to take the other portion. If only they could have come to
close quarters with him, they would have crushed him with one hand;
but get at him they could not--that required skill, not strength.

At last the besiegers set the town on fire all around him, but still
Ali did not budge from his place, and the wind blew the flames in the
face of Gaskho Bey, who began to look about him uncomfortably when the
two Suliote kinsfolk, Kleon and Artemis, at the head of their
squadrons, urged him to boldly assault the market-place.

Tepelenti saw the girl with her white banner, and as her troops filled
the broad space at the head of the square, he himself, at first, drew
near to her. Four cannons were pointed at the Suliotes, loaded with
chain-shot and broken glass. Ali looked towards them with a gloomy
countenance, then stuck his sword in its sheath, bade his gunners turn
the guns round, harness the horses to them, and take refuge in the
citadel. He would not let a single shot be fired at the Suliotes.

The moment Ali turned his back, the besieging host captured the field
of battle. They followed hard upon the heels of the retreating band
all the way, and when Ali reached the bridge, the Spahis and
Timariots, like two swarms of bees mingled together, gained the head
of the bridge at the same time, and swarmed after him with a shout of
triumph. The real struggle began on the bridge itself. Man to man they
fought at close quarters with their shorter weapons (they could use no
other), and clubs and dirks did bloody work in the throng which poured
from two different quarters, along and over the overcrowded bridge
like ants coming out of a slender reed. Six hundred of the Albanians
succeeded in escaping into the citadel, and then, at Ali's command,
the iron gates were clapped to, leaving the remaining hundred to
perish on the bridge, where the overwhelming crowd swallowed them up.
Each single Albanian fought against ten to twenty Timariots. The
bridge rang with the din of combat, and trembled beneath the weight of
the heavy crowd. Then suddenly the guns on both sides of the bastions
which were attached to the bridge began to roar, the supports of the
captured bridge collapsed, and the bridge itself, with its load of
fighting Turks and Albanians, plunged down into the deep trenches
below.

Down there were sharp-pointed stakes beneath the deep waters, and
those of the besiegers who remained on the bank were horrified to
perceive that n