It was no time to note what others did; one realizes little at such a supreme moment except the flashing in his eyes where menacing weapons play across his front; the swift blows continually threatening to crush his guard; the fierce, cruel faces glaring at him eye to eye, and his own desperate efforts to drive and kill.

It all abides in fevered memory not unlike those pictures of horror coming of a dark night when lightning leaps from the black void.

I mind the first man to reach me, a burly ruffian, whose shining spear-point missed my throat by so narrow a margin it tasted blood ere my rifle-stock crushed the side of his head and sent him backward, a reeling corpse into the mass at his heels.

Then all was confusion, a riot of leaping figures, frantic shouting, and clanging weapons, and I know not what was done, except that I struck out like a crazed man, heedless of what might be aimed at me, but letting drive at every savage head within range, until, at last, there seemed no others in my front.

Then, as I paused, breathless and uncertain, passing my hand across my eyes to clear them from the blood and hair which half blinded me, I heard De Noyan's drawling tone.
"Most beautifully done, Master Benteen, and as for our red-headed preacher, by the memory of Jeanne d'Arc, the like of him as fighting man I have never seen." I leaned back heavily against the stones, now the strain of battle had relaxed, feeling strangely weakened by my exertions as well as the loss of blood, and glanced about me.