Page:Into Mexico with General Scott (1920).djvu/100

 "All right. You tell me where to take you."

"Right-o, my hearty. Steady, there. P'int due son'-sou'east. The sick bay and the bloody sawbones 'll be some'ers abeam. You'll smell the arnicky."

With the shells exploding and the cannon-balls pursuing they made way down the trench, the sailor leaning with his sound arm on Jerry's shoulders.

The sick bay, or hospital, was a sandbag-covered room at one side; not a pleasant place—oh, no, for wounds were being dressed and things were being cut off by the navy surgeon and his assistant. Still, it seemed to be safe from the shot and shell, and there were not many wounded, yet; only four or five. So Jerry lingered, until the surgeon espied him and set him at work picking lint, serving water, and so forth.

The reports from the battery were encouraging, judging by the conversation. The six guns were all in action, together: the three Paixhans, which threw shells eight inches in diameter and weighing sixty-eight pounds, and the three solid-shot pieces, which threw balls, six inches in diameter, and weighing thirty-two pounds. These were the heaviest American guns firing yet, for breaching.

"Yes, shiver my timbers!" growled Jerry's sailor to one of the other wounded. "Scott axed for 'em, didn't he Would the commodore please to land a few o' the navy toys and furnish the bass in this here music? Would the navy lend the army some genuyine main-deck guns, of a kind to fire a broadside with and send the bloomin' dons to Davy Jones? 'Bless my bloody eyes!' says the commo