The Opelousas courier., 1892-06-04
THE ROAR OF %GREATGUNS
THE oRJEAL OF SOLDIERS WHO
SUPPORT A BATTERY.
The Effect of a Terrific and Continu-
Gus Cannonade Upon Man, Beast,
Bird and Fish

M twelve. SIX anu l1ue pGunoclS
in all-fring as rapidly as
- they can be loaded. The re-
ports blend into a roar. and you must
raise YOUR voice as if d hurricane was
bowling about you. You are not i'm
pressed, but rather aggravated and
ANNOYED. There's a snap to each
report like the cracking of d great whip
"a s~piteful sound which reminds you .of
a dog following at your heels with his
yelp! yelpI yelp!
There is no more trying situation for
a soldier than to be lyingodoWn II sup
port of a battery. He y only a few
wards in front of the guns, and he not
only feels the full force of the conclusion
as communicated to the earth, from the
s'kick" of the gun, but the report itself
seems to strike the spinal column and
travel up to the back of the head. Then,
too. there is the fear of shells explod-
ing prematurely or of grape or canister
ter s'dribbling' to cause wounds or
death, and 1t is a positive relief to see a
column OF the enemy break cover for a
charge. The roar of the guns does not
! linoer for hours after, as is the case with
mortars and siege guns, but you find
YOUR nerves on edge and your temper
spoiled for a day or two. The men who
lay in lines with a battery firing over
them probably endured more mental sui
fering than the enemy at whom the guns
were pointed. The fire OF great guns is
terribly trying for the first few minutes,
but this feeling gradually gives way to
one of awe and sublimity.
There is something terrific and appat-
ling-you feel yourself so atomless in
comparison-that you would speak IN
whispers if the roar could suddenly ease.
You are an onlooker; if assisting to
work a gun, physical activity would take
away from the mental strain. When
Admiral Porter got his twenty mortar
boats, each armed with an eight and a
half-ton mortar and d thirty-two pound
rife cannon, at work against the forts
below New Orleans, and the big guns in
both forts had opened in reply, there
was something akin to the sound of
heaven and earth coming together. The
mortar shells weighed over 20U pounds
a piece, and the rush of them through
the air made ones hair feel as if it
crawled. The venomous hiss of a big
skyroeket was magnified thousands OF
times, to be followed by a crash which
seemed to split the sky open into cracks
and erevices.
Whop +ho HrSnr hn1 continued until
all reports had been merged into n
steady 1oar there was little short of an
earthquake on land or sea for ten miles
around. The earth shook as if a great
steam hammer was pounding it a few
yards from your feet. If standing near
a tree, you could feel the roots letting go
of the soil with a sound like bugs crawl
ing over dry leaves. On the water great
mud spots rose up here and there to
show where the earth, forty feet below
had been disturbed. In the Mississippi
River itself huge catfish leaped above
the surface in fright and pain or loated
and were carried along with the current,
gasping for breath. Out on the blue
water air bubbles as large as dining
plates foated to the surface and bursted
with a snap, and fish of all kinds exhi-
bited the greatest confusion and alarm.
Thirty miles away the roar was like
that of a gale sweeping over a pine for
est. Horses and cattle sought to hide
away, birds few about uttering cries of
distress, and dogs pointed their noses
toward the sky and aowled dismally.
Birds and fowls felt the air and earth
waves long before human beings did,
and their actions were SO queer as to be-
come alarming. The coming of the roar
to those afar of was preceded by a jar
ring of the earth and a moaning in the
air. Springs overlooked, and the water
in wells circled around as in a whirl-
pool. The widest species of birds left
the woods aud thickets and came flying
about the houses, aud rabbits deserted
their burrows and sought the companion
ship of domestic ami nails. The thunder
storms of a score of years combined
could not have rent the heavens nor dis
turbed the solid earth as that cannonade !.
did. !
If the beginning was painful and ex-
separating the ending was something to
be remembered for its grandeur. One
mortar after another, one great gun after
another, was s~ileneed by order. The re.
verberations had travelled through air
and earth and water a distance of fifty
miles. They now seemed to return
back to the guns. The rent and riven
skies had kept up a constant moaning
and complaining. These sounds gradu-
ally died away, as a man in pain finally
drops oil to sleep. The earth resumed
its solidity again, tie sun shone forth
in its old familiar way, aud the bank of
piled up in the west and tinged
with gold all along their lower edges
seemed proof to the eye that the world
still stood as we had lived in it the day
before those monsters awoke and de.
manded human blood and wreck and de.
struetion as the price Of their silence
NJ. Quad, in st. Louis Republic.
Public Schools i'm Japan.