Chapter Thirty Five.
The Flight of a Lim-bing.
It was no rash assertion. The small erection that it had been the Major’s pride to erect by means of the men a short distance back and just inside the jungle, and to which he had brought to bear all the ingenuity he possessed, so as to ensure safety—sinking it deep in the earth, protecting it by a chevaux de frise, and then thickly planting the outside with a dense belt of the closest and most rapid-growing of the jungle shrubs—had been levelled with the earth, and its framework was now blazing furiously.
The first few moments after the explosion, it had seemed to the besieged that defence now would be madness, and that nothing was left for them but to throw themselves on the mercy of the Malays. But that natural desire of the Briton to make the best of things exemplified in the Latin proverb Nil desperandum soon began to assert itself. A sergeant suddenly shouted, “Look out there, my lads! Want to see the place burnt down?” And first one and then another made a rush towards the different buildings to pick or knock off fragments of burning wood and bright embers, cast by the tremendous force and scattered by the powder, that were beginning to threaten destruction on the roofs where they had fallen. The example set was quite sufficient for the rapid stamping out of the fires.
Meanwhile the remains of the magazine were burning furiously, and though the river was so near, it was no time for any attempt at checking the fire’s progress.
“Let it go, my lads,” the Major had said, “and be ready to take cover again, for we shall have the enemy back directly.”
For, instead of taking advantage of the explosion and the temporary bewilderment that had been caused to the besieged by the shock, the Malays, utterly demoralised by the terrific roar, had to a man made for the shelter of the jungle.
The silence that had succeeded the roar was intense. Where, firing their clumsy old muskets and increasing the noise by their savage yells of defiance all round the cantonments, the Malays had been tearing about and rushing from tree to tree, peace now reigned, while the snapping and crackling of the burning wood, the deep-toned, half-whispered orders of the officers, and the talking of the men seemed to sound unnaturally loud.