Battle of Queenston Heights. From an old Print
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE ATTACK ON THE REDAN.
Checking his reeking horse for a moment, Brock acknowledged with a smile the salute, saying to the men who had leaped to his side, "Take breath, my good fellows; you will need all you have, and more, in a few minutes," words which evoked much cheering. Then he breasted the rise at a canter, exposed to a galling enfilading fire of artillery, and running the gauntlet of the sniping of some invisible marksmen, reached the redan, half-way to the summit. Here he dismounted, threw his charger's reins to a gunner, and entered the enclosure.
From the loftier elevation of the Heights a still more striking scene confronted him. He saw, in the yellow light, battalion after battalion drawn up in rear of the Lewiston batteries, across the river, only two hundred yards wide at this point, awaiting embarkation. Other soldiers he saw crouching in the batteaux on the river, while an unknown number had already crossed and were in possession of Queenston landing. Round and grape shot from the American batteries were searching the banks and scourging the village, while shells from mortars at short range came singing across the river. He saw a boat with fifteen American soldiers smashed in mid-stream by a six-pounder from Dennis's battery, and watched the mangled bodies drift into the gloom.