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Round
this, outside, were piled chairs, furniture, pitch, tar, powder,
whale-oil. Promptly at nine in the morning, three women and twelve
young girls--wives and daughters of the Cossack officers--were
despatched to the Cossack besiegers on the hill with word that unless
the Cossacks surrendered their arms to the exiles and sent down fifty
soldiers as hostages of safety for the exiles till the ship could
sail--precisely at ten o'clock the church would be set on fire.
The women were seen to ascend the hill. No signal came from the
Cossacks. At a quarter past nine Benyowsky kindled fires at each of
the four angles of the church. As the flames began to mount a forest
of handkerchiefs and white sheets waved above the hill, and a host of
men came spurring to the fort with all the Cossacks' arms and fifty-two
hostages.
{122} The exiles now togged themselves out in all the gay regimentals
of the Russian officers. Salutes of triumph were fired from the
cannon. A _Te Deum_ was sung. Feast and mad wassail filled both day
and night till the harbor cleared.


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