The colonel and a hundred men are fighting hand to hand with
the Prussians, who have charged out at the back doors of the bastion.
Success there, and the bastion must fall--both sides know this.
The colors disappeared. There was a groan from the French lines. The
colors reappeared, and close under the bastion.
And now in front the attack was so hot, that often the Prussian gunners
were seen to jump down, driven from their posts; and the next moment
a fierce hurrah from the rear told that the French had won some great
advantage there. The fire slackening told a similar tale and presently
down came the Prussian flag-staff. That might be an accident. A few
moments of thirsting expectation, and up went the colors of the 24th
brigade upon the Bastion St. Andre.
The French army raised a shout that rent the sky, and their cannon began
to play on the Prussian lines and between the bastion and the nearest
fort, to prevent a recapture.
Sudden there shot from the bastion a cubic acre of fire: it carried up a
heavy mountain of red and black smoke that looked solid as marble.
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