United States or China ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Don't you know, ef that old sow had been in them woods, the boys would have got her up las' fall an' ef they hadn't, she'd come up long befo' this?" "Mister Hall ketch you boys puttin' his hogs up in pen, he'll teck you up," said Lucy Ann, in her usual teasing way. This was too much for the boys to stand after all they had done. Uncle Balla must be right. They would have to admit it.
"Hi, Mistis," broke in Uncle Balla, "whar is I got to go? I wuz born on dis place an' I 'spec' to die here, an' be buried right yonder;" and he turned and pointed up to the dark clumps of trees that marked the graveyard on the hill, a half mile away, where the colored people were buried. "Dat I does," he affirmed positively. "Y' all sticks by us, and we'll stick by you."
By a jet of stones blown out through the Balla Hissar gate four Afghans were killed, and two sowars and an Afghan badly hurt. Captain Shafto's body and the remains of the Goorkhas were found later, and buried; and the determination was formed to have no more to do with the Balla Hissar, but to occupy the Sherpur cantonment.
Old Balla held his torch inside the house, amid a confused cackle and flutter of fowls. "Well, ef 'tain' a white man, and a soldier at dat!" he exclaimed. "What you doin' heah, robbin' white folks' hen-roos'?" he called, roughly. "Git up off dat groun'; you ain' sick."
Another road was constructed from Behmaroo village to the Siah Sung heights and yet another from the south-eastern gateway direct to the Balla Hissar, on both of which there were bridges across the Cabul river. Along the northern face of Cabul from Deh Afghan to the Balla Hissar, a road broad enough for guns was made, and another broad road cut through the lower Balla Hissar.
Sabres flashed in front of the procession, bayonets sparkled in its rear, as it wended its way through the great bazaar which Pollock was to destroy three years later, and along the tortuous street to the gate of the Balla Hissar. But neither the monarch nor his pageant kindled the enthusiasm in the Cabulees.
There was a bond of sympathy between Uncle Balla and his mistress which did not exist so strongly between her and any of the other servants. It was due perhaps to the fact that he was the companion and friend of her boys.
"It's in a line with the longest limb of the big oak-tree by the gate," added Willy, "and when this locust bush and that cedar grow to be big trees, it will be just half-way between them." As this seemed to Balla a very good place, he set to work at once to dig, the two boys helping him as well as they could.
So after a trial of Roberts' mettle at Charasiah, and finding the testing sample not quite to their taste, the Afghans fell into an attitude of expectancy, and were mightily relieved by his proclamation read at the Balla Hissar durbar of October 12th.
"I know I ain't gwine nowhar wid no Yankees or nothin'," said Lucy Ann, in an undertone. "Dee tell me dee got hoofs and horns," laughed one of the women in the yard. The boys' mother started to say something further to Balla, but though she opened her lips, she did not speak; she turned suddenly and walked into the house and into her chamber, where she shut the door behind her.
Word Of The Day