THE APRIL BOMBARDMENT. 151 mightiest ordnance, one ought to have some idea chap. of the ways of a cannon-ball when obstructed ! — without being stopped. Whether taking its flight through the air, or The ways oi encountering more solid obstacles ; a round-shot bau n when p , , i i • . • , i obstructed of course must be always obeying strict, natural without laws, and must work out the intricate reckoning stepped, enjoined by conflict of power with absolute, ser- vile exactness ; but between the ' composition of ' forces ' maintained in our physical world and the fixed resolve of a mind made up under warring motives there is always analogy, with even some- times strange resemblance ; * and to untutored hearers a formula set down in algebra would convey less idea of the path of a hindered, though not vanquished cannon-ball than would the simple speech of a savage who, after tracing its course (as only savages can), has called it a demon let loose. For not only does it seem to be armed with a mighty will, but somehow to govern its action with ever-ready intelligence, and even to have a ' policy.' The demon is cruel and firm ; not blindly, not stupidly ob- stinate. He is not a straightforward enemy. Against things that are hard and directly con- fronting him he indeed frankly tries his strength, and does his utmost to shatter them, and send them in splinters and fragments to widen the havoc he brings ; but with obstacles that are
- I ouce saw an instance in which ' composition of forces ' —
forces simply mechanical — was so completely mistaken for heroic resolve that it excited a lively enthusiasm.( 3 )
