"Well, and if it's not so many! and if you, who ought to be first in the fight have managed to save your own skin! quite enough have fallen for all that, and we shall all perish if this mad business goes on any longer. Take care, Knéz! Look after yourself! for Batu Khan is not used to being played with by new men such as you!" Libor staggered to his feet, and though badly frightened by his ill-success, as well as by what Bajdár had said, his natural cunning did not altogether desert him. "Be off, Bajdár! and don't blame me! Of course, I meant it for the best! The castle is crammed with gold and silver, and there are some good horses, as well as a pretty girl or two. Who could have supposed the rascals would defend themselves in such a fashion! Be off, I tell you, Bajdár, and stop this senseless fighting, and we'll draw off into the woods." "What! with empty hands?" "Who is to help it? But we won't go quite empty-handed either." The Mongol glanced up from under his cap as Libor said this, and his small eyes glittered like fire-flies in the darkness. "Master Peter has a large sheep-fold in a valley not far from here, and the few men who guard it are nothing to reckon with; if we drive off the sheep, there will be a good feast for a thousand or two of hungry fellows in the camp." "What's that?" said the Tartar hotly. "Why, we shall eat those up ourselves! All the cattle have been driven off out of our way, and we are as hungry as wolves!" "Only go, Bajdár, and call the men off, and then I'll tell you something which will make up for our ill-luck here." Bajdár shook his head. He was in no good humour, but he had gained his object, and he went off, cursing and threatening, to stop the assault. As for the amends which Libor promised, we can say only so much as this, that they were ample. He believed the country to be wholly at the Mongols' mercy, he was well acquainted with the neighbourhood, and he led his men, who had now dwindled to thirty or so, to the most defenceless places, where they found cattle enough to satisfy them. So great was the prevailing terror, that many had fled from their homes leaving everything behind them, or had been so harassed by perpetual alarms that they had at last concealed their property in such senseless ways that it was found without difficulty. However it may have been in this case, it was a fact that when Knéz Libor returned from his campaign, he received high praise from Batu Khan, who cared nothing at all that the force had melted away till little more than a fourth part was left to return to the Sajó. Batu had further uses for Libor. When the Mongols had at last made off, and Moses and Talabor found that the shepherds had been killed, and the sheep, either eaten on the spot, carried off, or scattered in the woods, they first cautiously searched the neighbourhood, and then proceeded with no little labour, to bury the dead.