We were progressing in the direction of Heraclea, where Major Catanagh lay with the rest of our comrades and the regiment of the Mir Alai Saïd. Callum urged that we should lose no time in repairing there, and insuring our own safety; but I was more intent on reaching Rodosdchig, where I could draw off my little party, embark them in boats, and sail for the opposite Isle of Marmora, as I had now no thought in this world but to save or rescue Sir Horace and his friends from the danger that menaced them.
'But if our detachment has been recalled from Rodosdchig?' said Callum; 'what then?—we have been absent several weeks, I think, though I forgot to reckon the time in yonder atrocious den.'
I had not thought of this chance, and it puzzled me.
Major Catanagh, may have been ordered to join at head-quarters, for all that we know to the contrary, sir, and may have marched for Constantinople, said he.
Still my resolution was not altered.
'Let us reach Rodosdchig,' said I, doggedly.
The silent night wore away; pale Phosphorus, the morning star of the old Greeks, melted into the rosy sky of sunrise, as the god of day ascended from the distant Ægean sea, and tipped the hills and castles of the Dardanelles with fire. The waves of the Propontis gleamed in gold, and rolled like liquid light upon its fertile shores. We found ourselves in a lonely place, where the sea broke in surf on one hand, and on the other lay a marshy waste, where buzzards and vultures seemed the only living things, with a few of those solemn-looking storks, which are so often to be found perched on the roofs of Turkish houses; or peeping out of nests of twigs and clay, made under their eaves.
Day had now fully broken. I concealed the bayonet in my sleeve as a weapon of defence; but threw the musket into the sea. Then Callum and I put our sorely-soiled uniforms into the best order, and though the amount of hair which flourished around our visages gave us rather a Crimean aspect, it mattered not in Turkey, and we stepped forward with growing confidence, looking about for some one to direct us, as the dome and minarets of a mosque (like a punch-bowl between two champagne bottles) appeared at a distance, and indicated the vicinity of a town.
Near a well on the wayside, we found an old woman, of an aspect rather Ghoulish, with her eyes shining through the holes in her yashmack, which was carefully drawn over her head, though her poor mammary region was bare and flat as a drumhead. She was filling a vase of most classical aspect, with the pure water of the circular well, over which drooped the long branches of a solitary date-palm.
On my inquiring the name of the little town which was now visible above the orange-groves, she hastily flung down her pitcher in great alarm, and muttering something about 'Franks and Giaours,' fled from us.