But these Cameronians were no levies roughly disciplined and driven in chains to the battlefield. Men of the moors and the moss-hags were they—good at the prayer, better at the musket, best of all with the steady eye which directed the unshaken hand, and the quiet heart within dourly certain of victory and of the righteousness of its cause.
Clan by clan, the very men who had swept Mackay's troops into the Garry fell back shattered and dismayed from the broken defences of the Hill Folk. In vain the war-pipes brayed; in vain a thousand throats cried "Claymore!" In vain Lochiell's men drove for the fourth time desperately at the wall. From within came no noise, save the clatter of the musket-shots running the circuit of the defences, or the dull thud as a man fell over in the ranks or collapsed like a shut telescope in his place—not a groan from the wounded, as men stricken to death drew themselves desperately up to get a last shot at the enemies of Christ's Cause and Covenant, that they might face God contentedly with their duty done and all their powder spent.
Left almost alone in the fierce ebb of the fourth assault, Wat had gained the top of the wall when a sudden blow on the head stunned him. He fell inward among the wounded and dying men of the defenders and there lay motionless, while outside the last charge of the baffled clansmen broke on the stubborn hodden gray of the Cameronian regiment, vainly as the water of the ninth wave breaks on the cliffs that look out to the Atlantic.
The chiefs still tried to rally their men. Cannon offered to lead them again to the assault in person. But it might not be.
"We can fight men," they said, as they fell back, sullenly, "but these are devils incarnate."
[CHAPTER XLVII]
THE GOLDEN HEART
When Wat Gordon opened his eyes, he looked into a face he knew right well.
"Faith, Will, is it time to get up already?" he said, thinking his cousin and he were off together on some ploy of ancient days—for a morning's fishing on the hills above Knockman, mayhap.