Ned struck him again and yet more sharply.
"Go, old friend!" he cried.
The good horse trotted away across the plain.

Once he looked back as if in reproach, but as Ned did not call him he kept on and disappeared over a swell.

It was to Ned like the passing of a friend, but he knew that Old Jack would not allow the Mexicans to take him.

He would fight with both teeth and hoofs against any such ignominious capture.
Then Ned turned his attention to the retreat.

It was a little band that went toward the Alamo, and there were three women and three children in it, but since they knew definitely that Santa Anna and his great army had come there was not a Texan who shrank from his duty.