They Seemed Each To Be
Acting On His Own Account, Without Unison Or Organization.
As I have
said, you ceased considering the scattered whole, and became intent
on the adventures of individuals.
These fell so suddenly, that you
waited with great anxiety to learn whether they had dropped to dodge
a bullet or whether one had found them. The men came at last from
every side, and from out of every ridge and dried-up waterway. Open
spaces which had been green a moment before were suddenly dyed yellow
with them. Where a company had been clinging to the railroad
embankment, there stood one regiment holding it, and another sweeping
over it. Heights that had seemed the goal, became the resting-place
of the stretcher-bearers, until at last no part of the hill remained
unpopulated, save a high bulging rampart of unprotected and open
ground. And then, suddenly, coming from the earth itself,
apparently, one man ran across this open space and leaped on top of
the trench which crowned the hill. He was fully fifteen yards in
advance of all the rest, entirely unsupported, and alone. And he had
evidently planned it so, for he took off his helmet and waved it, and
stuck it on his rifle and waved it again, and then suddenly clapped
it on his head and threw his gun to his shoulder. He stood so,
pointing down into the trench, and it seemed as though we could hear
him calling upon the Boers behind it to surrender.
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