The two parties met. There was a brief rattle of stick against stick.
But the hill boys were the stronger, and Napoleon gave the order to
retreat.

Down the hill rushed the town boys. After them, pell-mell, came the hill
boys, flushed with victory and careless of consequences. Suddenly, as
Napoleon reached his guide-post, he shouted in his shrill little voice,
"Halt!" And his army, knowing his intentions, instantly obeyed.

"Stones!" he cried, and they scooped up their supply of ammunition.

"About!" They faced the oncoming foe.

"Fire!" came his final order; and, so fast and furious fell the shower
of stones upon the surprised and unprepared hill boys, that their
victorious columns halted, wavered, turned, broke, and fled.

"Now! upon them! follow them! drive them!" rang out the little Captain
Napoleon's swiftly given orders.

They followed his lead. The hill boys, utterly routed, scattered in
dismay. One-half of them were captured and held as prisoners, until
Napoleon's two big challengers, now acting as commissioners of
conquest, received from the hill boys an unconditional surrender, an
acknowledgment of the superiority of the town boys, and the humble
promise to molest them no more.

This was Napoleon's first taste of victorious war. But ever after he
was an acknowledged leader of the boys of Ajaccio. Andrew Pozzo was