This was already all ablaze from the rockets and bursting shells of the admiral's brigade, the straw-thatched houses as they looked, though they were really covered with dry plantain and banana leaves, burning up like so many fierce bonfires in our front, and right and left; while the sharp rattle of musketry and loud banging of the guns of the first division was mixed up with the platoon-like reports from the matchlocks of the Somalis, who were urging on their somewhat reluctant allies, the slave-traders of the interior, with hoarse yells and shrill screams, bolstering up their courage likewise by the beating of innumerable gongs and clashing cymbals, the consensus of sound making din enough to have wakened up all the dead dervishes of the desert for generations past, and caused them, had they come to life, to have proclaimed a `Jehad' or holy war against us, and thus roused up all the fanaticism of all those of the Moslem race yet left alive! Such was our grand rush, however, coming as it did on top of the cleverly planned combined attack of the admiral's columns in front of the town, thus taking the Arabs between two fires, that even Saladin would not have saved them. Hundreds of them were shot down behind their stockades, which I must say they defended gallantly to the last; while those who were not potted by our bullets, were `put out of action' by the bayonets of us bluejackets, who carried their intrenchments by storm. So far, I was only one of the crowd, loading and firing my Martini as I advanced or halted on the word of command being given by `old Hankey Pankey'; who, plucky as a lion, was in the forefront all through, his uniform cap tumbled off and his face all blackened with powder, `potting' this chap with the revolver that he held in his left hand, or sticking another Somali through the gizzard with his sword, which was always thrust out straight before him as he went onward, and always `at the point.' But, now, I had a little diversion on my own account. "Left turn!" shouted our company leader Mr Chisholm, whose sharp eye detected through the smoke a body of the Arabs attacking an officer and a detached party of our men who had escaladed the fortifications on the right of the town; and seeing that they were hard pressed, though making a gallant stand of it against heavy odds, our officer quickly called out, "Double! Charge, my lads!" By George! We did charge; and then, the bronze-coloured beggars, who had thought to make an easy prey of our before isolated comrades, turned savagely to receive us, a whole horde of them! Larrikins, who was next me, got his right arm transfixed by one of their light spears or jereeds, a lot of which came whistling through the air into our ranks like a flight of sparrows. This made Larry drop his rifle like a hot potato; but, nothing daunted, he kept alongside of me all the same, drawing his cutlass as we raced along together.