ll the breach, but
inch by inch, foot by foot we won nearer and nearer to our goal.

Presently a cry went up from a section of the stands near by--"Rise
slaves!" "Rise slaves!" it rose and fell until it swelled to a mighty
volume of sound that swept in great billows around the entire
amphitheatre.

For an instant, as though by common assent, we ceased our fighting to
look for the meaning of this new note nor did it take but a moment to
translate its significance. In all parts of the structure the female
slaves were falling upon their masters with whatever weapon came first
to hand. A dagger snatched from the harness of her mistress was waved
aloft by some fair slave, its shimmering blade crimson with the
lifeblood of its owner; swords plucked from the bodies of the dead
about them; heavy ornaments which could be turned into bludgeons--such
were the implements with which these fair women wreaked the long-pent
vengeance which at best could but partially recompense them for the
unspeakable cruelties and indignities which their black masters had
heaped upon them. And those who could find no other weapons used their
strong fingers and their gleaming teeth.

It was at once a sight to make one shudder and to cheer; but in a brief
second we were engaged once more in our own battle with only the
unquenchable battle cry of the women to remind us that they still
fought--"Rise slaves!" "Rise slaves!"

Only a single thin rank of men now stood between us and Issus. Her
face was blue with terror. Foam flecked her lips. She seemed too
paralysed with fear to move. Only the youth and I fought now. The
others all had fallen, and I was like to have gone down too from a
nasty long-sword cut had not a hand reached out from behind my
adversary and clutched his elbow as the blade was falling upon me. The
youth sprang to my side and ran his sword through the fellow before he
could recover to deliver another blow.

I should have died even then but for that as my sword was tight wedged
in the breastbone of a Dator of the First Born. As the fellow went
down I snatched his sword from him and over his prostrate body looked
into the eyes of the one whose quick hand had saved me from the first
cut of his sword--it was Phaidor, daughter of Matai Shang.

"Fly, my Prince!" she cried. "It is useless to fight them longer. All
within the arena are dead. All who charged the throne are dead but you
and this youth. Only among the seats ar