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Total result of one of these firework displays: several thousand rounds of ammunition squibbed off, hundreds of star shells wasted, and no casualties. It put the "wind up" me at first, but I soon got to know these affairs, and learnt to take them calmly. I went along with the platoon commander back to his lair. An excellent fellow he was.
'If there's any firing, every man to fire over the parapet and only straight to his own front, he said, and almost at the moment there came a loud 'bang' from out in front, followed quickly by 'bang-bang-bang' in a running series of reports. The shouting had cut off instantly on the first bang, some rifles squibbed off at intervals for a few seconds and increased suddenly to a sputtering roar.
When the Chilians dashed into view, there was a sentry on the roof of the fort, and he immediately squibbed off his rifle; but the alarm was given too late; the report of his rifle was drowned in the roar of the guns, and the splintering and rending of the fort gate was the first intimation afforded the guerillas that the enemy was upon them from a different quarter from that whence he was expected.
The mischief, however, was done, and the slumbering camp was effectually alarmed. The sentries squibbed off their rifles, and then, reloading, began to blaze away into the Chilian encampment. The captain's harsh voice was heard giving orders, and in a few seconds the Peruvian soldiers had formed up in line, fixed their bayonets, and were prepared to charge.
Whatever was the cause, nothing could be more agreeable than this letter to the active spirit of Birmingham. Public meetings were held. The rockets of war were squibbed off in the news-papers. The plodding tradesman and the lively hero assembled together in arms, and many a trophy was won in thought.
He banged the table with his fist. "Even now that these unknown fiends have achieved their object, I am helpless, helpless. There was not a wisp of smoke to guide me, Knox, and one man cannot search a county." I sighed wearily. "Do you know, Harley," I said, "I am thinking of a verse of Kipling's." "I know!" he interrupted, almost savagely. "A Snider squibbed in the jungle.
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