faces were
already visible through the smoke, and amid the crash of the firing
their savage and offensive shouts were audible, as they uttered insults,
suggested a surrender, and threatened slaughter. Some soldiers were
terrified, and withdrew from the windows; the sergeants drove them
forward again. But the fire of the defence weakened; discouragement made
its appearance on all faces. It was not possible to protract the
resistance longer. At a given moment the fire of the Austrians
slackened, and a thundering voice shouted, first in German and then in
Italian, "Surrender!"

"No!" howled the captain from a window.

And the firing recommenced more fast and furious on both sides. More
soldiers fell. Already more than one window was without defenders. The
fatal moment was near at hand. The captain shouted through his teeth, in
a strangled voice, "They are not coming! they are not coming!" and
rushed wildly about, twisting his sword about in his convulsively
clenched hand, and resolved to die; when a sergeant descending from the
garret, uttered a piercing shout, "They are coming!" "They are coming!"
repeated the captain, with a cry of joy.

At that cry all, well and wounded, sergeants and officers, rushed to the
windows, and the resistance became fierce once more. A few moments later
a sort of uncertainty was noticeable, and a beginning of disorder among
the foe. Suddenly the captain hastily collected a little troop in the
room on the ground floor, in order to make a sortie with fixed bayonets.
Then he flew up stairs. Scarcely had he arrived there when they heard a
hasty trampling of feet, accompanied by a formidable hurrah, and saw
from the windows the two-pointed hats of the Italian carabineers
advancing through the smoke, a squadron rushing forward at great speed,
and a lightning flash of blades whirling in the air, as they fell on
heads, on shoulders, and on backs. Then the troop darted out of the
door, with bayonets lowered; the enemy wavered, were thrown into
disorder, and turned their backs; the field was left unincumbered, the
house was free, and a little later two battalions of Italian infantry
and two cannons occupied the eminence.

The captain, with the soldiers that remained to him, rejoined his
regiment, went on fighting, and was slightly wounded in the left hand by
a bullet on the rebound, in the final assault with bayonets.

The day ended with the victory on our side.

But on the following day, the con