ten o'clock
Every rod in retreat was a running combat . In the darkness the discharge of the Zouaves ' rifles ran from the guns ' muzzles like streams of molten metal spilling out on the grass . McDunn 's guns spirted great lumps of incandescence ; the fuses of the shells in the sky showered the darkness with swarming sparks . Toward ten o'clock the harried column halted on a hill and bivouacked without fires , food , or shelter . The Zouaves slept on their arms in the drenched herbage ; the Lancers , not daring to unsaddle , lay down on the grass under their patient horses , bridle tied to wrist . An awful anxiety clutched officers and men . Few slept ; the ceaseless and agonised shrieking from an emergency hospital somewhere near them in the darkness almost unnerved them .