Lifting my head, however, my glance fell, through the window to
which the Vision had drawn me, directly upon Ecasfe and upon the home
from which I had taken her whose remains were now being carried back
thither. Snatching up my field-glass, I scanned the scene of which I
had thus caught a momentary and confused glimpse. The roof was
occupied by a score of men armed with the lightning weapon, and among
them glanced the familiar badge--the band and silver star. Clambering
over the walls of the wide enclosure, and threatening to storm the
house, were a mob perhaps a thousand in number, many of them similarly
armed, the rest with staves, spears, or such rude weapons as chance
might afford. Two minutes brought me immediately over them. In
another, I was descending more rapidly than prudence would have
suggested. The strife seemed for a moment to cease, as one of the
crowd pointed, not to the impending destruction overhead, but to some
object apparently at an equal elevation to westward. A shout of
welcome from the remaining defenders of the house called right upward
the eyes of their assailants.
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