rses in the bushes and quickly formed a
circle. The soil was all soft sand. We cut the thin sod with our butcher
knives and began throwing up a low defence, working like fiends with our
hands and elbows and toes, scooping out the sand with our tin plates,
making the commencement of shallow pits. We were stationed in couples,
and I was beside Morton when the onslaught came. Up from the undulating
south, and down over the north bluff swept the furious horde. On they
came with terrific speed, their blood-curdling yells of hate mingling
with the wild songs, and cries and taunts of hundreds of squaws and
children that crowded the heights out of range of danger, watching the
charge and urging their braves to battle. Over the slopes to the very
banks of the creek, into the sandy bed of the stream, and up to the
island they hurled their forces, while bullets crashed murderously, and
arrows whizzed with deadly swiftness into our little sand-built defence.

In the midst of the charge, twice above the din, I caught the clear
notes of an artillery bugle. It was dim daylight now. Rifle-smoke and
clouds of dust and gray mist shot through with flashes of powder, and
the awful rage, as if all the demons of Hell were crying vengeance, are
all in that picture burned into my memory with a white-hot brand. And
above all these there come back to me the faces of that little band of
resolute men biding the moment when the command to charge should be
given. Such determination and such splendid heroism, not twice in a
lifetime is it vouchsafed to many to behold.

We held our fire until the enemy was almost upon us. At the right
instant our rifles poured out a perfect billow of death. Painted bodies
reeled and fell; horses sank down, or rushed mad with pain, upon their
fallen riders; shrieks of agony mingled with the unearthly yells; while
above all this, the steady roar of our guns--not a wasted bullet in all
the line--carried death waves out from the island thicket. To me that
first defence of ours was more tragic than anything in the days and
nights that followed it. The first hour's struggle seasoned me for the
siege.

The fury of the Indian warriors and of the watching squaws is
indescribable. The foe deflected to left and right, vainly seeking to
carry their dead from the field with them. The effort cost many Indian
lives. The long grass on either side of the stream was full of
sharpshooters. The morning was bright now, and we durst not