he hall below was
flooded with the advancing Loco-Focos. Stealthily but swiftly they
advanced, little dreaming of the reception that awaited them. The
staircase was certainly a very defensible position; it was not wide, and
made a sharp bend near the top, so that the assailants could not see the
danger that threatened them. The foremost pressed eagerly up-stairs, and
just as they arrived at this turn, their leader could no longer contain
himself. "Now, boys," he exclaimed, with a flourish of his bludgeon,
"we'll give the Whigs their gruel!"

"_No you don't!_"

And as Travis spoke, slam-bang came the big plank above mentioned, which
shot out with startling suddenness, and worked with commendable
dexterity, made a clean sweep of the whole first column. The leader and
five or six more were hurled bodily into the air, and tumbled upon the
heads of their followers, while fifteen or twenty others were pitched
down the upper flight of ten steps. The mass on the main staircase below
recoiled with the shock, and as those in the hall still pressed onward,
a dense body was wedged together in woful confusion. "Tippecanoe and
Tyler too!" shouted Travis, and the Whigs poured forth from the room,
and mustered thickly at the head of the staircase, exulting in the
disaster of their opponents, while the end of the plank, which had been
reset for action, peered over the banisters, as if saying, "Come on, if
you dare!"

The foremost enemies were evidently unwilling to encounter this
formidable engine of defence, but the pressure from behind drove them
forward. Their first leader was _hors du combat_, and they were now
headed by a young man of tolerably respectable appearance, clearly not
one of the regular Butt-enders. "Let go!" cried Travis, and the
primitive ram was again shot forward, but not with equal success.
Several of the Locos were knocked down, but others threw themselves
desperately on the plank, and their general, by a dexterous movement,
placed himself within it. Travis recognized his cousin Lloyd! It was a
fine bit of romance, but there was no time to fabricate reflections
corresponding, for even as he made the discovery, the amateur Spartan
was springing up the stairs, and the man who had been most active in
managing the plank went down before his hickory. The fallen Whig upset
the board with him, and it lay upon the stairs, useless as a weapon, but
still impeding the enemy's advance. At the same moment, a stalwart
Irish