CHAPTER XXVII.

THE SIEGE OF THE LONE CITY. Our losses totaled nearly a hundred and fifty girls. We brought back with us on the platforms but six wounded. I shall never forget that hour we spent searching among the wreckage--those blackened, twisted forms of what had once been men and women. I shall not describe it. Of all the boats which Tao had dispatched on this ill-fated expedition, only one escaped to return with news of the disaster. I was glad now that one, at least, had survived, for the report it would give would, I felt …