rush, the assault was repulsed, the British remaining possessors of San Bartholomeo.

On the 24th the batteries on Mount Olia, having effected what was believed to be a practicable breach, 2000 men of the fifth division, consisting of the 3rd battalion of the Royals, the 38th, and the 9th, made an assault at night. To arrive at the breach they had to make their way along the slippery rocks on the bed of the Urumea, exposed to a flank-fire from the river-wall of the town. The breaches had been isolated from the town, and guns placed to take the stormers in flank. The confusion and slaughter were terrible, and at daybreak the survivors fell back, with a loss of forty-nine officers and 520 men.

The whole arrangement of the siege was bad. The plan of of Major Smith, of the engineers, a most excellent officer, which had been approved by Wellington, was not followed, and the assault, contrary to Wellington's explicit order, took place at night, instead of by day, the consequence being confusion, delay, and defeat. The total loss to the allies of this first siege of St. Sebastian was 1300 men.

Neither of the Scudamores were present at the first siege, but both witnessed the second assault, of the 31st of August, as Wellington himself was present on the 30th, to see to the execution of the preparation for attack, and they obtained leave to remain for the next day to witness the assault. The siege had been resumed on the 5th of that month, and on the 23rd the batteries had opened fire in earnest, and immense damage was done to the defences and garrison. But upon this occasion, as upon the former one, the proper precautions were not taken ; no lodgment had been effected in the horn-work, and, worst of all, the blockade had been so negligently conducted by the fleet, that large bodies of fresh troops, guns, and ammunition had

been passed in, and the defence was even stronger than it had been when the first assault was delivered.

General Graham took up his position on the heights of the Chofres to view the assault, and the Scudamores stationed themselves near him. A dense mist hid the fortress from view, and it was not until eight o'clock that the batteries were able to open. Then for three hours they poured a storm of shot and shell upon the defences. The Scudamores sat down in one of the trenches, where they were a little sheltered from the blazing heat of the sun, and Sam took his place at a short distance from them.

As the clock struck eleven the fire slackened, and at that moment Sam exclaimed, "Golly, Massa Tom, dere dey go." As he spoke Robinson's brigade poured out from the trenches, and, passing through the openings in the sea-wall, began to form on the beach.

It was known that the French had mined the angle of the wall overhanging the beach, and a sergeant, followed by twelve men, dashed gallantly forward to try to cut the train leading to the mine. He was unsuccessful, but the suddeness of the rush startled the French, who at once fired the mine, which exploded, destroying the brave sergeant and his party, and thirty of the leading men of the column, but not doing a tithe of the damage which it would have inflicted had the column been fairly under it.

"Hurrah! dere dey go," Sam exclaimed as the column clambered over the ruins and pursued its way unchecked along the beach. They had, however, to make their way under a storm of fire.

The French, as before, lined the wall, and poured a tremendous musketry fire into their flank, and the batteries of Mount Orgullo and St. Elmo plied them with shot and shell,

while two pieces of cannon on the cavalier and one on the horn-work raked them with grape.

Still the column neither halted nor faltered, but dashed, like a wave, up the breach. When, however, they reached the top they could go no farther. A deep gulf separated them from the town, while from every loop-hole and wall behind, the French musketry swept the breach. The troops could not advance and would not retreat, but sullenly stood their ground, heaping the breach with their dead. Fresh bodies of men came up, and each time a crowd of brave men mounted the breach, only to sink down beneath the storm of fire.

"This is awful, horrible, Tom!" Peter said in a choked voice. "Come away, I can't look at this slaughter, it is a thousand times worse than any battle."

Tom made no reply, his own eyes were dim with tears, and he rose to go, taking one more look at the deadly breach, at whose foot the survivors of the last attempt had sunk down, and whence the mass of soldiers were keeping up a musketry fire against the guns and unseen foes who were sweeping them away, when an officer ran up from General Graham's side, and in a minute fifty guns from the Chofres batteries opened a storm of fire upon the curtain and the traverses behind the breach.

It was a terrible trial to the nerves of the assaulting columns when this terrific fire was poured upon a spot only twenty feet above them; but they were not men to shrink, and the men of the light division seized the opportunity to pull up the broken masonry and make a breastwork, known in military term as a lodgment.

For half an hour the iron storm poured overhead unchecked, smashing the traverse, knocking down the loopholed

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