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Each column was provided with a certain number of axemen, selected to act as pioneers; but not one of the necessary implements was in a condition to be used; neither had a single fascine or ladder been provided, although it was well known a deep ditch remained to be passed before the axes, inefficient as they were, could be brought into use.
Why should not the soldiers help the farmers whose sons are away at the front and perhaps helping farmers back of some Other point of the line? Over the crest of the hill we came on long lines of soldiers bearing timbers and fascines for trench-building, which explained why some of the villages were empty. A fascine is something usually made of woven branches which will hold dirt in position.
The young grub's fascine did not lack a certain elegance, with its dainty laths, all stacked crosswise, methodically; and, lo and behold, the builder, grown larger, more experienced and, one would think, more skilful, abandons the orderly plan to adopt another which is wild and incoherent! There is no transition stage between the two systems.
Each soldier was accompanied by a pioneer carrying a fascine, in order to form a cover against the Vaudois bullets as they advanced. Several days elapsed before all the preliminaries for the grand attack were completed, and then the Marquis ordered a white flag to be hoisted, and a messenger was sent forward, inviting a parley with the defenders of the Balsille. The envoy was asked what he wanted.
By this time, however, the cunning brute, enjoying the pleasure of his situation, after the heat and partial privation of water to which he had been lately exposed, was unwilling to work any longer; and all the threats of his keeper could not induce him to place another fascine.
And that the reader may know it was not a common occasion that alarmed us thus, I must inform him of the particulars of this dreadful din that astonished us. The fire of the Spaniards proceeded from eighty-four great guns, besides a mortar and small arms, in Bocca Chica; thirty-six in Fort St. Joseph; twenty in two fascine batteries, and four men-of-war, mounting sixty-four guns each.
Each column was provided with a certain number of axemen, selected to act as pioneers; but not one of the necessary implements was in a condition to be used; neither had a single fascine or ladder been provided, although it was well known a deep ditch remained to be passed before the axes, inefficient as they were, could be brought into use.
Having plowed through the barbed wire and reached the edge of the Hindenburg trench, the tank would drop the fascine into the center of the ditch, stretch out its long body, reach the bundle of fagots, find support on it, and use it as a stepping-stone to the other side. Very simple in idea and effect!
To prevent the French from pressing forward along the strip of shore between the fort and the sea, the English erected a strong stockade, behind which was a battery called the Fascine Battery.
When the troops got under arms, instead of bringing his battalion to the redoubt, where he had been instructed to find the ladders, he marched directly past it, and led them into the field without a single ladder or fascine.
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