Yet it could not be believed that such a nation, a race originally so splendid in fibre, so dogged in courage, would take the onslaught of her rivals lying down. England, surely, now at the eleventh hour, would be roused to action. England would fight, and even dying breathe defiance to her foes. But, alas! England sorely needed leadership—the potent magic of some great personality to inspire her people with courage and enthusiasm. And in this hour of dire distress, Renshaw, the only leader who could have commanded a widespread patriotic following, was lost to England—lying scarred and beaten, it was said, chained like a dog in the prison of the Mahdi.
So thought most of those who thought of him at all. Yet, even while his name was on their lips, the Phœnix was reviving. Sir Robert Herrick knew it. General Hartwell and Linton knew it; and there were others, quick of hearing, keen of sight, who already heard the flapping of the wings; saw the Phœnix rising from the ashes of the past and speeding from afar towards our violated shores.
THE FIGHT FOR THE FORT.
The enemy still held the fort. All through the night a terrific bombardment had been maintained, and even when the first grey line of dawn began to creep across the downs the insistent fury of the guns increased rather than diminished. Major Wardlaw estimated that during the last twelve hours over eleven thousand shots had been fired from the big guns of Fort Warden, while thousands of shrapnel hurled against its fortifications from the various encircling field batteries manned by British gunners were beyond all definite calculation. At the height of the bombardment not less than 80 per minute must have been directed by way of return against the British batteries, and in this onslaught the great guns (of which there were seven at work in Fort Warden) contributed the most overwhelming and terrible results. This deafening and incessant rain of fire was directed mainly against the Castle and Fort Burgoyne, but, incidentally, it had wrought ruin and convulsion on every side. Shells falling into the town of Dover had already reduced it to heaps of tumbled masonry. Here and there great volumes of smoke rose from the wreckage of shops and houses. The Town Hall—the ancient Maison Dieu, founded by Hugh de Burgh, Constable of Dover, in the reign of John—having escaped destruction during the night, caught fire about daybreak, the flames, rushing upward in the morning air, watched by thousands from the western heights, to which the terrified inhabitants had fled for safety.
On the Castle Hill the bluish haze caused by the ceaseless bursting of shells and shrapnel in some measure veiled the central scene of conflict; and this haze, spreading far and wide over the landscape, presently assumed the most delicate and beautiful colours as the sun rose up and threw its shafts of light on hill and dale. When the light grew stronger, cloud after cloud of smoke was seen to rush aloft from the contending forts, and every moment the sun, with growing glory, painted these rolling billows with glorious hues of burnished gold or bronze. Here and there, while the people watched, columns of earth and chalk rose high into the air, as shot and shell ploughed deep into the soil, while flashes of fire from the bursting shells, the pale smoke rushing like steam from the shrapnels, and the leaping fountains of soil, all combined to give the beholder the impression of some terrific convulsion of nature. So extraordinary and ghastly was the general effect produced that many of the spectators believed they were witnessing a volcanic eruption allied in some way with the seismic disturbances reported to have occurred at Bath and other inland watering-places.
Yet towards the awful crater of this man-made volcano, British troops were now advancing. It had been fondly hoped by the British staff that the tremendous bombardment from the big howitzers, maintained ceaselessly during the night, would have disabled Fort Warden to such an extent that an infantry attack in the morning would meet with but feeble resistance. Very few of the officers, however, had any true conception of the enormous strength and staying power with which Wardlaw had endowed his military master-piece.