t colonel was the first that had succeeded in inspiring
him with unlimited confidence. "He knows every point of war--this
one," said La Croix, "I heard him beg and pray for leave to storm this
thundering bastion before it was armed: but no, the old muffs would be
wiser than our colonel. So now here we are kept at bay by a place that
Julius Caesar and Cannibal wouldn't have made two bites at apiece; no
more would I if I was the old boy out there behind the hill." In such
terms do sergeants denote commanders-in-chief--at a distance. A voluble
sergeant has more influence with the men than the minister of war is
perhaps aware: on the whole, the 24th brigade would have followed its
gloomy colonel to grim death and a foot farther. One thing gave these
men a touch of superstitious reverence for their commander. He seemed
to them free from physical weakness. He never SAT DOWN to dinner, and
seemed never to sleep. At no hour of the day or night were the sentries
safe from his visits.

Very annoying. But, after awhile, it led to keen watchfulness: the more
so that the sad and gloomy colonel showed by his manner he appreciated
it. Indeed, one night he even opened his marble jaws, and told Sergeant
La Croix that a watchful sentry was an important soldier, not to his
brigade only, but to the whole army. Judge whether the maxim and the
implied encomium did not circulate next morning, with additions.

Sixteenth day of the siege. The round bastion opened fire at eight
o'clock, not on the opposing battery, but on the right of the French
attack. Its advanced position enabled a portion of its guns to rake
these trenches slant-wise: and depressing its guns it made the round
shot strike the ground first and ricochet over.

On this our colonel opened on them with all his guns: one of these
he served himself. Among his other warlike accomplishments, he was
a wonderful shot with a cannon. He showed them capital practice this
morning: drove two embrasures into one, and knocked about a ton of
masonry off the parapet. Then taking advantage of this, he served two of
his guns with grape, and swept the enemy off the top of the bastion,
and kept it clear. He made it so hot they could not work the upper guns.
Then they turned the other two tiers all upon him, and at it both
sides went ding, dong, till the guns were too hot to be worked. So then
Sergeant La Croix popped his head up from the battery, and showed
the enemy a great white plate. This was