surprise, at a cross-road I saw numbers of women in their curious Manchu head-dress standing at a big gateway, all dressed in their best clothes.  As we passed they caught sight of me, and, nothing abashed, began immediately calling to me and waving with their arms.  This was extraordinary and unlocked for.  At first I thought that they were only courtesans, who had been deprived for so long of all custom that they had been rendered desperate, and were seeking to inveigle me faute de mieux; but remembering that such women are confined to the outer city, I reined in my mount, halted the whole caravan, and went slowly towards them, half fearing, I confess, some ruse.  Yet the women greeted me with fresh cries and words.  There were a full dozen of them of the best class, and they explained to me that they had been left, absolutely abandoned, two nights before by all the men of the household, who, fearing the worst and hearing that the way out through the north of the city was still open, had seized all the draft and riding animals and ridden rapidly away, saying that the women would be spared by the foreign soldiery, but that probably every man of rank would be killed.  No one had molested them so far, because this house lay so close to the foreign troops, but with so many armed men on the streets, and with the pillaging and the murder that was going on, they did not know how long they would be spared.  They told me this quickly in gasps.  I paused in doubt to know what to answer; it was everyone for himself, and the devil not even looking after the hindmost, as I have just said.  But women....  I must propose something.

They saw my hesitation, and women-like, renewed their pleading in chorus.  I noticed, also, that two or three of the older ones grouped themselves close together, and, putting down their heads, began rapidly discussing in loud whispers, which showed their trepidation.  Then they called a tall, splendidly built woman, and, telling her something in an undertone, pushed her forward towards me.  Unabashed, she advanced on me with a firm step, and laying a white-skinned hand—­for the Manchus can be very white—­on my arm, she begged me to stop here myself—­to make this my house for the time being—­to do as I pleased with all of them....  After all those weeks of privation, that constant rifle-fire, that stench of earth-soiled men, this woman so close seemed strange....  I answered, in greater confusion, that I could not yet say whether it was possible for me to stay so far away; that there might be trouble; that I would see and let them know before the night was far advanced....

Not wholly satisfied and half doubting, they let me draw off with their pleadings renewed.  Then, as I thought something might happen before I could let them know, I gave them two rifles from the store we had collected, and telling them to bar and bolt their gate, showed them how a shot or two would probably drive off an attack.  We clattered on and lost them in the gloom....