At this time, too, the whole of Quay Side was a mass of roaring, crackling flames, the thin spire of St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cathedral had been shot away, Bainbridge's great emporium was blazing furiously, and the Art Club premises had taken fire. One shot had fallen at the back of the Town Hall, and torn an enormous hole in the wall, while another, entering the first floor of the County Hotel, had burst with awful force, and carried away the greater part of its gloomy façade.
In the Central Station opposite, dozens of shells had exploded, and it was now on fire, hopelessly involved together with the adjoining Station Hotel. The grey front of the imposing Chronicle building had been wrecked by a shell that had descended upon the roof, and a row of dark old-fashioned houses in Eldon Square had been demolished.
The same fate had been shared by the Co-operative Wholesale Society's warehouse, the Fish Market, the Journal office, and both the Crown and Métropole Hotels at the bottom of Clayton Street.
Yet the firing continued; the terrified citizens were granted no quarter. The Royal Arcade was blown to atoms, the new red brick buildings of the Prudential Assurance Company were set on fire, and were blazing with increasing fury. The building of the North British and Mercantile Assurance Company, the Savings Bank at the corner of Newgate Street, and the Empire Theatre were wrecked. Along New Bridge Street dozens of houses were blown to pieces, several fine residences in Ellison Place were utterly demolished and blocked the roadway with their débris, and the whole city, from the river up to Brandling Village, was swept time after time by salvoes of devastating shots. Rows of houses fell, and in hundreds the terrified people were massacred. Away over the Nun's Moor shells were hurled and burst, and others were precipitated into the great Armstrong works at Elswick.
Suddenly, in the midst of the incessant thunder, a series of terrific explosions occurred, and the great High Level Bridge collapsed, and fell with an awful crash into the Tyne. The enemy had placed dynamite under the huge brick supports, and blown them up simultaneously. A few moments later the Swing Bridge was treated in similar manner; but the enemy, under the galling fire from the Volunteer batteries, were now losing frightfully. Many of the new guns at the Elswick works were brought into action, and several ironclads in the course of construction afforded cover to those desperately defending their homes.
But this blow of the invaders had been struck at a most inopportune moment, and was evidently the result of an order that had been imperfectly understood. It caused them to suffer a greater disaster than they had anticipated. Six torpedo boats and two gun-vessels had passed under the bridge, and, lying off the Haughs, were firing into the Elswick works at the moment when the bridges were demolished, and the débris, falling across the stream, cut off all means of escape.
The defenders, noticing this, worked on, pounding away at the hostile craft with merciless monotony, until one after another the French and Russians were blown to atoms, and their vessels sank beneath them into the dark, swirling waters.
While this was proceeding, two mines, one opposite Hill Gate, at Gateshead, and the other near the Rotterdam Wharf, on the Newcastle side, were fired by the Volunteer Engineers, who thus succeeded in blowing up two more French gunboats, while the battery at the foot of the Swing Bridge sank two more torpedo boats, and that in front of the Chemical Works at Gateshead sent a shell into the "vitals" of one of the most powerful torpedo gunboats, with the result that she blew up.
Everywhere the enemy were being cut to pieces.
Seeing the trap into which their vessels had fallen above the ruined bridges, and feeling that they had caused sufficient damage, they turned, and with their guns still belching forth flame, steamed at half speed back again towards the sea.
But they were not allowed to escape so easily, for the mines recently laid by the Volunteers were now brought into vigorous play, and in the long reach of the river between High Walker and Wallsend no fewer than six more of the enemy's gun and torpedo boats had their bottoms blown out, and their crews torn limb from limb.
Flashed throughout the land, the news of the enemy's repulse, though gained at such enormous loss, excited a feeling of profound satisfaction.
The injury inflicted on the invaders had been terrible, and from that attack upon the Tyne they had been hurled reeling back the poorer by the loss of a whole fleet of torpedo and gun boats, one of the most effective arms of their squadrons, while the sea had closed over one of France's proudest battleships, the Neptune, and no fewer than four of her cruisers.
The surviving vessels, which retreated round the Black Middens and gained the open sea, all more or less had their engines crippled, and not half the men that had manned them escaped alive.
They had wrought incalculable damage, it is true, for part of Newcastle was burning, and the loss of life had been terrible; yet they were driven back by the Volunteers' desperately vigorous fire, and the lives of many thousands in Newcastle and Gateshead had thus been saved at the eleventh hour by British patriots.
Alas, it was a black day in England's history!
Was this to be a turning-point in the wave of disaster which had swept so suddenly upon our land?
CHAPTER XVII
HELP FROM OUR COLONIES
Days passed — dark, dismal, dispiriting. Grim-visaged War had crushed all joy and gaiety from British hearts, and fierce patriotism and determination to fight on until the bitter end mingled everywhere with hunger, sadness, and despair. British homes had been desecrated, British lives had been sacrificed, and through the land the invaders rushed ravaging with fire and sword.
Whole towns had been overwhelmed and shattered, great tracts of rich land in Sussex and Hampshire had been laid waste, and the people, powerless against the enormous forces sweeping down upon them, had been mercilessly mowed down and butchered by Cossacks, whose brutality was fiendish. Everywhere there were reports of horrible atrocities, of heartless murders, and wholesale slaughter of the helpless and unoffending.
The situation, both in Great Britain and on the Continent, was most critical. The sudden declaration of hostilities by France and Russia had resulted in a great war in which nearly all European nations were involved. Germany had sent her enormous land forces over her frontiers east and west, successfully driving back the French along the Vosges, and occupying Dijon, Chalons-sur-Saône, and Lyons. Valmy, Nancy, and Metz had again been the scenes of sanguinary encounters, and Chaumont and Troyes had both fallen into the hands of the Kaiser's legions. In Poland, however, neither Germans nor Austrians had met with such success. A fierce battle had been fought at Thorn between the Tsar's forces and the Germans, and the former, after a desperate stand, were defeated, and the Uhlans, dragoons, and infantry of the Fatherland had swept onward up the valley of the Vistula to Warsaw. Here the resistance offered by General Bodisco was very formidable, but the city was besieged, while fierce fighting was taking place all across the level country that lay between the Polish capital and the Prussian frontier. Austrians and Hungarians fought fiercely, the Tyrolese Jägers displaying conspicuous bravery at Brody, Cracow, Jaroslav, and along the banks of the San, and they had succeeded up to the present in preventing the Cossacks and Russian infantry from reaching the Carpathians, although an Austrian army corps advancing into Russia along the Styr had been severely cut up and forced to retreat back to Lemberg.
Italy had burst her bonds. Her Bersaglieri, cuirassiers, Piedmontese cavalry, and carabiniers had marched along the Corniche road into Provence, and, having occupied Nice, Cannes, and Draguigan, were on their way to attack Marseilles, while the Alpine infantry, taking the road over Mont Cenis, had, after very severe fighting in the beautiful valley between Susa and Bardonnechia, at last occupied Modane and Chambéry, and now intended joining hands with the Germans at Lyons.
France was now receiving greater punishment than she had