Some sank, to stay, and the dark night battle, far more
deadly than that of the night before, reeled to and fro.
The combat at first had been more of a spectacle than anything else to
Paul. The extraordinary play of light and darkness, the innumerable
shadows and flashes on the surface of the bayou, the black tracery of the
forest on either bank, the red beads of flame from the rifle fire
appearing and re-appearing, made of it all a vast panorama for him. There
were the sounds, too, the piratical shout, hoarse and menacing, the Indian
whoop, shriller and with more of the wild beast's whine in it, the fierce,
sharp note of the rifle fire, steady, insistent, and full of threat, and
over it the heavy thudding of the great guns.
It was Paul's eye and ear at first that received the deep impression, but
now the aspect of a panorama passed away and his soul was stirred with a
fierce desire to get on, to cut through the hostile line, to crush down
the opposition, and to reach the full freedom of the wide river. He began
to hate those men who opposed them, the fire of passion that battle breeds
was surely mounting to his head. Unconsciously, Paul, the scholar and
coming statesman, the grave quiet youth, began to shout and to hurl
invectives at those who presumed to hold them back.
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