“You may as well come on with me, Bateman; we shall very likely fall in with some villagers and perhaps capture a Boxer, and so get information as to the position of the enemy in front of us and the state of the line.”
“I shall be very glad to come, sir.”
Ah Lo, without receiving any specific orders, fell in as a matter of course in the rear of the marines. They went steadily on, keeping two miles ahead of the leading train, and when eight miles above Lo–Fa they saw a body of Boxers, which they reckoned about three thousand strong, streaming out from a village on the left. This force did not make directly for the little party, but bore towards their rear with the evident intention of cutting them off. They had with them a good many mounted men who, dashing forward, crossed the railway behind them, while the men on foot made for a partially–burned bridge and a village commanding the line.
“Fall back at the double!” Major Johnston called. “Not too fast; it is certain that we shall have to fight them, and it wonʼt do to put ourselves out of breath. Keep up a quick fire as you go; halt when you fire, and take steady aim. They wonʼt like the long range of our bullets. I donʼt suppose we shall do them much harm, but our fellows will hear the firing at the wagons and we shall soon have a party up to our assistance.”
Rex and Ah Lo unslung their rifles and joined the marines in their steady fire. The return of the enemy was not effective; only a few were armed with guns, and these were not of long range. For a mile a running fight was kept up, twenty or thirty of the enemy being killed. They nevertheless persisted in their endeavour to cut off the party. When, however, he saw a body of marines and blue–jackets coming up at the double, the major at once halted his men.
“Now, my lads, you can give them independent fire as quick as you like; there is no fear of their closing with us now.”
The Boxers who had crossed the line began to move back and join their companions, and the approaching blue–jackets at once opened fire upon them with rifles and Maxims. The reinforcements soon joined Major Johnstonʼs party, and under his lead attacked the village and drove the Boxers from it. Following hotly upon their heels, they forced them also to retire from another village with the loss of some forty killed and wounded.
Rexʼs services were at once called into requisition. He slung his rifle behind him, and set to work to interrogate seven wounded Boxers who had fallen into our hands. From them he learned that farther back the line had been almost entirely pulled up, that the forces there were very numerous, and their strength had just been increased by the addition of ten thousand regular troops, who had been nominally disbanded in order that they could join the Boxers, while the Government might be able still to affirm that the Boxers were acting in defiance of their orders and that no Imperial troops had joined them. They said, too, that a considerable proportion of the troops in Pekin had been brought to the southern gate to oppose the relieving army if they broke through the forces opposed to them. Rex learned that two days previously there had been fighting in Pekin and that it was expected that the Legations would all be taken in the course of a few days.
The army advanced no farther that night, but the next day pushed on to Lang Fang, which was half–way to Pekin. They found all the station buildings destroyed and three hundred yards of the track torn up. Boxers were seen busy in the work of destruction, but when a shell was dropped among them they fled. A patrol that went out reported that a mile and a quarter of the track had been destroyed.