directed entirely against the east side, and to
that quarter the two of us ran fleetly.

"Spare guns this way!" the factor shouted at the top of his voice.
"Stand firm, men!"

The scene that followed baffles description. There was no panic or
fright, nor did the men entirely desert the other sides of the fort for
the threatened point; but all who could be spared rallied to the north.
I felt sure that this second rush would be a more serious business than
the first, and I was not mistaken.

I quickly reached the stockade--I did not see what had become of
Griffith Hawke--and managed to squeeze my way through to one of the
loopholes. At grave risk--for the fire was already heavy on both
sides--I peered briefly out. Through the smoke and snow I saw the dusky
warriors advancing in great numbers and at close quarters, filling the
air with their infernal yells. Some carried felled saplings with the
branches lopped off short, the purpose of which was plain.

One glimpse was enough. I began to fire with my comrades, reckless of
the bullets that whizzed about me. From angle to angle of the north
stockade, from the embrasures of the tower, poured a deadly sheet of
flame. A howitzer crashed, and then a swivel gun. I fired three
times--spare muskets were passed to me--and I drew back from the
loophole to reload. By the ruddy flashes I recognized friends--Baptiste
and Captain Rudstone, Griffith Hawke and Andrew Menzies, the excited
countenance of Christopher Burley in the rear.

"Rake them down," the factor cried shrilly. "Beat them off if you can.
Don't let them get a footing inside!"

The words were hardly uttered when the stockade groaned and rattled. The
savages had reared their rude scaling ladders against it, and by these
means some gained the top, while others clambered up with the agility of
cats.

It was a most desperate and daring assault, but we met it with the
dogged pluck of men who fight for a last chance. We shot half a score of
the devils as they clung to the top of the stockade, and speedily
finished others who dropped down among us.

They poured over thicker and faster, screeching like fiends, and now we
were driven back a little. We fired as long as we could load, and then
made an onset with clubbed muskets. The advantage was on our side, the
Indians being mostly armed with tomahawks, and though more than a score
of them were inside at once, we soon sent them scrambling back, and so
checked the incoming t