the trenches on the left were occupied by the regiments of Agenois and Saintonge, under the Marquis de Chastellux; on that of the 8th by the regiments of Gatinois and Royal-Deux-Ponts, under the Marquis de Saint-Simon. At 5 P.M. of the 9th the American battery on the right of the line opened its fire--General Washington in person firing the first gun--and six eighteen and twenty-four pounders, two mortars, and two howitzers were steadily engaged during the entire night. At an early hour on the morning of the 10th the French battery on the left, with four twelve-pounders and six mortars and howitzers, also opened fire; and on the same day this fire was increased by the fire from two other French and two American batteries--the former mounting ten eighteen and twenty-four pounders, and six mortars and howitzers, and four eighteen-pounders respectively; the latter mounting four eighteen-pounders and two mortars. "The fire now became so excessively heavy that the enemy withdrew their cannon from their embrasures, placed them behind the merlins, and scarcely fired a shot during the whole day." In the evening of the 10th the Charon, a frigate of forty-four guns, and three transports were set on fire by the shells of hot shot and entirely consumed; and the enemy's shipping was warped over the river, as far as possible, to protect it from similar disaster.