Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/473

 THE CANNONADE STILL MAINTAINED. 413 teiy refused to confront the fire, and thereupon chap. a number of men volunteered to unload the _1 ' waggon at the place where it stood, and carry up its freight to the magazine. This they hastened to do ; and the powder they had brought up was already collected in the midst of them, and in readiness to be stowed away in the magazine, when a shell came into the heap. A voice cried out, ' The fuse is burning ! ' In perhaps twenty seconds, perhaps in ten, perhaps one, the fire would But instantly, and, as the narrator says, ' with one spring,' Captain Peel darted upon the live shell, and threw it over the parapet. The shell burst about four yards from his hands with- out hurting any one.* Since the silencing of their fire on the 17th of cannonade " . . of the lyth October, the irench had been not only repairing October, the havoc made in their works, but establishing new, powerful batteries ; and as it was known that, on the morning of the 19th, they would be in a condition to reopen their fire with largely in- creased means, the hour of trial was looked for- ward to with great interest by the Allies. Indeed it may be said that, notwithstanding the adoption and continual prosecution of the plan for carrying forward regular approaches, there was a revival of the hope which had animated the assailants at the opening of the first cannonade. Men trusted On the IStli there fell, in the sailors' batteries, Lieutenant Greathead. He was one of the splendid body of officers belong- h'^ to the Britannia, our flag-ship.
 * Captain Lnsliington to Atlmiral Dundas, 23d OctoTier 1S54.