th was gulleyed and torn. The smoke from so much firing
drifted about in banks and clouds, and it gave forth the pungent odor of
burned gunpowder.

The boy knew not only that the Alamo had fallen, but that all of its
defenders had fallen with it. The knowledge was instinctive. He had been
with those men almost to the last day of the siege, and he had
understood their spirit.

He was not noticed in the crush. Santa Anna and the generals were
running into the church, and he followed them. Here he saw the Texan
dead, and he saw also a curious crowd standing around a fallen form. He
pressed into the ring and his heart gave a great throb of grief.

It was Crockett, lying upon his back, his body pierced by many wounds.
Ned had known that he would find him thus, but the shock, nevertheless,
was terrible. Yet Crockett's countenance was calm. He bore no wounds in
the face, and he lay almost as if he had died in his bed. It seemed to
Ned even in his grief that no more fitting death could have come to the
old hero.

Then, following another crowd, he saw Bowie, also lying peacefully in
death upon his cot. He felt the same grief for him that he had felt for
Crockett, but it soon passed in both cases. A strange mood of exaltation
took its place. They had died as one might wish to die, since death must
come to all. It was glorious that these defenders of the Alamo, comrades
of his, should have fallen to the last man. The full splendor of their
achievement suddenly burst in a dazzling vision before him. Texans who
furnished such valor could not be conquered. Santa Anna might have
twenty to one or fifty to one or a hundred to one, in the end it would
not matter.

The mood endured. He looked upon the dead faces of Travis and Bonham
also, and he was not shaken. He saw others, dozens and dozens whom he
knew, and the faces of all of them seemed peaceful to him. The shouting
and cheering and vast chatter of the Mexicans did not disturb him. His
mood was so high that all these things passed as nothing.

Ned made no attempt to escape. He knew that while he might go about
almost as he chose in this crowd of soldiers, now disorganized, the ring
of cavalry beyond would hold him. The thought of escape, however, was
but little in his mind just then. He was absorbed in the great tomb of
the Alamo. Here, despite the recent work of the cannon, all things
looked familiar. He could mark the very spots where he had stood and
talked with Crockett o