Fighting is sometimes a very agreeable
pastime, but excess "palls on the sense:" and here we had enough of
it, without what I always thought an indispensable accompaniment,
namely, a good bellyful; nor did I conceive how a man could perform
his duty without it; but here I was forced, with many others, to make
the experiment, and when the boats could not land, which was often the
case, we piped to dinner _pro forma_, as our captain liked regularity,
and drank cold water to fill our stomachs.
I have often heard my poor old uncle say that no man knows what he can
do till he tries; and the enemy gave us plenty of opportunities of
displaying our ingenuity, industry, watchfulness, and abstinence. When
poor Penelope wove her web, the poet says--
"The night unravelled what the day began."
With us it was precisely the reverse: the day destroyed all the
labours of the night. The hours of darkness were employed by us in
filling sand-bags, and laying them in the breach, clearing away
rubbish, and preparing to receive the enemy's fire, which was sure to
recommence at daylight. These avocations, together with a constant and
most vigilant watch against surprise, took up so much of our time that
little was left for repose, and our meals required still less.
There was some originality in one of our modes of defence, and which,
not being _secundum artem_, might have provoked the smile of an
engineer. The captain contrived to make a shoot of smooth deal boards,
which he received from the ship: these he placed in a slanting
direction in the breach, and caused them to be well greased with
cook's slush; so that the enemies who wished to come into our
hold, must have jumped down upon them, and would in an instant be
precipitated into the ditch below, a very considerable depth, where
they might either have remained till the doctor came to them, or, if
they were able, begin their labours _de novo_.
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