, but not yet, for they didn't know we
were here.

Again a rebel shell howled above, and again a volley from the front was
heard as bullets sang over us, and our men behind us became silent.

We sprang to place, every eye on watch, every musket in its port-hole.

"Don't waste a shot, men," says Willis; "we're not goin' to have another
chance like that. Take it in order from right to left. Berwick first.
Wait till a man's body shows; don't shoot at a head--"

I had fired--Thompson fired immediately after. He had seen that my shot
missed. Again the musketry opened behind us, and both sides pegged away
for a while. Thompson claimed that he had hit his man.

Suddenly a loud rap was heard on one of the sand-bags,--one of the bags
between Willis and Holt,--a bullet had gone through and into the wall of
the ravine behind us. Willis fired.

"Damnation!" says he, "I believe they see us."

Yet it was possible that this was an accident; Holt fired, and then
Freeman, and it became my turn again.

That bullet which had become entirely through the sand-bag and buried
itself deeply in the ground, gave me trouble. I did not believe that an
ordinary musket had such force, and I doubted whether an Enfield had it.
The rebels were getting good arms from England. It might be that some
man over there had a Whitworth telescope rifle; if so he had detected us
perhaps--a telescope would enable him to do it. I said nothing of this
speculation, but watched. Rebel bullets continued to fly over. I saw a
man as low as his waist and fired; almost at the same moment my sand-bag
was struck--the second one on my right, which protected that flank, and
which the bullet, coming from the left oblique, struck endwise; the
bullet passed through, the length, of the bag and went on into the wall
of the gully. I sprang back and caught up the spade.

"What's up, Jones?" asked Willis.

"I'll report directly, Sergeant."

I dug at least two feet before I found the bullet; it was a long, leaden
cylinder, with, a rounded point--not bigger than calibre 45 I guessed.
This was no Enfield bullet. I handed it to Willis; he understood.

"Can't be helped," says he; "they know we're here, boys."

The danger had become great; perhaps there was but one Whitworth over
there, but the marksman would at once tell the skirmishers where we were
posted; then we should be a target for their whole line, and at three
hundred yards their Enfields could riddle our sand-bags a