The students and the other volunteers whom Ödön had rallied around him amounted to about two hundred in all,--a small but determined band. When the enemy saw that this handful of young men was holding the cavalry in check, they caused their rocket-battery to play upon the little band of patriots. And the lads took it for play indeed. "Aha, old friend!" cried Mausmann, as a rocket came shrieking through the air. "See, boys, the first has stuck in the mud; up with a whiz and down with a thud! The second there bursts in mid-air; the third comes nearer, but we don't care. Here comes the fourth; its course is straight." (Indeed, the rocket was so well aimed that it landed in their very midst, whereupon Mausmann stepped forward, coolly took it by its stick, although it was spitting fire in an alarming manner, and hurled it into the ditch beside the road, where it exploded harmlessly; then he finished his rhyme.) "It bursts at last; too late, too late!" The young recruits laughed aloud. Perceiving that their rockets were effecting nothing, the enemy planned another cavalry charge, this time sending a troop of cuirassiers to open the road. The little company of patriots drew up, three deep, clear across the highway, and awaited the assault. During this pause Mausmann started the German student song: "_Wer kommt dort von der Höh?_ _Wer kommt dort von der Höh?_ _Wer kommt dort von der Höh?_ _Sa sa, ledernen Höh_-- _Wer kommt dort von der Höh?_" His comrades joined in, and then with a loud hurrah they gave the oncoming horsemen a volley from their rifles at twenty paces distance. Aha! how they broke and turned tail and scampered back, leaving their dead and wounded behind! Then the gallant band reloaded, shouldered their pieces, and marched back to join their comrades. But presently the sound of approaching cavalry was again heard on the road behind them. The horsemen divided to right and left, hoping to surround their foe. The latter, however, closed in about their leader, and then faced outward, presenting a bristling wall of bayonets on every side, like a monstrous hedgehog; and again their merry student song rang out defiantly. Once more the attacking cavalry was forced to fall back before the lively volleys of this determined band, which seemed ignorant of the meaning of fear, and proof against all modes of assault. Its method was to let the enemy advance until a rifle-volley was sure to do the most execution. The student song had many stanzas, one for each attack from the pursuing cavalry; it was sung to the end, and the enemy repulsed at each onset. The slightly wounded bound up their wounds, while those who had fared the worst were laid across their comrades' rifle-barrels and so carried along, marking their path with their life-blood, and ever shouting hurrahs for the cause of liberty. At last the cartridges ran low.