flogged him. "I nebber was a king befoh, and now Imeans to be one king all over."
If being a king all over meant occupying Googagoo's tent, being led outto dinner precisely as his majesty had been, and eating as much curry ashe could get down, then undoubtedly Raggy was a king all over.
Long before the dawn appeared in the east, Googagoo's army had commencedthe march towards the enemy's camp, guided by Walda.
At the king's right hand was Harry, who was generalissimo in all butname. His majesty might fight well, but he could hardly be expected todirect the manoeuvres of a great battle so well as a British officer.
By daybreak Harry had drawn up his men in battle array on the brow of ahill, almost within stone's throw of the enemy's big camp beneath.
In numbers Kara-Kara's men were as three to one of Harry's army, but,having vantage ground, the latter hoped to provoke the foe to attack.
In this they were disappointed, for although there was skirmishing, asthe day went on, between the outposts, nothing serious occurred; KingKara-Kara made no attempt to storm and capture the hill. His mottoseemed to be "Wait."
By twelve o'clock Googagoo's patience was exhausted.
"I love to fight," he said to Harry, "but to lie idle with the spear inmy hand is not good for Googagoo. Let it be now."
Then Harry, after visiting all his lines, speaking words ofencouragement and issuing commands, gave the order to advance, hehimself leading in person, sword in hand.
Kara's army lay at arms, in vast squares or impis, along a wide andsparsely wooded valley, Harry's hill being on the east of him, the laketo the north, and a dense forest land behind and to the west. It was adifficult position to attack, but they had come here to fight and mustface every odds.
It must also be to a great extent a hand-to-hand engagement.
Now unlike a battle with guns and rifles, a fight of the nature Googagoowas now to engage in could not be of long duration. Harry knew that,and resolved to make his onset as telling as possible. He had twoadvantages over Kara: his men were well drilled, and they possessed amost deadly weapon in the cross-bow.
At the very moment the signal of advance was given by Harry, wildshouting arose from the ranks of the enemy, accompanied by the rattle oftom-toms and the blaring of innumerable chanters. But the foe showed nointention of coming on, so the Googagoo men and amazons marched steadilyto meet them.
There was no racing or shouting. To have run would have meant to losewind, and Harry knew well the value of breath in a hand-to-hand fight.A movement was first made towards the south with the view ofout-flanking the enemy. This had the desired effect, and Kara's swarmsnow came on in that direction.
Harry threw his archery-men out in skirmishing order now, in two lines,and the orders were to advance steadily to within a hundred yards of theenemy, then commence firing, one line supporting the other, but thewhole army falling back towards the hills as the foe advanced.
This was to prevent the latter closing, when of course the cross-bowswould be of no more use.
The battle began, and for a time raged on two sides, the amazons havingpartially out-flanked the foe. The army as at present might berepresented by the capital letter L, the short limb being the sidefacing southwards and fronting the terrible amazons, the long limb themain body of Kara's army driving back--as they thought--Googagoo'sarchers towards the hills.
But while this driving back process was taking place, Harry's side wasnot losing a man, while the field was soon strewn with the dead andwounded of the enemy.
The latter began to stop short and waver, the arrows poured in upon themin clouds, and for a time victory appeared to be inclining towards theside of the island king.
Soon, however, Kara-Kara himself was seen running along behind his linesand shouting wild words of command to his men.
Their charge was now redoubled in fury as well as in speed, and itbecame at once evident to Harry that the cross-bows would in a fewminutes more become useless in line, and his ranks be broken by theenemy through force of numbers.
He quickly, therefore, formed up into two English squares with theScottish triangle in the centre, both he and the king being inside thelatter.
Hardly had he done so, ere the impis of the savage foe closed on them,those on the outsides of each phalanx receiving the shock at spear'spoint, while archers from the interior poured in a steady fire fromtheir murderous cross-bows.
