Well, a steady and deliberate aim, and from across the water we could hear the dull thud—thud of our bullets, as they struck the sides of the boats.
“Anyhow,” cried Martin, “there is a couple of loopholes in their sides, but that is not enough. Again, Claud, but this time an inch or two higher;” and once more we fired. The reports of our pieces aroused Prabu and the men, who came towards us, shouting, “Malik, Malik!—they are coming, they are coming!”
“Are they, though!” exclaimed Martin—“not a bit of it; at least not until they have put into dock again to stop the shot-holes in their sails and boats.” And Prabu, at first angry that we had commenced action without orders, no sooner saw the telling effect of our well-directed fire, than he cried out—
“The sahibs are heroes—let them keep their rifles pointed at the boats,” and then he employed himself in posting his little force, with their muskets, at angles of the works; so that while we, with our long-range rifles, harassed the enemy, Prabu and his party could, by a cross-fire, deal out destruction to any who, after the habit of their race, might take to the water—which, as it was then low tide, was not more than breast-high.
For a couple of hours, however, we had but little employment, save discharging a bullet now and then among stragglers, who from time to time ventured to the edge of the water, for the purpose of sending an arrow or two at any head that might chance to appear above our sandbank. As for the two boats, they had long since been lugged ashore, their crews not a little scared that a bullet could be sent among them from so great a distance; for it was, in all probability, the first time the deadly rifle had been heard by them.
But the brave Balinese will get accustomed to any weapon, however terrible at first, and so speedily the boats were again manned, but this time their crews, all but two rowers in each, laid themselves at the bottom; and at the same time that they put off, some eighty of their comrades, armed with bows, arrows, spears, and creeses, took to the water—in order, I suppose, to create a diversion, for the latter were equally divided into parties and placed at each side of the boats: thus, shrieking and yelling, they advanced toward us.
As before, Martin and I kept our eyes upon the boats; but so well and gallantly did their crews manœuvre them—keeping them for ever moving, twisting, and whirling them about in the water—that they became as difficult to hit as seagulls on the wing in a tempest: we fired and fired, but all in vain. In the meantime, Prabu and his men had stood at their posts without firing a shot, and a well-planned manœuvre it was; for as the yelling, screaming enemy—having exhausted a considerable portion of their strength by their toil in the water, and the frequent discharge of their arrows (you must remember that they stood breast-high in the sea)—came near the shore, one half kept firing and the other loading, and that with such good aim and rapidity, that in about an hour, all who were not killed beat a retreat to the mainland.
But while this had been going on, Martin and I had been engaged keeping the boats, which, daringly enough, had run right beneath the works, from landing their crews: one of these we managed to scuttle by pouring bullets into her, and her few remaining men swam back to the opposite shore; but the other, in spite of rifles and muskets, set her crew ashore.
Had they effected this an hour before, when their comrades were finding full occupation for Prabu and the men, we should have been hopelessly lost. But now the latter, throwing aside their muskets and drawing their creeses, sprang to our aid, and drove them back to their boat—all but one, and he, Martin and I carried a prisoner into the interior.
The enemy being thus beaten back, we began to take stock of our ammunition: the result was pitiful.