While the dead were being buried and the wounded removed, there was a long cessation of the savage struggle. Indeed, the long lull in the firing almost led some people to believe that it would be heard no more. Crowds on the Western heights glanced curiously, anxiously, towards Fort Warden, with some idea that its picked garrison would now abandon their desperate and daring attempt to hold the position. It became known that the enemy's plans had been in part defeated--either by reason of some official blunder or through the watchfulness of the French at the other extremity of the Channel Tunnel. The German troops that were to have raided the French terminus, and then poured into England, under the protection of the guns of Fort Warden, already seized by their advance guard, had not arrived, and could not now approach to aid their countrymen. Movements of foreign warships and transports were hourly reported by telegraph and wireless messages, but the British Fleet had by this time formed a deadly barrier of iron and steel around the coast line of Kent and Sussex. There must be a great battle and a great defeat of our squadrons before another foreigner could set his foot on Kentish shore. The brooding day wore on, tense with suspense and fear. In the stillness that accompanied the deepening of twilight, hundreds of field-glasses were finally directed towards the silent fort to discover whether the American and German flags had yet given place to the white flag of submission. Any such anticipation, however, proved unfounded. For suddenly, as the dusk increased, the roar of artillery was heard; the masked batteries of the British once more had opened simultaneous fire upon the Fort. Instantly the challenge was accepted. Fort Warden roared its defiance. The big naval gun thundered its repeated demand for surrender; the siege guns crashed in unison; the howitzers savagely chimed in, barking as in sudden fury, like monster dogs of war; and fifty field guns combined to swell the dreadful, deafening chorus.