I did not like abandoning the gallant animal that had carried me through so many dangers, but there was no help for it; and, indeed, I had little time to spend in regrets.
Directly the Russians saw our plan, those on the opposite cliffs discharged their muskets, while the head of the column quickened its pace.
Whiz! whiz! came the bullets, singing overhead or chipping the rocks beside us--much too near in either case for comfort.
At first we managed to dodge them pretty well behind the boulders, but we should soon have to move out into a more exposed position, and it did not require an extra amount of brains to foretell what would happen then.
However, we were having a try for our lives, and that was more satisfactory than sitting still to be killed; but we were rapidly approaching the end of our tether.
The men on the opposite cliffs could not fire now for fear of hurting their comrades, who came after us in full cry for all the world like dogs on the track of a boar.
Suddenly Mecsey's foot slipped and he fell, but he was up again in an instant.
"Hurt?" I asked anxiously.
"It's nothing," he said--"nothing. Look! Look just above us! There is a hole in the rocks. If we could get inside there we might hide."
I did look, and saw a huge fissure in the cliffs several yards in length and about six feet in depth.