Quickly, now, after firing one other volley, the sailors sweep onwards to the shore, and assist with revolver and bayonet in the dreadful tulzie.
It is indeed a wild and fearsome fight, but in the end the enemy are beaten. They are beaten, they are surrounded, and—awful to say, annihilated.
No mercy, no quarter is given, even to the wounded.
But this is, after all, but the introduction to the pitched battle that follows.
For quickly now, along the silver sands, where the blue sea is breaking and singing in long, white, curling lines, comes the main body.
From the boats, war-rockets considerably disconcert the savages, but they are not to be denied.
With wild slogan and shout, the horrid horde rushes on.
CHAPTER IX
A FLEET OF THE DEAD
Men had been left in the boats in charge of the war-rocket apparatus, and as the invaders dashed onwards along the beach, rocket after rocket tore through their midst.
I do not know anything more disconcerting to savage warriors, who nearly always charge in a compact body, than these terrible rockets.