Gerzson proved on this occasion that if
he was not a great strategist, at any rate he was a great beater up of
game. His plan was to occupy all the mountain roads and passes leading
out of the six counties with armed bands of militia, while at the same
time he himself advanced slowly along the highroads with his
gentlemen-volunteers joining hands together from place to place. Between
various groups of the volunteers were regular lines of _pandurs_ who had
to thoroughly scour all the forests they came to. The encircling network
of this gigantic army of beaters grew narrower and narrower day by day
and was to converge towards a fixed point which Squire Gerzson said he
would more definitely indicate later on.
Moreover there was a flying column admitted to the full confidence of
its leader, whose duty it was to appear suddenly and unexpectedly in all
parts of the closely environed region, in order to head off anything
like a definite plan of defence on the part of the adventurers and track
them down more easily. The leadership of this special corps was
entrusted to young Szilard Vamhidy, upon whose ingenuity, determination
and ability Squire Gerzson professed to place the utmost reliance.
As soon as he had received this important charge, Szilard took horse
and set off at the head of his four and twenty _pandurs_. First of all
he went in the direction of the Alps of Bihar and along a narrow
mountain path and through a melancholy, uncanny, region with not a
living plant by the wayside and not a morsel of moss on the naked rock.
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