were most insistent to carry with them, at whatever risk to their
own mobility and safety, an officer to whom they were devotedly
attached. But he, knowing, it may be, better than they, the exertions
which still lay in front of them, and unwilling to inflict upon them the
disabilities of a maimed man, very resolutely refused, and asked of them
one thing only, that there should be given to him, as he lay alone in
the trench, two loaded Colt revolvers to add to his own, which lay in
his right hand as he made his last request. And so, with three revolvers
ready to his hand for use, a very brave officer waited to sell his life,
wounded and racked with pain, in an abandoned trench.

On Friday afternoon the left of the Canadian line was strengthened by
important reinforcements of British troops amounting to seven
battalions. From this time forward the Canadians also continued to
receive further assistance on the left from a series of French
counter-attacks pushed in a northeasterly direction from the canal bank.

But the artillery fire of the enemy continually grew in intensity, and
it became more and more evident that the Canadian salient could no
longer be maintained against the overwhelming superiority of numbers by
which it was assailed. Slowly, stubbornly, and contesting every yard,
the defenders gave ground until the salient gradually receded from the
apex, near the point where it had originally aligned with the French,
and fell back upon St. Julien.

Soon it became evident that even St. Julien, exposed to fire from right
and left, was no longer tenable in the face of overwhelming numerical
superiority. The Third Brigade was therefore ordered to retreat further
south, selling every yard of ground as dearly as it had done since 5
o'clock on Thursday. But it was found impossible, without hazarding far
larger forces, to disentangle the detachment of the Royal Highlanders of
Montreal, Thirteenth Battalion, and of the Royal Montreal Regiment,
Fourteenth Battalion. The brigade was ordered, and not a moment too
soon, to move back. It left these units with hearts as heavy as those
with which his comrades had said farewell to Captain McCuaig. The
German tide rolled, indeed, over the deserted village, but for several
hours after the enemy had become master of the village the sullen and
persistent rifle fire which survived showed that they were not yet
master of the Canadian rearguard. If they died, they died worthily of
Canada.