The Karaites fell back after a time, defeated and foiled, and Harry'striangle then charged into their very midst, delivering by far and awaythe most furious and successful charge of the day.
For a time now it seemed to be a drawn battle.
It might have been well, now for Harry had he retreated farther, andprobably gained the eastern hills, for, excited by fighting, Kara's armywould undoubtedly have followed them.
He did not, however, and in less than an hour he lost all opportunity offever being able to do so.
On came the enemy once again, and this time they managed completely tosurround Googagoo's army.
Not his amazons, though; these fought with spear and axe in the rear ofthe enemy, and it is quite impossible to describe the terrible fury ofeach of their onsets.
For three long hours the battle raged.
The sun was now beginning to decline. The enemy seemed as determined asferocious, and as numerous as before, while Googagoo's ranks were sadlythinned.
They still kept their stand, however, against all the odds that Karacould fling in front of them.
Fight they must.
It was victory or death with them.
For defeat meant annihilation, it meant that not one man or amazon wouldever return to the islands to tell the terrible tale, and that theislands themselves would soon have to capitulate, and come under thesway of the cruel King Kara-Kara.
The sun began to decline towards the western woods, but still the battleraged on. The words of Scott came into Harry's head even now as he sawhis brave fellows falling on all sides.
"What 'vails the vain knight-errand's brand? Oh! Douglas, for thy leading wand! Fierce Randolph for thy speed! Oh! for one hour of Wallace wight, Or well-skilled Bruce to rule the fight, And cry Saint Andrew and our right."
The battle raged on.
One of Harry's squares had already been broken, and it being impossibleto re-form again, the men had fought their way through the cloud ofsavages around them and joined the ranks of the amazons.
Hope was beginning to fade even from Harry's heart.
He could not bear to hear the plaint of poor King Googagoo.
"Where is He who fights for the right?" he was saying.
"Where is the Eye who beholds all things?"
Where is the Eye? Look. Whither shall we look? Look far away towardsthe western horizon yonder. Are those the crimson clouds that heraldthe sunset? No, they are too low down on the plain, and a rollingcanopy of blue is rising up and meeting the sun.
The southern woods are all on fire. The battlefield itself is soon--
"Wreathed in sable smoke."
And out from the fire, it would seem, there now rushes an enemy thatKing Kara-Kara has but little reckoned on meeting.
No wonder he withdraws his men from the sadly weakened phalanxes of theisland king, and tries to make his way southwards.
Here he is opposed by the stern fierce amazons, and their ranks are soonstrengthened by a cloud of savages, spear-armed, who rush up behind themand fall upon the enemy in their front.
"Scarcely can they see their foes, Until at weapon's point they close, They close in clouds of dust and smoke, With sword-sway and with lance's thrust; And such a yell is there Of sudden and portentous birth, As if men fought upon the earth, And fiends in upper air; Oh! life and death are in the shout, Recoil and rally, charge and rout, And triumph and despair."
Neither King Googagoo nor Harry could tell what the meaning of thissudden attack on the ranks of Kara-Kara meant. It seemed like aninterposition
of Providence. So, indeed, they both considered it, anddoubtless they were right.
Meanwhile Kara's army, now sadly thinned, fought like veritable fiends.
Escape there seemed none.
The hills to the east were guarded by the island men, there was the lakebehind them, the new foe in front, and the woods in the west were allablaze.
The route was soon complete and the carnage dreadful to contemplate.
So terrible are these fights between African kings that it is noexaggeration to say, that out of all the thousands that Kara-Kara hadbrought into the field hardly one thousand escaped alive, and they hadto force their way through the burning forest, many falling by fire whohad come scathless from the field.
King Kara-Kara was among the killed.
He was found, next day, in the midst of a heap of the bodies of thosewho had rallied round him to the last--
"His back to the field, and his feet to the foe."
In his hand he still clasped the
Harry Milvaine; Or, The Wanderings of a Wayward Boy Page 41
