arlos as
their next neighbour to the eastward, came galloping over the temporary
drawbridge with a warning to Don Hermoso to fly, with all his family and
dependents, since Weyler, with his army of butchers, was already
approaching in such overpowering strength that nothing could possibly
stand before him. The poor fellow gasped out a breathless story of
ruthlessly savage murder and destruction, telling how he had seen every
atom of his property looted and burnt, every member of his family shot
down; and how he had at the last moment escaped by the skin of his
teeth, with the horse he rode and the clothes that he stood up in as his
sole remaining possessions in the world. He had effected his escape
with some mad idea of flying for his life somewhere, he knew not
whither; but upon learning that Don Hermoso was resolved to defend his
property to the last, the poor fellow--a certain Don Luis Enrile--begged
permission to be allowed to remain and assist in the defence, since he
was now a ruined man and had nothing left to live for save revenge.
Naturally, Don Hermoso readily acceded to his request.

The unhappy Don Luis, having drawn, in broken, gasping sentences, the
main outlines of his tragical story, was still filling in some of the
more lurid details of that morning's happenings upon his farm, when the
lookout perched aloft on the hillside signalled the approach of the
enemy; and while Carlos dashed off in one direction to sound the alarm
bell and occupy his former defence post, Jack rushed off in the other to
raise the temporary drawbridge which had been constructed to take the
place of the wrecked stone bridge, and which was now the only means of
entering upon and leaving the estate. Having raised the bridge, and
carefully secured it against any possibility of becoming lowered by
accident, Jack climbed the structure to its uplifted extremity, and from
thence looked out over the wide plain that gently sloped away toward the
east, south, and west of him; and presently he became aware of a loud,
confused, rumbling jumble of sound which, when he was presently able to
dissect it, resolved itself into a mingled trampling of multitudinous
feet and hoofs, a rumbling and creaking of many wheels, the combined
murmur of many human voices, the occasional low, deep, protesting bellow
of overdriven animals, the crack of whips, and the continuous shouts of
men. The air was still thick with acrid smoke, rendering it difficult
to s