210 
THE STRAND MAGAZINE. 
stood a good ten inches above the ground. 
Evidently the Russians — at least, so we 
thought at the time — had not anticipated 
a renewal of the bombardment of Sebastopol, 
during which occurred the most impressive 
sight that 1 have ever witnessed. We after- 
wards heard that they had run out of gun- 
cartridges, and were obliged to use infantry 
cartridges to make up charges for their guns. 
But this, of course, we did not know at 
the time. 
We got the range immediately with an 
eight-inch gun which stood in the obtuse 
angle of the battery, the right of which looked 
to the Malakoff and the left face to the Redan. 
The gun was served by the “ Queen’s/' who 
had been in battery since October, but the 
“ Leanders,” who had two thirty-two-poun- 
ders, fifty-six-hundredweight guns, were new 
to the work, and the shooting, therefore, 
was somewhat erratic. Indeed, while 1 was 
myself getting the range with the centre gun, 
the captain of the right-hand gun made such 
wild shots that I ordered him to “ cease 
firing,” when No. 3, the “ loader,” Able 
Seaman Michael Hardy, asked me if the gun’s 
crew might “ change rounds,” and that he 
might be No. t. I agreed to this at once, 
and after two trial shots Hardy got on the 
target, and afterwards made excellent practice. 
Yes, that 19th of April is a day I shall never 
forget. During the first hour the embrasure 
of the eight-inch gun which drew the greater 
portion of the enemy’s fire was cut clown and 
rebuilt three times. A sergeant and two 
sappers, detailed for repairing that part of 
the battery, were wounded, and I had per- 
sonally to repair the embrasure after the 
first occasion of its being demolished. After 
three hours’ firing the eight-inch gun where 
I was standing became so hot from the quick 
work it had been doing that we were obliged 
to “ cease fire,” and the men, released from 
their work, crowded up on the platform to 
be out. of the water, which in the trench was 
half-way up to their knees. Fortunately, how- 
ever, my other two guns continued in action, 
so that “ something was doing ” all the time. 
When the eight-inch gun was out of action 
I had a telescope laid in my left hand along 
the gun, and my right elbow on the shoulder 
of Charles Green, First Class boy of H.M.S. 
Queen , who was sitting on the right rear 
truck of the gun, and while I was calling out 
the results of the targets made a man handed 
round the rum for the crew, and Green asked 
me to move my elbow so that he would not 
run the risk of shaking me while drinking. 
At that moment we both stood up, and 
Green was in the act of holding the pannikin 
to his mouth when a shot from the Redan, 
coming obliquely from our left, took off his 
head as cleanly as though it had been severed 
from his body by the guillotine. With 
metallic clang the pannikin fell to the gun 
platform, and Green’s body lurched towards 
me and fell at my side. 
At this moment Michael Hardy, one of the 
cheeriest Irishmen that ever breathed, and 
one of the most courageous men I have ever 
met— he was invariably cheerful in all 
circumstances, and in the most perilous 
moments he did not seem to know what fear 
was — having just fired his gun, was “ serving 
the vent,” which consists of stopping with 
the thumb all currents of air in the gun, which, 
if allowed to pass up the vent, would cause 
sparks remaining in the chamber to ignite 
the fresh cartridge. 
llardy had turned up his sleeves and 
trousers, and, his shirt being opened low on 
the neck and chest, his face and body were 
covered with the contents of poor Green’s 
head. Indeed, for a moment Hardy was 
practically blinded. Now, if he bad lifted his 
thumb from the vent the result might easily 
have been fatal to No. 3 and No. 4, who were 
then ramming home the next charge. 
But with the coolness of a man on parade 
Hardy never flinched. With his left hand, 
without moving his right, he quietly wiped 
away his late comrade’s brains from his face. 
In print, no doubt, this incident sounds par- 
ticularly gruesome, but in the heat of action 
the gruesomeness of the incident did not 
strike us — did not strike me, at any rate, as 
strongly as it does to-day. 
Several men sitting at my feet were, how- 
ever, speechless, being startled, as indeed I 
was, for as that Russian shot which had sent 
poor Green on the journey from which he 
would never return had passed within an 
inch of my face I had felt the breath of wind 
which carried it on its way, and knew full well 
that it was only the chance of War which 
had not ordained that Green and I should go 
together. When you miss death by an inch, 
or perhaps less, you realize that, in times of 
war, you may be here one moment and far 
away the next. 
For perhaps thirty seconds we stood there 
motionless. By my side lay poor Green’s 
body. All around was blood, and in the 
distance sounded the dull boom, boom, 
boom, from the Russian guns. Green had 
gone, and maybe it was a sense of reverence 
for the passing of his soul which rendered us 
temporarily inert. Maybe it was a feeling 
