A few minutes ago, at half-past six by summer-time, the British
bombardment, which has continued heavily for six days, suddenly came in
with a crash, as an orchestra might enter on its grand finale. Last
night, some of us who were out here watched the British shells playing
up and down the distant skyline, running over it from end to end as a
player might run the fingers of one hand lightly over the piano keys.
There were three or four flashes every second, here or there in that
horizon; night and day for six days that had continued. Within the last
few minutes, starting with two or three big heart bangs from a battery
near us, the noise suddenly expanded into a constant detonation. It was
exactly as though the player began, on an instant, to use all the keys
at once.

We now ought to be able to see, from where we sit with our telescopes,
the bursts of our shells on those distant ridges. But I cannot swear
that I see a single one. The sound of the bombarding is like the sound
of some titanic iron tank which a giant has set rolling rapidly down an
endless hill. We can hear the soft whine of scores of shells hurrying
all together through the air. Every five minutes or so a certain
howitzer, tucked into some hiding-place, vents its periodical growl, and
we can hear the huge projectile climbing slowly, up his steep gradient
with a hiss like that of water from a fire-hose. There is some other
heavy shell which passes us also, somewhere in the middle of his flight.
We cannot distinguish the report of the gun, and we do not hear the
shell burst; but at regular intervals we can quite distinctly hear the
monster making his way leisurely across our front.

We can distinguish in the uproar the occasional distant crash of a heavy
shell-burst. But not one burst can I see. The sun upon the mist makes