The Heidelbergian repeated these words.
The captain, in a fury, ordered his men to advance.
The Americans fully expected an attack, and stood ready to pour in a volley at the first movement on the part of the enemy. But the enemy did not move. The soldiers stood motionless. They did not seem afraid. They seemed rather as if they were animated by some totally different feeling. It had been whispered already that the Neapolitan army was unreliable. This certainly looked like it.
"Cowards!" cried the captain, who seemed to think that their inaction arose from fear. "You will suffer for this, you scoundrels! Then, if you are afraid to advance, make ready! present! fire!"
His command might as well have been addressed to the winds. The guns of the soldiers stood by their sides. Not one of them raised his piece. The captain was thunder-struck; yet his surprise was not greater than that of the Americans when this was hastily explained to them by the Heidelbergians. Evidently there was disaffection among the soldiers of his Majesty of Naples when brought into the presence of _Red Shirts_.
The captain was so overwhelmed by this discovery that he stood like one paralyzed, not knowing what to do. This passive disobedience on the part of his men was a thing so unexpected that he was left helpless, without resources.
Meanwhile the crowd outside had been intensely excited. They had witnessed the arrival of the dragoons. They had seen them dismount and enter the hotel after the captain. They had seen the captain come down after another detachment. They had known nothing of what was going on inside, but conjectured that a desperate struggle was inevitable between the Red Shirts and the dragoons. As an unarmed crowd they could offer no active intervention, so they held their peace for a time, waiting in breathless suspense for the result. The result seemed long delayed. The troopers did not seem to gain that immediate victory over the Red Shirts which had been fearfully anticipated. Every moment seemed to postpone such a victory, and render it impossible. Every moment restored the courage of the crowd, which at first had been panic-stricken. Low murmurs passed among them, which deepened into words of remonstrance, and strengthened into cries of sympathy for the Red Shirts; until, at last, these cries arose to shouts, and the shouts arose wild and high, penetrating to that upper room where the assailants confronted their cool antagonists. The cries had an ominous sound.
"_Viva la Liberia_!" "_Viva la Republica_!" "_Viva Garibaldi_!" At the name _Garibaldi_, a wild yell of applause resounded wide and high--a long, shrill yell, and the name was taken up in a kind of mad fervor till the shout rose to a frenzy, and nothing was heard but the confused outcries of a thousand discordant voices, all uttering that one grand name, "_Garibaldi_!" "_Garibaldi_!" "_Garibaldi_!"
The Americans heard it. What connection there was between themselves and Garibaldi they did not then see, but they saw that somehow the people of Salerno had associated them with the hero of Italy, and were sympathizing with them. Obed Chute himself saw this, and understood this, as that cry came thundering to his ears. He turned to his friends.
"Boys," said he, "we came here for a dinner and a night's rest. We've got the dinner, but the night's rest seems to be a little remote. There's such an infernal row going on all around that, if we want to sleep this blessed night, we'll have to take to the yacht again, and turn in there, sailor fashion. So I move that we adjourn to that place, and put out to sea."