he straightened himself to the precision of the parade ground the end came rapidly. "Prepare to fire," said he, and number two stepped forward, dropping the friction tube into the vent. "Fire," said Panzera, and one raised the glasses to fix them upon a party of Boers whom we could see drinking their coffee, as they sat upon the parapet of the trench. There was a roar, a cloud of smoke, and a red fierce tongue of flame leapt from the muzzle of the gun. Dust and smoke and sand enveloped the place where those Boers had been sitting, and I found myself wondering and endeavouring to believe that the breach in the parapet foreboded no great harm to anybody. The battle, if battle it were to be, had been started by a well-directed shell. Quickly the gun was trained and loaded again, and I felt the excitement entering into my soul. The feelings of humanity left me, and I began to hope that we should kill them every time. Again our gun fired, falling short, but giving the signal to the others along the front to join in the comparative splendour of the cannonade. Away down in the river-bed our guns boomed; beyond it and between that emplacement and Cannon Kopje there were the jets of smoke from the Nordenfeldt like the spurts of steam from a geyser. Above us there was the Hotchkiss and the merry rattle of the Maxim. So far as noise, and numbers of the pieces engaged, went the press of battle was about us. All down our front there broke the whistling rush of Lee-Metford rifles, as the eastern line of the defence dropped into action. For the moment the Boers were surprised at the manner and method of our onslaught, and beyond a few desultory rifle shots our guns fired some few rounds before any shells came back in answer. As Major Panzera had opened the fight so they threw their first shells upon his emplacement, and a well-directed flight of one-pound steel-topped base fuse Maxim broke in a cloud of dust about us, flinging their sharp-edged fragments in all directions. Then we fired again, raking the parapet of the Boers' trench, and wondering whether the big gun would reply to us, or whether those who had speculated upon its removal would win. The music of the fight grew louder and louder, the quick-firing guns of the enemy paying their tribute. From where we were we could see the gun in the river-bed emplacement doing remarkable execution. The smoke of our own hung heavy upon us, mingling with the dust from the Maxim shell, as the enemy continued to pepper our emplacement. We were beginning to find it difficult to see, while the roar of the guns made it almost impossible to catch the officer's orders. Suddenly, as our gun again broke forth, the bell clanged in the distance six times. It was the signal that the big gun had fired, the six strokes indicating that it was pointed upon us. We heard it and crouched in the dust, and as we crouched we wondered. There was a screaming tumult in the air, a