“Steady! Steady! Pick your marks, boys, and fire at command.”
“See their feet?” whispered Jim, tensely, to Ernest.
Ernest nodded, for his heart was thumping in his throat and he did not dare try to speak. This was going to be a bigger fight than the one at Gonzales.
And a curious sight that was: out on the prairie before them, about 300 yards distant, an array of men’s legs, in dankly hanging cotton trousers; and an amazing array of slimmer horses’ legs! Some of the legs were moving, hither-thither, as if marching about by themselves, for the fog cut sharply and they appeared to have no bodies.
“Lucky for them they fetched their legs,” commented one of Ernest’s neighbors. “They’ll need ’em to run away on.”
“I like something better’n legs to shoot at,” added somebody else.
The fog had lifted from the parapet, and the Texan lines were revealed—and the long-barrelled muskets and rifles levelled and resting upon the sod, and the lean bronzed faces laid expectantly against each stock. Ernest, aiming steadily, blinked and stared.
Swiftly uprolled the fog—above the waists, and the horses’ bellies, and ever higher; and suddenly the sun blazed down and the whole prairie leaped into brilliant life.
The Mexicans! See them! Fully 400: infantry, in blue cotton uniforms and high-peaked caps; half a dozen companies of cavalry; and a brass cannon drawn by mules! They had forded the river and here they were, opposite the points of the horseshoe!