Within ten minutes this part of the house was burning.
Now our state became desperate.

We retreated across the central passage, fearing lest the blazing rafters should fall upon our natives, who were losing heart and would no longer stay beneath them.

But the Quabies, more bold, clambered in through the south window, and attacked us in the doorway of the larger sitting-room.
Here the final fight began.

As they rushed at us we shot, till they went down in heaps.

Almost at our last charge they gave back, and just then the roof fell upon them.
Oh, what a terrible scene was that! The dense clouds of smoke, the screams of the trapped and burning men, the turmoil, the agony! The front door was burst in by a flank onslaught.
Leblanc and a slave who was near him were seized by black, claw-like hands and dragged out.