The muzzle was eaten by the rust of centuries into a ragged filigree-work, like the end of a burnt-out stove-pipe.

I shut one eye and peered within--it was flaked with iron rust like an old steamboat boiler.

I borrowed the ponderous pistols and snapped them.

They were rusty inside, too--had not been loaded for a generation.

I went back, full of encouragement, and reported to the guide, and asked him to discharge this dismantled fortress.