e stood firm and raised his weapon shrill whistles
sounded in the throng, and he gasped as he realized that those frightful
creatures must be intelligent beings, for not only did they signal
to each other, but he saw that they were armed with bows and arrows,
spears, and slings!

Six-limbed creatures they were, of a purplish-red color, with huge,
tricornigerous heads and with staring, green, phosphorescent eyes. Two
of the six limbs were always legs, two always arms; the intermediate
two, due to a mid-section jointing of the six-foot-long, almost
cylindrical body, could be used at will as either legs or arms. Now, out
of range, as they supposed, they halted and gathered about one who was
apparently their leader; some standing erect and waving four hands while
shaking their horns savagely in Stevens' direction, others trotting
around on four legs, busily gathering stones of suitable size for their
vicious slings.

Too far away to use their own weapons and facing only one small
four-limbed creature, they considered their game already in the bag, but
they had no comprehension of earthly muscles, nor any understanding of
the power and range of a hundred-pound bow driving a steel-headed war
arrow. Thus, while they were arguing, Stevens took the offensive, and
a cruelly barbed steel war-head tore completely through the body of
their leader and mortally wounded the creature next beyond him. Though
surprised, they were not to be frightened off, but with wild, shrill
screams rushed to the attack. Stevens had no ammunition to waste, and
every time that mighty bow twanged a yard-long arrow transfixed at least
one of the red horde--and a body through which had torn one of those
ghastly, hand-forged arrow-heads was of very little use thereafter.
Accurately-sped arrows splintered harmlessly against the re-enforced
windows of his helmet and against the steel guards protecting his hands.
He was almost deafened by the din as the stone missiles of the slingers
rebounded from his reverberating shell of steel, but he fired carefully,
steadily, and powerfully until his last arrow had been loosed. Then,
the wicked dirk in his left hand and the long and heavy saber weaving
a circular path of brilliance in the sun, he stepped forward a couple
of paces to meet the attackers. For a few moments nothing could stand
before that fiercely driven blade--severed heads, limbs, and fragments
of torsos literally filled the air, but sheer weight of number