Page:Into Mexico with General Scott (1920).djvu/292

 night batteries had been emplaced down in front of Tacubaya and facing Chapultepec. They seemed to be four sections, in pairs. One pair, about to open up, was located on the right of the hill slope, near the Quitman division and the road leading from Tacubaya to the eastern foot of Chapultepec. The other pair, not yet quite ready, was located near the King's Mill and the Pillow brigade. The engineers and the artillerymen had worked all night planting the batteries.

It was Sunday morning, but—

"Boom! Boom-m-m!" The heavy reports jarred the breakfast cups and platters, and rolled back from the castle and the city walls and the mountains. Everybody sprang up to see the shots land.

"Boom! Boom! Boom-m-m!" They were two eighteen-pounders and an eight-inch howitzer of Captain Huger's ordnance—a twenty-four-pounder. Dust from the pulverized stone and mortar floated above the castle of Chapultepec—dirt and rock spurted from the breastworks of the hillside—the Mexican soldiers were ducking and scampering. The men cheered.

"Now let 'em tend to their own funerals, and we'll play 'em Yankee Doodle."

The other battery joined. The bombardment of Chapultepec continued steadily. The Riley brigade of General Twiggs remained in the east upon the first main road from the south there, which entered the gate in the southwest corner of the city wall—the Belen gate. Old Davy's two batteries, Taylor's, and Steptoe's Third Artillery detached from the Fourth Division, were peppering the gate and also firing