The yelling had ceased, but the grinding and rattling heard through the
detonation of cannon came nearer still, and suddenly there was a shower
of leaves and twigs from the lower branches of a chestnut-tree near the
broken hedge. As the smoke thinned again a rising and falling medley of
flapping hats, tossing horses' heads and shining steel appeared for an
instant, advancing tumultuously up the slope. But the apparition was as
instantly cloven by flame from the two nearest guns, and went down in a
gush of smoke and roar of sound. So level was the delivery and so close
the impact that a space seemed suddenly cleared between, in which
the whirling of the shattered remnants of the charging cavalry was
distinctly seen, and the shouts and oaths of the inextricably struggling
mass became plain and articulate. Then a gunner serving the nearest
piece suddenly dropped his swab and seized a carbine, for out of
the whirling confusion before them a single rider was seen galloping
furiously towards the gun.

The red-capped young officer rode forward and knocked up the gunner's
weapon with his sword. For in that rapid glance he had seen that the
rider's reins were hanging loosely on the neck of his horse, who was
still dashing forwards with the frantic impetus of the charge, and
that the youthful figure of the rider, wearing the stripes of a
lieutenant,--although still erect, exercised no control over the animal.
The face was boyish, blond, and ghastly; the eyes were set and glassy.
It seemed as if Death itself were charging the gun.

Within a few feet of it the horse swerved before a brandished rammer,
and striking the cheeks of the gun-carriage pitched his inanimate rider
across the gun. The hot blood of the dead man smoked on the hotter brass
with the reek of the shambles, and be-spattered the hand of the gunner
who still mechanically served the vent. As they lifted the dead body