The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1900-04-10

he lifts his rifle the dust begins to jump
again, and the rife barrel is scalding
hot, the varnish is sizzling on the stock
as though it stood before FIRE, and 10
touch 1t seems to quicken his unbeara-
Bile thirst.
Writes Words in the Sand.
ale tries to guess at the hour as the
sun goes over and falls on his left side.
He writes words in the sand with his
fingers, and rubs them out. bewlders an
ant which runs with its bundle OF fooc
in front of him; does anything he can
to keep from thinking of the madden
ing drouth within him. What he
really thinks of God knows. 4 lay
there blarstlng them Beers so long as
1 can remember" said one who had lost
consciousness after eight hours of that
kind of fighting, and his attitude was
probably characteristic. But cursing
is not cool work, and dries a man al
ready droutl1y, while stlH the crackle
of the fire comes from the river and
death stands before a drink. At last,
while there are still some three hours
Of daylight, the patter of rifles along
the dongas on the further bank grows
more and more hurried, tilt It runs In
to continuous roll. A last deter
mined, disastrous attempt Is being
made to push back the enemy's right.
The Seaforths, Cornwalls and Cana
dams, mixed together. ara clambering.
leaplng, laundering forward across the
deep. intricate channels Of the donga
beds.
The Man on the Other Side.
But the man on the other side of
the river only knows of what is going
forward-both the swell and spread of
the fire. Five minutes, and It has sunk
again to the snap. snap of solitary RI
fes. What has happened? Whose
are the bodies in those pits Of death?
wher. is the enemy and where is the
friend. He has not the least idea. If
things have gone well there will be
fresh orders. probably, but no orders
CAM
"At 6 o'clock he has been twelve
hours under Are; his last meal was a
biscuit, fifteen hours back, when he
had fallen in at three O'Clock in the
morning, after marching all the day
before. But he is aware neither OF
WEAKNESS nor of hunge: in the fever
of his thirst. The flesh of his face,
stained walnut brown by the sun, has
dry, twisted look, like the parched
stem of scrub, though all the moisture
haG been wrung from 1t. One grows to
know that look out here. His fingers
never leave his water bottle, nor his
eyes the steen fringe Of bush along the
river Another hour, and the guns
about him cease firing, and a new fight
seems to be beginning far away on the
right. The sun is golng down, and
he can see nothing to the left Of him
but a hot. gold glare Of dust.
His Last Dash for Water.
"Then out of 1t a man leaps and
makes a dash forward toward the
river. There is sharp ring of an
order to stop him, and almost with 1t
the quick stammer of dozen shots.
and the man swings around and pitches
forward on his back. The rattle grows
louder on the right. HOwItzer battery
has come into action, brownlsh puffs of
lyddIte are bursting along the kopie.
But the man lying in the scrub pays
no heed to 1t. His arms are spread
out fiat. his fingers dug into the sand.
He is pulling himself slowly forward.
his eyes glaring ahead through the
scrub. When bullet strikes near him
he stops a moment. but goes on again.
So In about half an hour he covers
about fifty yards. He can see the cool
hollow of the river. but there is only
brown grass along the banks, and his
one chance lies in dash. He is on all
fours for spring, but he gets no fur
Their. A rifle has been following the
faint trail Of dust above him, and he
sinks down in lump. with bullet
through his head"