A moment later he said:
"There come more. The French must be doing some execution. There are already more wounded in sight than we had all day last Thursday. It's the rifle-fire which counts."
Singly or in groups, the squads of stretcher-bearers could be seen filing across the common on their way to the Mission Hospital.
"I must go now. We are going to have our hands full."
"Down! Down!" roared Gardenier.
Every one fell flat behind the battlements. There was a crash and the old fort trembled to its foundations. They sprang to their feet and looked over. A shell had struck it squarely a few feet above the ground. But the solid brick walls, eight feet thick, built by conscientious workmen two hundred and fifty years before, had hurled it back and were hardly even dented by the terrific impact.
Soon afterwards Sinclair left for the Mission Hospital down in the town. There he joined Dr. Bergmann in time to receive the first of the wounded. But they came so fast that before long the two doctors had to signal for Black of the Locust. As the afternoon came on the number increased. The hospital was small, and soon not only the operating-room and the wards, but the courtyard as well, were crowded with between one hundred and twenty and one hundred and thirty wounded men.
The forenoon passed into the afternoon; the afternoon wore slowly away. Up and down between the lines of rude plank cots the three doctors moved, with bare arms and clothing stained with blood. Several of the Christian students acted as nurses and assisted at the dressings.
The noon hour had passed, but they took no time for lunch. A messenger arrived from the rendezvous with an invitation from Mrs. Beauchamp and Mrs. MacAllister to go there for tiffin.
"I fancy that we had better accept this," said Black. "We have more time now than we shall have later. But these are slaughter-house clothes in which to go to tiffin with ladies."