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But at length seeing that all our good intentions were of no avail, and that all the natives had put on their wooden corselets and rope armor and had armed themselves with their lances, shields, small cutlasses, and arrows; and that many plumes and varicolored headdresses were waving; and that help of men had come in praus from the outside, so that their number must be almost two thousand warriors; and considering that now was the time for us to make a settlement and effect a colony, and that the present port and location were exactly suited to our needs, and that it was useless for us to wait any longer; and seeing that there was no hope for peace, and that they did not wish it, although we had offered it the master-of-camp said to the natives through an interpreter: "Since you do not desire our friendship, and will not receive us peacefully, but are anxious for war, wait until we have landed; and look to it that you act as men, and defend yourselves from us, and guard your houses."
Somehow the regiment struggled through, and up the bank on the south side. Nigh a score of lances had been left in dervish bodies, some broken, others intact. Lieutenant Wormwald made a point at a fleeing Baggara, but his sabre bent and had to be laid aside. Captain Fair's sword snapped over dervish steel, and he flung the hilt in his opponent's face.
With this reply and a letter of the same purport for the governor, Don Luys Navarrete was dismissed. He was given a present for the governor consisting of lances, armor, and catans, considered rare and valuable by the Japanese. The ambassador thereupon left Miaco and went to Nangasaqui, whence by the first ship sailing to Manila, he sent word to Governor Don Francisco concerning his negotiations.
No mercy was shown to age or sex; it was a savage and indiscriminate butchery. Now and then a Spanish horseman, either through an emotion of pity, or an impulse of avarice, caught up a child, to bear it off in safety; but it was barbarously pierced by the lances of his companions.
'So they are, he said, 'like plumed lances. And how beautifully that beech bends, what an exquisite curve, like a lance bent in the shock of the encounter. The underwood seemed to promise endless peace, happy life amid leaves and birds; and Mildred thought of a duel under the tall trees. She saw two men fighting to the death for her.
From every side arose the shouting, "Swiftly, swiftly; bridle and spur; gallop, gallop." The whole host was mightily moved together. They set saddles on destriers, and led the steeds from the stable. They girt their baldrics about them, and taking their lances, spurred after the fugitives. The three barons pricked swiftly across the plain.
Lo! from over the crest of the rise rushed squadron upon squadron of turbaned cavalry, who, as they came, set their lances in rest, and shouted: "Salah-ed-din! Salah-ed-din!" The Assassins saw also, and turned to fly too late! "A horse! A horse!" screamed Godwin in Arabic; and presently how he never knew found himself mounted and charging with the Saracens.
The desert ceased, the caravan entered upon a vast but fruitful plain. In the extreme distance might be descried a long undulating line of palm-trees. The vanguard gave a shout, shook their tall lances in the air, and rattled their scimitars in rude chorus against their small round iron shields.
Snowy hands were raised to heaven from amid fiery flames, with piteous shrieks which would have moved the damp earth itself to pity and caused the steppe-grass to bend with compassion at their fate. But the cruel Cossacks paid no heed; and, raising the children in the streets upon the points of their lances, they cast them also into the flames.
"I always feel mighty sorry for them. They hadn't nothin' to do with gittin' up this rebellion. We must go around and kill such as is alive, and put them out o' their misery." Monty resumed: "And there lay the rider, distorted and pale. With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail; And the tents were all silent, the banners alone. The lances uplifted, the trumpets unblown."
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