For a second,
perhaps, he stared, amazed at his own prowess, and with that the lust
of battle seized him.

He rained blows; yet with cunning, running forth and back into our
ranks as each was delivered; and between the blows he capered,
uttering shrill inarticulate cries. This diversion indeed saved us.
For the rabble, pressing up to see the fun, left a space more or less
clear on the far side of the Market Strand, and for this space we
stampeded, dragging the Mayor along with us.

The next thing I remember was fighting side by side with Nat before a
door beneath the window where I had seen the woman throwing down her
handfuls of artificial flowers. The lower windows were barred, but
the door stood open; and we fought to defend it whilst my father
lifted the Mayor of Falmouth by his coat-collar and the seat of his
breeches and flung him inside. Then we too backed and, ducking
indoors under the arms of the little man in black--who stood on the
step swinging the borough mace as though to scythe off the head of
any one who approached within five feet of it--seized him by the
coat-tails, dragged him inside and, slamming to the door (which shut
with two flaps), locked and bolted it and leant against it with all
our weight.

Yet a common house-door is but a flimsy barricade against a mob,
especially if that mob be led by five-and-twenty stout-bodied seaman.
We had shut it merely to gain time, and when the cudgels outside
began to play tattoo upon its upper panels I looked for no more than
a minute's respite at the best.

It puzzled me therefore when--and immediately upon two ugly blows
that had well-nigh shaken the lock from its fastenings--the shouting
suddenly subsided into a confused hubbub of voices, followed by a
clang and rattle of arms upon the cobblestones. This last sound
appeared to hush the others into silence. I stood listening, with my
hip pressed against the lock to hold it firm against the next
concussion. None came: but presently some one rapped with his
knuckles on the upper panel and a voice, authoritative but civil
enough, challenged us in the name of King George to open.

To this I had almost answered bidding him go to the devil, when a
damsel put her head over the stair-rail of the landing above and
called down to us to obey and open at once: and looking up in the dim
light of the passage I recognized her for the one who had scattered
the flowers, just now, to the rioters.

"Pardon me," s