Page:Memoirs of a Huguenot Family.djvu/220

 214 a double quantity of powder. I had no sooner loaded than I had the opportunity of aiming at a hand I saw raised; I fired, but my piece was overloaded, and it burst, by which unfortunate accident I was thrown down with much violence, three of my ribs and my right collar-bone were broken, and the flesh of my right hand was much torn. I was so completely stunned that I had no power to move, or even to breathe for some seconds. My wife saw me fall, and she naturally concluded I had been struck by a ball from the enemy. She ran to my assistance, and raised me up without making any noise whatever. As soon as I was able to articulate, I told her how it had happened. I was now completely "hors de combat," but I had already done much work, for I had fired five pounds of swan shot from my now disabled piece, during the morning. After I was prostrated, my dearest wife assumed the command; she had an eye to every thing; she went round to furnish ammunition as it was required, and she gave courage as well by her exhortations as by her example.

In the mean time the enemy had been engaged upon the breach, which they had increased to four or five feet square: nevertheless, they derived no benefit from it; my sons defended it by an incessant fire from behind their mattress rampart. At last, a grenade was thrown in at the breach, which ran under the basket, and overturned the whole affair, but without doing any harm, thanks be to God, except giving the boys a fright which made them abandon their post; but only for a very short time. One of them ran to me, in great dismay, to tell me that the hole was as large as any door, and that the enemy were entering by it; the other boys were still firing from the dormar windows.