HE must take his chance." "Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers.

The men must not be ORDERED out on such a service as that." Colonel Dujardin bowed, and retired.
"Volunteers to go out of the trenches!" cried Sergeant La Croix, in a stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker, and swelling with importance.
There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds.
"Only twelve allowed to go," said the sergeant; "and I am one," added he, adroitly inserting himself.
A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death's Alley, but out of the line of fire.
The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun; and to the surprise of the men had the shot weighed first, and then weighed out the powder himself.
He then waited quietly a long time till the bastion pitched one of its periodical shots into Death's Alley, but no sooner had the shot struck, and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious noses, than Colonel Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his cocked hat.

At this preconcerted signal, his battery opened fire on the bastion, and the battery to his right opened on the wall that fronted them; and the colonel gave the word to run the gun out of the trenches.

They ran it out into the cloud of smoke their own guns were belching forth, unseen by the enemy; but they had no sooner twisted it into the line of Long Tom, than the smoke was gone, and there they were, a fair mark.
"Back into the trenches, all but one!" roared Dujardin.
And in they ran like rabbits.
"Quick! the elevation." Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark--hoo, hoo, hoo! ping, ping, ping! came the bullets about their ears.
"Away with you!" cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.
Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full blazing uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do.

He kneeled down and adjusted his gun, just as he would have done in a practising ground.