[Illustration: "THERE WAS A TREMENDOUS ROAR AND A BLINDING CRASH."]
Prepared as they were for a scene of destruction, the reality far
exceeded their expectations. All the waggons within a considerable
distance of the explosions were smashed into fragments, their wheels
broken and the axles twisted. The ammunition trucks had disappeared, and
many close to them had been completely shattered. Those in which the
muskets had been were a mere heap of fragments; the rest of the trucks
lay, some with their sides blown in, others comparatively uninjured.
Some were piled on the top of others three or four deep; their contents
were scattered over the whole yard. Boxes and cases were burst open, and
their contents--including large quantities of tea, sugar, tinned
provisions in vast quantities, and other stores--ruined.
Some still smoking brands showed where the huts had stood, and the dead
bodies of some twenty natives and several Portuguese officials, were
scattered here and there. The bodies of eight Boers were laid out
together by the bridge, and forty or fifty men were wandering aimlessly
amid the ruins. A huge cannon stood upright nearly in the centre of the
yard. It had fallen on its muzzle, which had penetrated some feet into
the earth.
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