We had a moment of breathing space before the enemy came up with us, and in this time Rayburn and Young and I had a grip of each other's hands, in which, without any words over it, we said good-bye to each other; for we neither of us for one moment doubted that our last hour had come. Tizoc stood a little distance from us, as steady and as gallant in his bearing as ever I saw a man; but that he also counted surely upon dying there was shown by the glance of grave friendliness that he gave us, and by his making the gesture that among his people is significant of farewell. Then we ranged ourselves across the gate-way, holding our swords in hand firmly, and Rayburn, who had caught up a javelin, stood with it poised above his shoulder in readiness to discharge it as the enemy came on. The sight of his splendid figure towering defiantly in that heroic attitude set my mind to running upon the Homeric legend of the glorious battling of the Greeks before the gates of Troy, and of Hector uplifting the rock; and I was very angry with Young, whose disposition to seize upon the whimsical side of everything was the most irrepressible that ever I came across, when he exclaimed: "I'll bet you five dollars, Rayburn, that when you throw that clothes-prop you don't hit th' man you fire at!"
But Rayburn did hit his man, straight in the heart too, a moment later, as the enemy with a wild yell charged us; and then, with his back set well against the wall, he fell to work most gallantly with his sword.
From the very beginning of it we knew that our fighting was utterly hopeless; for all of our company together did not number fifty men, and we were confronting there a whole army. Up the street, as far as we could see, the troops of the enemy were solidly massed; and for every man whom we struck down twenty were ready to spring forward, fresh and vigorous, to exhaust still further the strength that rapidly was leaving us. That we fought on was due not to our valor but to our desperation; and also--at least such was my own feeling--to a swelling rage that made us long to kill as many as possible of these savages before we ourselves died beneath their blows. Death, we knew, was the best thing that could happen to us; for it would save us from the worse fate, that surely would come to us should we be captured, of being turned over to the priests, that they might torture us before their heathen altars, and in the end tear our still quivering hearts out. And that the wish of our enemies--according to the Aztec custom--was rather to capture us than to kill us was shown by the way in which they fought; for all their effort was to disable us, and so to take us alive; nor did they seem to have any great care, if only this purpose could be accomplished, how many of themselves were slain.