onth,
making continual sallies at the head of his men, and doing every thing
that the most resolute and reckless bravery could do to harass and
beat off the besiegers. But all was in vain. In the end the walls of
the citadel were so broken down by the engines brought to bear upon
them, that one day the Monguls, by a determined and desperate assault
made on all sides simultaneously, forced their way in, through the
most dreadful scenes of carnage and destruction, and began killing
without mercy every soldier that they could find.

The soldiers defended themselves to the last. Some took refuge in
narrow courts and lanes, and on the roofs of the houses--for the
citadel was so large that it formed of itself quite a little town--and
fought desperately till they were brought down by the arrows of the
Monguls. The governor took his position, in company with two men who
were with him, on a terrace of his palace, and refused to surrender,
but fought on furiously, determined to kill any one who attempted to
come near him. His wife was near, doing all in her power to encourage
and sustain him.

Genghis Khan had given orders to the princes not to kill the governor,
but to take him alive. He wished to have the satisfaction of disposing
of him himself. For this reason the soldiers who attempted to take him
on the terrace were very careful not to shoot their arrows at him, but
only at the men who were with him, and while they did so a great many
of them were killed by the arrows which the governor and his two
friends discharged at those who attempted to climb up to the place
where they were standing.

[Illustration: THE GOVERNOR ON THE TERRACE.]

After a while the two men were killed, but the governor remained
alive. Yet nobody could come near him. Those that attempted it were
shot, and fell back again among their companions below. The governor's
wife supplied him with arrows as fast as he could use them. At length
all the arrows were spent, and then she brought him stones, which he
hurled down upon his assailants when they tried to climb up to him.
But at last so many ascended together that the governor could not beat
them all back, and he was at length surrounded and secured, and
immediately put in irons.

The princes wrote word at once to their father that the town was
taken, and that the governor was in their hands a prisoner. They
received orders in return to bring him with them to Bokhara. While on
the way, however, anoth