172 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



saw the opposite bastion rock and then sink down 

 into the moat. A joyous hurrah greeted its fall, and 

 the general and his staff sprang forward. 



It would be necessary to have witnessed the scene 

 that followed in order to form any adequate idea of 

 the mad joy and enthusiasm of its actors. The 

 general seized Ready in his arms and eagerly em- 

 braced him, then almost threw him to one of his 

 officers, who performed the like ceremony, and, in 

 his turn, passed him to a third. The imperturbable 

 captain flew, or was tossed like a ball, from one to 

 the other. I also came in for my share of the 

 embraces. 



I thought them all stark-staring mad ; and, indeed, 

 I do not believe they were far from it. The balls 

 were still hailing into the battery ; one of them cut 

 a poor devil of an orderly nearly in two, but no notice 

 was taken of such trifles. It was a curious scene 

 enough ; the cannon-balls bouncing about our ears 

 the ground under our feet slippery with blood 

 wounded and dying lying on all sides and we our- 

 selves pushed and passed about from the arms of one 

 black - bearded fellow into those of another. There 

 was something thoroughly exotic, completely South 

 American and tropical, in this impromptu. 



Strange to say, now that the breach was made 

 and a breach such that a determined regiment, assisted 

 by a well-directed fire of artillery, could have had no 

 difficulty in storming the town there was no appear- 



