"They had a dozen neighbours under guard when I left." Sheldon, looking like death, sat his saddle a little apart.

No one spoke to him.

For even a deeper disgrace had now befallen the dragoons in the loss of their standard left behind in Lockwood's house.
"What a pitiful mess!" whispered Boyd.

"Is there nothing to be done but sit here and see the red beasts yonder sack the town ?" Before I could answer, I caught the sound of distant firing on the Lewisboro road.

Colonel Thomas reared stiffly in his saddle, and: "Those are my own men!" he said loudly, "or I lie like a Tory!" A hill half a mile north of us suddenly became dark with men; we saw the glitter of their muskets, saw the long belt of white smoke encircle them, saw red-jacketed men run out of a farmhouse, mount, and gallop toward the burning town.
Along the road below us a column of Continental infantry appeared on the run, cheering us with their hats.
A roar from our dragoons answered them; our bugle-horn spoke, and I saw Major Tallmadge, with a trumpeter at his back, rein in while the troopers were reforming and calling off amid a whirlwind of rearing horses and excited men.
Below in the village, the British had heard and perfectly understood the volley from Thomas's regiment, and the cavalry and mounted infantry of the Legion were assembling in the smoke, and already beginning a rapid retreat by the Bedford road.
As Boyd and I went clattering down the hill, we saw Major Lockwood with Thomas's men, and we rode up to him.