The fire's too strong.
Besides, they'd have our men to face." Harry looked about, and saw several thousand men drawn up to dispute the passage, but the Northern troops recognizing its impossibility at that time, made no attempt.

Nevertheless their cannon sent shells curving over the stream, and the Southern cannon sent curving shells in reply.
But the burning bridge roared louder and the pyramid of flame rose higher.

The rain, which had never ceased to pour in a deluge, merely seemed to feed it.
"Ah, she's about to go now," exclaimed Sherburne.
The bridge seemed to Harry to rear up before his eyes like a living thing, and then draw together a mass of burning timbers.

The next moment the whole went with a mighty crash into the river, and the blazing fragments floated swiftly away on the flood.

The deep and rapid Shenandoah flowed a barrier between the armies of Jackson and Fremont.
"A river can be very beautiful without a bridge, Harry, can't it ?" said a voice beside him.
It was St.Clair, a heavy bandage over his left shoulder, but a smoking rifle in his right hand, nevertheless.
"I couldn't stand it any longer, Harry," he said.