CHAPTER XXI INSIDE OF BESIEGED PRZEMYSL

“The fiends!” exclaimed Alan, staring horrified down upon the heap of blazing ruins which so short a time before had been happy, peaceful homes. “It would be only right if we were to drop a few lyddite bombs down upon them!”

“No,” said Bob, “we mustn’t do that, because we would be almost certain to blow up a good many of those poor German villagers along with the guilty Cossacks.”

“I don’t believe that there are any Germans left alive there,” grumbled Alan.

“Nevertheless, we shouldn’t bombard the Russians,” interposed Ned. “Remember, Alan, that we aren’t in Europe either to fight or take sides in any way, unless we absolutely have to in order to protect our own lives. The United States is a neutral country, and we must do nothing which might later imperil that neutrality. I know that it’s hard to spare such wretches as those we have just escaped, but we ought to do it.”

“Ned is right,” chimed in both Bob and Buck, so Alan had to forego the bomb-dropping, richly as the Cossacks deserved it.

“Well, where to now?” asked Ned, when the _Flyer_ had continued on her course in a westerly direction for about ten minutes. “Shall we head for Russian Poland and see what General Von Hindenburg is doing towards capturing Warsaw?”

“Don’t go there because you may think that I want to,” replied Bob. “I’m sick of the way they fight here on the eastern frontier. They may kill more men in Belgium with their big cannon, but at least they do it in a soldierly fashion.”

“I’d rather go somewhere else too,” said Alan. “How about a flight to Asia Minor? I read in the papers just before we left America that the Allied fleets were knocking the Turkish forts on the Dardanelles to pieces with thirteen-inch guns. That might be an interesting sight.”

“No, let’s not go there,” Bob objected. “Let poor little Turkey die alone. She had no business getting mixed up in this war in the first place. We’ll pass up the scrap there and the Japanese assault on Tsing-Tau. As far as I’m concerned there’s only one place more I’d like to see before we start for New York again, and that is Przemysl.

“You know that it is one of the great strategic fortifications in Galicia, and was the first real stumbling-block in the way of the Russian invasion of Austria-Hungary. When the Austrian army was crushed at Jaroslaw and retreated in disorder to protect Budapest, they asked for volunteers to garrison Przemysl. It was pointed out at that time that the town and fortress would surely be besieged, and that there was very little hope of any Austrians remaining ever escaping with his life. The orders were to hold out at no matter what sacrifices.

“Volunteers came forward a plenty. Then millions of Russians poured down around the city. These burned the town, shelled the citadel and tried actual assault. All in vain! So the Russians left three army corps of men besieging the fortress and marched on to the conquest of Hungary. Those besiegers are still camped around the brave fellows in Przemysl. Six months and more of famine rations, terrible disease and unceasing bombardment have not quenched their determination to hold out until the last man drops.

“Now, don’t you boys agree with me that a visit to Przemysl ought to prove worth while?”

“Przemysl it is then,” cried Ned. “You’re a wonderful speech-maker, Bob.”

“Quit your kidding,” grinned the newspaper man. “Also, if you really want to reach Przemysl, I’d advise you to ship our course more to the southeast.”

“Aye, aye, sir!” grinned Ned, with a mock-serious salute. “Sou’ by sou’east it is, sir!”

“Humph!” grunted Bob. “I hope that Buck Stewart has our breakfast ready.”

The jagged summits of the Carpathians--mountains more rugged and awe-inspiring than those of Switzerland itself--scalloped the southern horizon and seemed to overshadow the countryside for leagues, when Ned announced from the pilot-room that Przemysl was in sight.

For an hour past they had been traversing a region of wild grandeur, where broad rivers rushed tumbling and foaming down from the rocky heights, where wild sheep browsed on lonely hillsides and where the binoculars showed natives as fantastically garbed as the bandit chorus of a popular musical comedy.

They had seen whole brigades of Russians on the march, plodding sullenly along like slaves under the driver’s whip. They had seen signal fires leap flaming from hill crest to mountain crag. They had seen a flotilla of Russian barges being poled down the broad, glistening waters of the Vistula, an ugly, snub-nosed cannon on every boat. They had seen the remnants of a once natty Austrian regiment being hunted down and shot like rabbits by mounted Cossacks. All this they had seen and much more.

Away off to the west the dull rumble and muttering of heavy cannonading vibrated through the air. That was the battle of Cracow in progress, although the boys did not know it then.

Death and devastation was everywhere. Smouldering villages with unburied bodies among the embers lay in the track of each army, whether Serb, Russian or Austrian.

“Przemysl is directly ahead!” called Ned down through the speaking tube, and the _Ocean Flyer_ began to plane slowly towards it.

The shell-battered citadel stood upon a little rise of ground with the ashes and fire-charred walls of what had been the flourishing town surrounding it. The tattered red, white and green flag of the dual empire still flapped defiantly upon the walls. All around the fortress, for miles and miles, stretched the vast encampment of the great horde of Russian besiegers.

They had dug a zigzag line of shallow trenches as close to the walls as they dared, and sharp-shooters lay flat on their stomachs in these, watching for an incautious head above the battlements. Every now and then a little puff of bluish smoke somewhere along the line showed the alertness of the marksmen.

Some distance farther back three batteries of artillery had been planted behind earthworks and these every now and then belched forth fire, shaking the ground as their shells went hurtling towards the obstinate defenders.

As always before, the appearance of the _Ocean Flyer_ created an instantaneous disturbance among all who saw it. Aerial guns were trained upon it from both the fortress and the Russian lines, and several smaller military aeroplanes shot bird-like into the sky to reconnoitre it.

The first of these rose directly from Przemysl itself and Alan signaled to it from one of the _Flyer’s_ outside runways by waving a white flag. The Austrian aviator swung near enough for Bob to explain that their mission was peaceful and that they wanted to alight inside the walls.

“Wait until I report concerning you,” called back the Austrian.

He volplaned down into the city and returned with the message that the _Flyer_ would be permitted to descend.

It seemed as if every man in the garrison not on guard duty gathered to see the big airship as it settled down upon the parade ground, and the commandant himself was there to meet his unusual visitors. After learning their identity, he greeted the boys cordially, but said:

“I confess that I am disappointed too, because the general outline of your vessel suggested to me that it might be a new form of German dirigible, come with news of a relief army on the way. You have heard, of course, of the great fleet of Zeppelins which they are getting ready for the aerial invasion of England?”

“We have heard rumors of something like that,” answered Alan, “but were inclined to believe that it was all just a bugaboo to frighten London.”

“Oh, no! Not at all,” the commandant assured him warmly. “You will see in the course of the next few weeks. Yes, and England shall see too!”

After that the young aeronauts were shown over the fortress, which really was a small town in itself. Many of the buildings had been set afire or demolished by bursting shells, but a corps of engineers was kept ready at all times to repair damages as fast as they were made.

Food supplies had run short some time before and the garrison was then reduced to starvation rations, consisting of a little soup with a few crumbs of black bread and, twice a week, a bit of tinned meats. Horses and even rats had been eaten with relish. The soldiers presented a pathetic but inspiring spectacle. The hospitals were crowded with sick and wounded; the walls were gradually crumbling under incessant shell fire, yet that garrison of heroes remained undaunted.

It was as Buck said, “just as if they had been Americans.”