To this end he sent out a
reconnaissance in the early morning, which included G Battery Horse
Artillery, the 9th Lancers, and the ponderous 4.7 naval gun, which,
preceded by the majestic march of thirty-two bullocks and attended
by eighty seamen gunners, creaked forwards over the plain. What was
there to shoot at in those sunlit boulder-strewn hills in front?
They lay silent and untenanted in the glare of the African day. In
vain the great gun exploded its huge shell with its fifty pounds of
lyddite over the ridges, in vain the smaller pieces searched every
cleft and hollow with their shrapnel. No answer came from the
far-stretching hills. Not a flash or twinkle betrayed the fierce
bands who lurked among the boulders. The force returned to camp no
wiser than when it left.
There was one sight visible every night to all men which might well
nerve the rescuers in their enterprise. Over the northern horizon,
behind those hills of danger, there quivered up in the darkness one
long, flashing, quivering beam, which swung up and down, and up
again like a seraphic sword-blade.
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