two o'clock
in the morning
The guns on the batteries were kept double shotted , and through the long nights dark lanterns were kept burning , and linstocks ready for firing lay beside every gun . Ever and anon a live shell screamed through the air , one of which penetrating an American magazine , caused it to explode with fearful violence . On the 14th of August , after a vigorous bombardment , a night attack , in three columns , was made upon the fort . At two o'clock in the morning , the columns moved out of the trenches , with the utmost silence , bearing scaling ladders , and crept stealthily over the plain toward the apparently slumbering fort . Dark clouds hung low , and the only sounds heard were the melancholy cry of the loon and the measured dash of the waves upon the shore . At length the American picket discovered the approach of the British columns and gave the alarm . The bugles rang shrill in the ear of night .