ht with.
The man who is responsible for this, and the fellow who forged it, ought
to be shot."

"_Forged_ is a good word," said Major Elmfoot. "To pass off stuff like
that for good steel is rank forgery, and a worse crime than making bad
money, for here men's lives are sacrificed by it."

"I wish we had some of 'em here!" murmured one of the men.

"Aye, and the triangles rigged up," said another, "I should like to lay
on the first dozen myself."

And so say all of us.

This conversation took place after the earthwork was cleared of the
enemy--at least of the living enemy, for the whole interior was crowded
with their dead--and while the sailors and artillerymen were turning the
two Krupp guns found in it upon the retiring foe and the ruins of the
old sugar-mill to which the Soudanese still clung. And the troops had a
little rest while the leaders determined the direction of the next
attack. And the water-bottles you may be sure were mostly drained, for
the men's throats were like lime-kilns.

An officer standing on the highest part of the parapet beckoned to
Strachan, who doubled up and joined the group assembled there.

"Look," said the friend who had called him, pointing to the right, "the
cavalry are going to have their turn." Sure enough, there were the
three lines of cavalry, advancing at a walk towards the dense hordes of
Soudanese who covered the plain, some retiring slowly and reluctantly,
but the majority still holding their ground.

As they drew nearer the Hussars broke into a trot, and then, when quite
close, they were loosed, and swept down on the foe at full gallop, a
simoon of glittering steel. Surely the grandest sight the modern world
can afford; the last remnant of chivalry. For ever since the invention
of fire-arms the infantry officer's place in battle has necessarily been
in rear of his men; but the cavalry officer still rides in front, yards
in front. He believes that his men are behind him, but he sees them
not. Alone he plunges into the enemy's ranks, and the first shock of
the encounter is his. He is a knight without his grandsire's defensive
armour, and exposed to rifle bullets and bursting shells, which the old
paladin knew not.

"Oh, to be with them!" cried Tom in his excitement, uttering what was in
the hearts of all the group, as with eager eyes, parted lips, and breath
coming short, they saw the line swallowed up in the sea of Arabs. A
minute's confusion, with nothing d