tinct, to reach some clearer ground where they could re-form. Three
faces were still intact, but the fourth had been caved in, and badly
mauled, without its comrades being able to help it. The Guards had met
a fresh rush of the Hadendowas, and had blown back the tribesmen with a
volley, and the cavalry had ridden over another stream of them, as they
welled out of the gully. A litter of hamstrung horses, and haggled men
behind them, showed that a spearman on his face among the bushes can
show some sport to the man who charges him. But, in spite of all, the
square was still reeling swiftly backwards, trying to shake itself clear
of this torment which clung to its heart. Would it break or would it
re-form? The lives of five regiments and the honour of the flag hung
upon the answer.

Some, at least, were breaking. The C Company of the Mallows had lost
all military order, and was pushing back in spite of the haggard
officers, who cursed, and shoved, and prayed in the vain attempt to hold
them. The captain and the subs. were elbowed and jostled, while the men
crowded towards Private Conolly for their orders. The confusion had not
spread, for the other companies, in the dust and smoke and turmoil, had
lost touch with their mutinous comrades. Captain Foley saw that even
now there might be time to avert a disaster. "Think what you are doing,
man," he yelled, rushing towards the ringleader. "There are a thousand
Irish in the square, and they are dead men if we break."

The words alone might have had little effect on the old moonlighter.
It is possible that, in his scheming brain, he had already planned how
he was to club his Irish together and lead them to the sea. But at that
moment the Arabs broke through the screen of camels which had fended
them off. There was a Struggle, a screaming, a mule rolled over, a
wounded man sprang up in a cacolet with a spear through him, and then
through the narrow gap surged a stream of naked savages, mad with
battle, drunk with slaughter, spotted and splashed with blood--blood
dripping from their spears, their arms, their faces. Their yells, their
bounds, their crouching, darting figures, the horrid energy of their
spear-thrusts, made them look like a blast of fiends from the pit. And
were these the Allies of Ireland? Were these the men who were to strike
for her against her enemies? Conolly's soul rose up in loathing at the
thought.

He was a man of firm purpose, and yet at the