None but the very farthest on the flank could have turned, given sense enough left to do it.

It was a flood of maddened monsters, crazed with fear, pent by their own numbers, forced forward by the crowd behind, that invited me to dam them if I could! As they burst into the open, more shots rang out in the forest to lend their fury wings! I glanced behind, to right and left, but there was no escape, I had come too far into the open to retreat! There were big rocks to the rear to have scrambled on, but there was no time.

There was one big rock in front of me that divided their course about in halves; to pass it they must open up, although they would almost surely close again.

I took my stand in line with that, as a man on trial for life takes refuge behind an unestablishable alibi.
They talk glibly about men's whole lives passing in review before them in the instant of a crisis.

That may be.