"I will when you do, sir."
"But I can't, you know," Cummins said, with a silly chuckle.
"For goodness' sake keep moving, then, sir," the giant answered nervously, as several bullets flew past, and one struck the sand-bag on which Cummins was sitting.
Cummins dug it out with his finger. It was a small-bore Mauser bullet.
"Hullo! that's capital!" he cried, jumping to his feet, as a faint report came from the extreme left, and a shell burst among the trees from which the two guns had been firing. "Bannerman's got round at last."
The men saw it too, and gave a joyful cheer of relief.
"Now, lads," he sang out cheerily, "you won't be bothered with those shells, and these Chinese can't hit a haystack. Save your cartridges, and never fire till you are sure of hitting. The Strong Arm's will be here with their Maxims in another hour, so don't waste a shot."
With the dreaded shells silent, the men settled down more confidently and fired very seldom, and once or twice a yell of pain below told them that a cartridge had not been wasted.
The bullets were going past in great numbers—ping-ping! flick-flick! Occasionally one struck the ground with a puff of dust, or struck a stone or an axe and went whistling away, twisted out of shape. Every now and again one buried itself in a sand-bag with a thud, but most of them were high overhead. Evidently the Chinese were too undisciplined to take aim.
Still, it was a sufficiently awkward position, with three or four hundred men attacking from below, and probably as many on the left, concealed among those bushes opposite the Log Redoubt.