Five Germans tumbled to the bridge.

A sudden idea struck Hal.

“There’s no use wasting five bullets on each German,” he told his men.  “Let the five men on the left each pick out a man.  The rest reserve your fire unless one of our men go down, then the one nearest him take his man, and so on!”

The second five Germans were too close behind their comrades, who had just fallen, to arrest their steps in time to avoid the British fire.

Five shots rang out as they came into view, and again five Germans fell.  So far not a shot had been fired by the Germans.  But now five more came around the turn with a rush, followed by five more, and still another five.

The first five dropped in a heap, but from the second five came a burst of flame and the crack of rifles.  Two men behind the barricade dropped, one of whom was Capt.  Lee.  But the Germans paid dearly for their rash attack.

In less time than it takes to tell it, ten more Germans had bitten the dust.  Then they drew off.

“Good work, men!” cried Chester.  “We can hold them off indefinitely,” he added to Hal.

“Looks like it,” was Hal’s reply.  “But if they make a concerted rush we shall have our hands full.  How is Capt.  Lee?”

“Very bad,” answered one of the men.  “I am afraid he’s done for.”

And now the Germans came on again.  The first five met the same fate that had overtaken their comrades, but behind them came more, and still more.

As each German rounded the turn in the bridge his rifle cracked, and continued to crack until he fell.  Men inside the barricade also were beginning to fall fast now, and the reserve lines were being drawn upon more rapidly each minute.

Hal and Chester, crouching down, directed the defense.  In spite of the fearful havoc wrought by the British fire, the Germans came on.  The bridge was piled high with dead and wounded, but the enemy did not hesitate.

Their officers urged them on without regard for life, and bravely went to death with them.  Rifles cracked in a steady roar and men on both sides fell rapidly.  But each Englishman, sheltered as he was behind the barricade, accounted for at least several of the enemy before he himself went to his death.

Now the defenders had dwindled to fifty, and still there was no cessation of the German assault.  The heaped up bodies of dead now formed a barricade for the Germans, and they advanced and fell behind them, using their dead companions as shields.  Ten or fifteen rows deep they stood behind their dead, and poured volley after volley into the defenders.

The British reserved their fire as much as possible, but whenever a German head showed above the barricade of bodies a rifle cracked and almost every time a German fell.

All afternoon the fighting continued, the Germans, because of the fierce fire of the remaining English and hampered by their own dead, being unable to rush the defenders.