Page:De Amicis - Heart, translation Hapgood, 1922.djvu/124

 hand, and resolved to die; when a sergeant descending from the garret, uttered a piercing shout, “They are coming!”

“They are coming!” repeated the captain, with a cry of joy.

At that cry all,—well and wounded, sergeants and officers,—rushed to the windows, and the resistance became fierce once more. A few moments later a sort of uncertainty was noticeable, a beginning of disorder among the foe. The captain hastily collected a little troop in the room on the ground floor, in order to make a sortie with fixed bayonets. Then he flew upstairs. Scarcely had he arrived there when they heard a hasty trampling of feet, accompanied by a formidable hurrah, and saw from the windows the two-pointed hats of the Italian carabineers advancing through the smoke, a squadron rushing forward at great speed, and a lightning flash of blades whirling in the air, as they fell on heads, shoulders, and on backs.

Then the troop darted out of the door, with bayonets presented; the enemy wavered, were thrown into disorder, and turned in flight; the field was cleared, the house was free, and a little later two battalions of Italian infantry and two cannon occupied the height. The captain, with the soldiers that remained to him, rejoined his regiment, went on fighting, and was slightly wounded in the left hand by a spent ball in the final assault with bayonets.

The day ended with the victory on our side.

But on the following day, the conflict having begun again, the Italians were defeated by the