The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1901-06-20

golden glow Of morning, and the day.
rose radiant over the world. They staid
not for it's beauty or its peace. The
carnage went on hour upon hour Men.
began to grow drunk with slaughter as
with raki.,
It was bitter, sitting, cruel work.
with their mouths choked with sand.
| with their threats caked with thirst.
with their eyes blind with smoke.
| cramped as in a wise, scorched with
the blaze Of powder, covered with blood
and with dust, while the steel was
thrust through nerve and sinew or the
shot ploWed through bone and flesh.
The answering fire Of the zouaves and
tirailleurs kept the Arabs farther at
bay and moved them faster down, but
in the chasseurs' quarter of the field.
parted from the rest of their comrades
as they had been by the rush of that
broken charge with which they had
sought to save the camp and arrest the
foe, the worst pressure of the attack
was felt and the fiercest of the slaugh-
| ter fell.
The commander of the chasseurs had
| been shot dead as they had first sWept
out to encounter the advance of the
desert horsemen. One by one the off.
GERS had been cut down, singled out by
the keen eyes of their enemies and
throwing themselves into the deadliest
OF the carnage with the impetuous self
devotion characteristic of their service.
At the last there remained but mere
handful out of all the brilliant squad
ron that had galloped down in the gray
ST the dawn to meet the whirlwind of
Arab fury. At their head was Cecil.
Two horses had been killed under
| him, and he had thrown himself afresh
across unwounded charges whose rid
ers had fallen in the melee and at
whose brides he had caught as he
shook himself free of the dead ami
mails stirrups. His head was uncoy-
cred; his uniform, hurriedly thrown on,
had been torn aside, and his chest was
bare to the red folds of his sash. He
was drenched with blood, not his own,
that had rained on him as he fought.
and his face and his hands were black
could not see yard in front of him.
He could not tell how the day went
anywhere save in that corner where
his own troop was hemmed in. AS fast
as they beat the Arabs back and fore
ed themselves some clearer space, so
| fast the tribes closed in afresh. No or
ders reached him from the general of
brigade in command; except for the
We'll known war shouts of the zouaves
that ever and again. rang above the
din he could not tell whether the
French battalions we're not cut utterly
to pieces under the immense numerical
superiority of their foes. All he could
see was that every officer Of chasseurs
was down and that unless he took the
vacant place and rallied them together
the few score troopers that were still
left would scatter, confused and de-
moralized, as the best soldiers will at
times when they can see no chief to
follow. -.~=
| He spurred the horse be had Just
mounted against the dense crowd op-
posing him, against the hard, black
wall of dust and smoke and steel and
savage faces and lean, swarthy arms,
which were all that his eyes could see
and that seemed impenetrable as gran
lite, moving and changing though it
was. He thrust the gray against it,
while he waved his sword above his
head.
"Charge, my brother! France!
France! Francer'
His voice, well known, we'll loved,
thrilled the hearts of his comrades,
and brought them together like trum-
pet call. They had gone with him
many time into the hell of battle,
into the jaws of death. They surged
| about him now, striking, thrusting,
forcing with blows of their sabers or
their lances, and blows of their beasts
ore feet, a passage one to another, until
they were reunited once more as one
troop. They loved him; he had called
them his brethren. They were like
lambs for him to lead, like tigers for
him to incite. They could see him lift
aloft the eagle he had caught from the
last hand that had borne it, the golden
CLEAN of the young morning flashing
like fame upon the brazen wings and
they shouted, as with one throat:
"Mazagran! Mazagranv AS the battal-
ion Of Mazagran had died keeping the
ground through the whole of the
scorching day, while the fresh hordes
poured down on them like ceaseless
torrents, snow fed and exhaustless, so
they were ready to hold the ground
here until of all their number there
should be left not one living man.
He glanced back on them, guarding
lis head the while from the lances that
were rained on him, and he lifted the
guidon higher and higher, till out of
the ruck and the throng the brazen
bird caught afresh the rays Of the
rising sun. --.
"Follow mev' he shouted.
Then, like arrows launched at once
from hundred bows, they charged,
he still slightly in advance of them,