AN UNFORTUNATE PURCHASE, 69)

ing my sword (for they are arrant cowards); but a second, coming
upon my left, gave me a blow on the head, which I never felt till
afterward, and wondered, when I came to myself, what was the
matter with me, and where I was, for he laid me flat on the
ground. But my never-failing old pilot, the Portuguese (so Pro-
vidence, unlooked-for, directs deliverances from dangers, which to
us are unforeseen), had a pistol in his pocket, which I knew nothing
of, nor the ‘Tartars either: if they had, I suppose they would
not have attacked us; but cowards are always boldest when there
is no danger,

The old man, seeing me down, with a bold heart stepped up to
the fellow that had struck me, and laid hold of his arm with one
hand, and pulling him down by main force a little towards him
with the other, shot him into the head, and laid him dead upon
the spot; he then immediately stepped up to him who had
stopped us, as I said, and before he could come forward again (for
it was all done, as it were, in a moment), made a blow at him with
a scimitar which he always wore, but, missing the man, cut his
horse into the side of his head, cut one of his ears off by the root,
and a great slice down the side of his face. The poor beast, en-
raged with the wound, was no more to be governed by his rider,
though the fellow sat well enough too, but away he flew, and
carried him quite out of the pilot's reach; and, at some distance,
rising up upon his hind-legs, threw down the Tartar, and fell upon
him.

In this interval the poor Chinese came in who had lost the
camel, but he had no weapon; however, seeing the Tartar down,
and his horse fallen upon him, away he runs to him, and seizing
upon an ugly, ill-favoured weapon he had by his side, something
like a pole-axe, but not a pole-axe either, he wrenched it from
him, and made shift to knock his Tartarian brains out with it.
But my old man had the third Tartar to deal with still; and,
seeing he did not fly as he expected, nor come on to fight him as
he apprehended, but stand stock still, the old man stood still too,
and falls to work with his tackle to charge his pistol again; but
as soon as the Tartar saw the pistol, whether he supposed it to
be the same or another I know not, but away he scoured, and

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