That's the laddies' patrol." she
gasped. "Count the cries, Dickson."

Another bird wailed, this time very near. Then there was perhaps three
minutes' silence till a fainter wheeple came from the direction of the
Tower. "Four," said Dickson, but he waited in vain on the fifth. He
had not the acute hearing of the boys, and could not catch the faint
echo of Peter Paterson's signal beyond the verandah. The next he heard
was a shrill whistle cutting into the wind, and then others in rapid
succession from different quarters, and something which might have been
the hoarse shouting of angry men.

The Gorbals Die-Hards had gone into action.

Dull prose is no medium to tell of that wild adventure. The sober
sequence of the military historian is out of place in recording deeds
that knew not sequence or sobriety. Were I a bard, I would cast this
tale in excited verse, with a lilt which would catch the speed of the
reality. I would sing of Napoleon, not unworthy of his great namesake,
who penetrated to the very window of the ladies' bedroom, where the
framework had been driven in and men were pouring through; of how there
he made such pandemonium with his whistle that men tumbled back and ran
about blindly seeking for guidance; of how in the long run his
pugnacity mastered him, so that he engaged in combat with an unknown
figure and the two rolled into what had once been a fountain. I would
hymn Peter Paterson, who across tracts of darkness engaged Old Bill in
a conversation which would have done no discredit to a Gallowgate
policeman. He pretended to be making reports and seeking orders.
"We've gotten three o' the deevils, sir. What'll we dae wi' them?" he
shouted; and back would come the reply in a slightly more genteel
voice: "Fall them to the rear. Tamson has charge of the prisoners."
Or it would be: "They've gotten pistols, sir. What's the orders?" and
the answer would be: "Stick to your batons. The guns are posted on the
knowe, so we needn't hurry." And over all the din there would be a
perpetual whistling and a yelling of "Hands up!"

I would sing, too, of Wee Jaikie, who was having the red-letter hour of
his life. His fragile form moved like a lizard in places where no
mortal could be expected, and he varied his duties with impish assaults
upon the persons of such as came in his way. His whistle blew in a
man's ear one second and the next yards away. Sometimes he was moved to
song, and unearthly fragments of