Pray God they save en! Come, sonny--" But we dallied up there till the horsemen were plain to see, and their scarlet coats and armour blazing in the dust as they came.

And when they drew near within a mile, and our limbs ached with crouching--for fear they should spy us against the sky--father took me by the hand and pulled hot foot down the stairs.

Before they rode by he had picked up his shovel and was shovelling out a grave for his life.
Forty valiant horsemen they were, riding two-and-two (by reason of the narrowness of the road) and a captain beside them--men broad and long, with hairy top-lips, and all clad in scarlet jackets and white breeches that showed bravely against their black war-horses and jet-black holsters, thick as they were wi' dust.

Each man had a golden helmet, and a scabbard flapping by his side, and a piece of metal like a half-moon jingling from his horse's cheek-strap.

12 D was the numbering on every saddle, meaning the Twelfth Dragoons.
Tramp, tramp! they rode by, talking and joking, and taking no more heed of me--that sat upon the wall with my heels dangling above them--than if I'd been a sprig of stonecrop.