l attack hotly, knowing
that aid will soon be forthcoming to us."

Roger leapt to his saddle, and galloped out through the gate. A man
had been placed there to mark off the names of all who entered,
from the list that had been furnished him. Philip took it, and saw
that a cross had been placed against every name. He therefore went
up to the top of the wall.

"The tenants are all in, Francois!"

"Very well, then, I will have the drawbridge raised and the gates
closed. I am glad, indeed, that we have had time given us for them
all to enter. My mother would have been very grieved, if harm had
come to any of them.

"I have everything in readiness, here. I have posted men at every
window and loophole, where the house rises from the side of the
moat. All the rest are on the walls. I will take command here by
the gate and along the wall. Do you take charge of the defence of
the house, itself. However, you may as well stay here with me,
until we have had our first talk with them. Pass the word along the
walls for perfect silence."

In another half hour they heard a dull sound. Presently it became
louder, and they could distinguish, above the trampling of horses,
the clash of steel. It came nearer and nearer, until within two or
three hundred yards of the chateau, then it ceased. Presently a
figure could be made out, creeping quietly forward until it reached
the edge of the moat. It paused a moment, and then retired.

"He has been sent to find out whether the drawbridge is down,"
Francois whispered to Philip. "We shall see what they will do now."

There was a pause for ten minutes, then a heavy mass of men could
be seen approaching.

"Doubtless they will have planks with them, to push across the
moat," Philip said.

"We will let them come within twenty yards," Francois replied,
"then I think we shall astonish them."

Believing that all in the chateau were asleep, and that even the
precaution of keeping a watchman on the walls had been neglected,
the assailants advanced eagerly. Suddenly, the silence on the walls
was broken by a voice shouting, "Give fire!" And then, from along
the whole face of the battlements, deadly fire from arquebuses was
poured into them. A moment later half a dozen fireballs were flung
into the column, and a rain of crossbow bolts followed.

Shouts of astonishment, rage, and pain broke from the mass and,
breaking up, they recoiled in confusion; while the shouts of the
officers, urging them