State Library of NSW
[Page 146]
(4)Then too had buildings crumpled up in a crash like the fall of childrens toys, and yet men had smiledThen too was the air, ever like a great unseen giant of friendly sport, buffeting with his hands till irritability came to all, by his ceaseless pranks.Such was the effect of our own gun fire. But they were grand those guns. They were for ever booming, cracking and roaring with full throated defiance and the splendid dignity which is a lasting [inheritance?] of all canon.True it is that modern methods of battle compelled them to snuggle under a thicket, in the leafy corner of a cemetery close to the sleeping dead, beneath the debris of a shattered barn; or in the rich foliage of a gardenOr perhaps to plaster their splendid brass and steel of burnished strength with the blackness of slimy sand, and the whiteness of chalk.Yet in spite of this necessary slinking and hiding, those guns retained their dignity always. And they held their breath in anger whenever the enemy'shung over planes hung over.
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