Cutlasses ! '' cried the captain . I snatched a cutlass from the pile , and someone , at the same time snatching another , gave me a cut across the knuckles which I hardly felt . I dashed out of the door into the clear sunlight . Someone was close behind , I knew not whom . Right in front , the doctor was pursuing his assailant down the hill , and just as my eyes fell upon him , beat down his guard and sent him sprawling on his back with a great slash across the face . `` Round the house , lads ! Round the house ! '' cried the captain ; and even in the hurly-burly , I perceived a change in his voice . Mechanically , I obeyed , turned eastwards , and with my cutlass raised , ran round the corner of the house . Next moment I was face to face with Anderson . He roared aloud , and his hanger went up above his head , flashing in the sunlight . I had not time to be afraid , but as the blow still hung impending , leaped in a trice upon one side , and missing my foot in the soft sand , rolled headlong down the slope . When I had first sallied from the door , the other mutineers had been already swarming up the palisade to make an end of us . One man , in a red night-cap , with his cutlass in his mouth , had even got upon the top and thrown a leg across . Well , so short had been the interval that when I found my feet again all was in the same posture , the fellow with the red night-cap still half-way over , another still just showing his head above the top of the stockade . And yet , in this breath of time , the fight was over and the victory was ours . Gray , following close behind me , had cut down the big boatswain ere he had time to recover from his last blow . Another had been shot at a loophole in the very act of firing into the house and now lay in agony , the pistol still smoking in his hand . A third , as I had seen , the doctor had disposed of at a blow .
Of the four who had scaled the XXXXX , one only remained unaccounted for , and he , having left his cutlass on the field , was now clambering out again with the fear of death upon him .
Anderson Cutlasses eastwards first hanger mutineers night-cap palisade smoking trice