ard.

There was an eruption of orange coloured flame, a deafening roar, a
crash of rendered steel, a cloud of smoke blue green, and yellow.

A black chunk of the gun cradle hurtled backward through the air with a
vicious swish. A piece of the bore splintered the wheels and buried
itself in the ammunition caisson. Thick hunks of gun metal crumbling
like dry cake filled the air. The ground shook.

The corporal gunner pitched backward from his seat and collapsed on the
ground. His mate with fists buried in his steel seared eyes staggered
out of the choking fumes. The rest of the crew picked themselves up in a
dazed condition. Fifty yards away a horse was struggling to regain his
feet.

Every man in the three other gun crews knew what had happened. None of
them moved from their posts. They knew their guns were loaded with
shells from the same lot and possibly with the same faults. No man knew
what would happen when the next firing pin went home. The evidence was
before them. Their eyes were on the exploded gun but not for long.

"Crash," the ten second firing interval had expired. The section chief
of piece number two had dropped his hand. The second gun in the battery
had fired.

"Number two on the way," sang out the signalman over the telephone wire
to the hidden observation station.

Ten seconds more for another gun crew to cogitate on whether disaster
hung on the dart of a firing pin.

"Crash."

"Number three on the way."

Another ten seconds for the last section to wonder whether death would
come with the lanyard jerk.

"Crash."

"Number four on the way." Round complete. The signalman finished his
telephone report.

Four horses drawing an army ambulance galloped up from the ravine that
sheltered them. The corporal gunner, unconscious and with one leg
pulverised was lifted in. Two other dazed members of the crew were
helped into the vehicle. One was bleeding from the shoulder. The lead
horses swung about; the ambulance rattled away.

"Battery ready to fire. Piece number one out of action." It was the
signalman reporting over the wire to the observer.

Battery X fired the rest of the morning and they used ammunition from
the same lot and every man knew what might happen any minute and every
man was in his exact position for every shot and nobody happened to
think about hiding in a dugout and putting a long string on the firing
lanyard.

It had been an unstaged, unconscious demonstration of nerve and