What it has taken minutes to write occurred in but a few seconds, but during that time Tars Tarkas had seen my plight and had dropped from the lower branches, which he had reached with such infinite labour, and as I flung the last of my immediate antagonists from me the great Thark leaped to my side, and again we fought, back to back, as we had done a hundred times before. Time and again the ferocious apes sprang in to close with us, and time and again we beat them back with our swords. The great tails of the plant men lashed with tremendous power about us as they charged from various directions or sprang with the agility of greyhounds above our heads; but every attack met a gleaming blade in sword hands that had been reputed for twenty years the best that Mars ever had known; for Tars Tarkas and John Carter were names that the fighting men of the world of warriors loved best to speak. But even the two best swords in a world of fighters can avail not for ever against overwhelming numbers of fierce and savage brutes that know not what defeat means until cold steel teaches their hearts no longer to beat, and so, step by step, we were forced back. At length we stood against the giant tree that we had chosen for our ascent, and then, as charge after charge hurled its weight upon us, we gave back again and again, until we had been forced half-way around the huge base of the colossal trunk. Tars Tarkas was in the lead, and suddenly I heard a little cry of exultation from him. “Here is shelter for one at least, John Carter,” he said, and, glancing down, I saw an opening in the base of the tree about three feet in diameter. “In with you, Tars Tarkas,” I cried, but he would not go; saying that his bulk was too great for the little aperture, while I might slip in easily. “We shall both die if we remain without, John Carter; here is a slight chance for one of us. Take it and you may live to avenge me, it is useless for me to attempt to worm my way into so small an opening with this horde of demons besetting us on all sides.” “Then we shall die together, Tars Tarkas,” I replied, “for I shall not go first. Let me defend the opening while you get in, then my smaller stature will permit me to slip in with you before they can prevent.” We still were fighting furiously as we talked in broken sentences, punctured with vicious cuts and thrusts at our swarming enemy. At length he yielded, for it seemed the only way in which either of us might be saved from the ever-increasing numbers of our assailants, who were still swarming upon us from all directions across the broad valley. “It was ever your way, John Carter, to think last of your own life,” he said; “but still more your way to command the lives and actions of others, even to the greatest of Jeddaks who rule upon Barsoom.”