so thickly that hardly could it be judged whether the hurt or unhurt
were most numerous.

"It was now evident that the assault must fail unless some accident
intervened, for the tide was rising, the reserves all engaged, and no
greater effort could be expected from men whose courage had been already
pushed to the verge of madness. In this crisis, fortune interfered. A
number of powder-barrels, live shells, and combustible materials which
the French had accumulated behind the traverses for their defence,
caught fire, a bright, consuming flame wrapped the whole of the high
curtain, a succession of loud explosions was heard, hundreds of the
French grenadiers were destroyed, the rest were thrown into confusion,
and while the ramparts were still involved with suffocating eddies of
smoke, the British soldiers broke in at the first traverse. The
defenders, bewildered by this terrible disaster, yielded for a moment,
yet soon rallied, and a close, desperate struggle took place along the
summit of the high curtain; but the fury of the stormers, whose numbers
increased every moment, could not be stemmed. The French colors on the
cavalier were torn away, by Lieutenant Gethin of the eleventh regiment.
The hornwork and the land front below the curtain, and the loopholed
wall behind the great breach, were all abandoned; the light-division
soldiers, who had already established themselves in the ruins on the
French left, immediately penetrated to the streets; and at the same
moment the Portuguese at the small breach, mixed with the British who
had wandered to that point seeking for an entrance, burst in on their
side.

"Five hours the dreadful battle had lasted at the walls, and now the
storm of war went pouring into the town. The undaunted governor still
disputed the victory for a short time with the aid of his barricades,