Max Pemberton

“ She had been riding for some time crouched down upon her brute's neck, fearing the pistol bullets of the carabineers; but when her own men began to shoot, she sat upright again, and screeched approval with a reckless flow of curses and encouragements which must have been heard away upon the sea. And in her exulting joy she circled about Messenger, so speedy beyond his was her pony, and shared with him her anticipations.
"Once beyond the bridge, mon ami, there is safety— safety! Let them follow me then! I have a hundred men at the gates, and another hundred upon the hills. ”

“ Let them come if they care nothing for their lives! Holy Virgin, what music!"
It was the music of musketry that she spoke of—the music of a rattling volley fired by the mercenaries upon the grass-land. And so well did they shoot that twenty of the horsemen reeled back in their saddles with the echo of the report, and twenty more at the least fell headlong upon the turf with dead or dying brutes beneath them. ”

“ So irresistible was the charge that the carabineers instinctively held back in their saddles as the witch neared them—a horrid figure of a woman screeching with uncontrollable rage—but she, as she swung outward from her pommel, fired twice at their horses, and the brutes reared and plunged before her, and galloped madly into the woods. Of the others Messenger shot one in the forehead, whereon the man's horse raced away with him, dragging a corpse at the saddle; but the fourth, in no wise fear-stricken, let the pair pass him, and then loosed rein for the pursuit. ”