“I will take one more thorough look, your honour,” answered the serjeant, mounting to the ridge of the building, where he obtained the immaterial advantage of seeing more at the same time, at the risk of exposing his whole person, should any hostile rifle be in reach of a bullet—­“then we may be certain.”

Joyce was a man who stood just six feet in his stockings, and, losing no part of this stature by his setting up, a better object for a sharp-shooter could not have been presented than he now offered.  The crack of a rifle soon saluted the ears of the garrison; then followed the whizzing of the bullet as it came humming through the air towards the Hut.  But the report was so distant as at once to announce that the piece was discharged from the margin of the forest; a certain evidence of two important facts; one, that the enemy had fallen back to a cover; the other, that the house was narrowly watched.

Nothing tries the nerves of a young soldier more than the whizzing of a distant fire.  The slower a bullet or a shot approaches, the more noise it makes; and, the sound continuing longer than is generally imagined, the uninitiated are apt to imagine that the dangerous missile is travelling on an errand directly towards themselves.  Space appears annihilated, and raw hands are often seen to duck at a round shot that is possibly flying a hundred yards from them.

On the present occasion, the younger Pliny fairly squatted below the root Jamie thought it prudent to put some of his own masonry, which was favourably placed in an adjacent chimney for such a purpose, between him and the spot whence the report proceeded; while even Blodget looked up into the air, as if he expected to see where the bullet was going.  Captain Willoughby had no thought of the missile he was looking for the smoke in the skirts of the woods, to note the spot; while Joyce, with folded arms, stood at rest on the ridge, actually examining the valley in another direction, certain that a fire so distant could not be very dangerous.

Jamie’s calculation proved a good one.  The bullet struck against the chimney, indented a brick, and fell upon the shingles of the roof.  Joyce descended at the next instant, and he coolly picked up, and kept tossing the flattened bit of lead in his hand, for the next minute or two, with the air of a man who seemed unconscious of having it at all.

“The enemy is besieging us, your honour,” said Joyce, “but he will not attack at present.  If I might presume to advise, we shall do well to leave a single sentinel on this stage, since no one can approach the palisades without being seen, if the man keeps in motion.”

“I was thinking of this myself, serjeant; we will first post Blodget here.  We can trust him; and, as the day advances, a-less intelligent sentinel will answer.  At the same time, he must be instructed to keep an eye in the rear of the Hut, danger often coming from the quarter least expected.”