Suddenly Valency, who was some hundred yards in advance, was encountered by a Greek, riding at full speed towards the advancing troop.
“Back! back! silence!” the man cried. He was a scout, who had been sent on before, and now brought tidings that a troop of three or four hundred of the Turkish army were entering the defile, and would soon advance on the handful of men which Valency accompanied. The scout rode directly up to the leader, and made his report, adding—
“We have yet time. If we fall back but a quarter of a mile, there is a path I know, by which I can guide you across the mountain; on the other side we shall be safe.”
A smile of scorn for a moment wreathed the lip of the chief at the word safety, but his face soon reassumed its usual sad composure. The troop had halted; each man bent his eye on the leader. Valency, in particular, marked the look of scorn, and felt that he would never retreat before danger.
“Comrades!” the chief thus addressed his men, “it shall never be said that Greeks fell back to make way for the destroyers; we will betake ourselves to our old warfare. Before we entered this olive wood, we passed a thick cover, where the dark jutting mountainside threw a deep shadow across our path, and the torrent drowned all sound of voice or hoof. There we shall find ambush; there the enemy will meet death.”
He turned his horse’s head, and in a few minutes reached the spot he named; the men were mostly eager for the fray—while one or two eyed the mountainside, and then the path that led to the village, which they had quitted that morning. The chief saw their look, and he glanced also at the English youth, who had thrown himself from his horse, and was busy loading and priming his arms. The chief rode up to him.
“You are our guest and fellow-traveller,” he said, “but not our comrade in the fight. We are about to meet danger—it may be that not one of us shall escape. You have no injuries to avenge, no liberty to gain; you have friends—probably a mother—in your native land. You must not fall with us. I am going to send a message to warn the village we last passed through—do you accompany my messengers.”
Valency had listened attentively at first; but as the chief continued, his attention reverted to his task of loading his pistols. The last words called a blush into his cheek.
“You treat me as a boy,” he cried; “I may be one in aspect, but you shall find me a man in heart this day. You also young, I have not deserved your scorn!”
The chief caught the youth’s flashing eye. He held out his hand to him, saying, “Forgive me.”
“I will,” said Valency, “on one condition; give me a post of danger—of honour. You owe it to me in reparation of the insult you offered.”
“Be it so,” said the chief; “your place shall be at my side.”
A few minutes more and his dispositions were made;—two of the most downhearted of the troop were despatched to alarm the village, the rest were placed behind the rocks; beneath the bushes, wherever broken ground, or tuft of underwood, or fragment from the cliff, afforded shelter and concealment, a man was placed; while the chief himself took his stand on an elevated platform, and, sheltered by a tree, gazed upon the road. Soon the tramp of horses, the busy sound of feet and voices were heard, overpowering the rushing of the stream; and turban and musket could be distinguished as the enemy’s troop threaded the defile.
The shout of battle—the firing—the clash of weapons were over. Above the crest of the hill, whose side had afforded ambush to the Greeks, the crescent moon hung, just about to dip behind; the stars in her train burnt bright as lamps floating in the firmament; while the fireflies flashed among the myrtle underwood and up the mountainside; and sometimes the steel of the arms strewn around, dropped from the hand of the dead, caught and reflected the flashes of the celestial or earthly stars. The ground was strewn with the slain. Such of the enemy as had cut their way through were already far—the sound of their horses’ hoofs had died away. The Greeks who had fled across the mountain had reached a place of safety—none lay there but the silent dead—cold as the moonbeam that rested for a moment on their pale faces. All were still and motionless; some lay on the hillside among the underwood—some on the open road—horses and men had fallen, pell mell—none moved—none breathed.
Yet there was a sigh—it was lost in
