he had become since his sister's shame had been known to him, when he drank he only brooded heavier upon it; and the hope of a more complete revenge only restrained him then from some desperate act of violence. As he walked to and fro, chafing with inward passion, he might have been compared to a caged wild beast, hungry and with food in sight, yet unattainable.

'A curse upon you, Tom!' said he. 'Would you roast us alive, this hot night? Leave the fire alone and bring your hang-dog face here!'

He treated his associate with the most bitter contempt.

'I doant fancy biding here with narra light!' said the fellow. 'There be a mort of ugly things here!'

'There's nothing uglier than your own carcase. Drink and get courage. If your heart is cold with fear, warm it with brandy.'

So saying he took a deep draught himself and handed the bottle to his companion.

'I hate the stuff!' said he. 'Bah! it's poison—but it rouses me. Fire this infernal cave! What's that?' A bat, disturbed by the smoke, flitted close before his face. 'I have had nothing but evil omens to-day. What is the day of the month?'

'I heern lawyer say the 26th, yesterday.'

'The 27th of August, then. By twelve o'clock to-night my time will be up—then I shall be free to act. If that old seaman should play me false now! I promised him to wait three years, and I have kept my word!' He was speaking more to himself than to his companion. 'Three long years—too long for vengeance for wrongs like mine to wait. But that he swore, I should tame his pride—but that he spoke of hurling him from his high estate, ere this I would have had the heart's blood of that proud man. But to-night I shall be free, and then—'

He took from his vest a miniature, and gazed upon it long and earnestly. Gradually his features softened, and burying his face in his hands, he wept. There was yet one green spot in the desert of his heart—love for the fair girl he had been betrothed to. Reader, it was a terrible thing to see that man weep—it would have made your heart sicken and your blood boil, while every scalding tear that fell would cry aloud in your thoughts, 'Vengeance, vengeance!'

A strange proceeding now took place. Curly Tom took from his pocket a small phial, and previously filling his own cup with brandy, poured the contents into the bottle. He watched his companion intently during this process, but his terrible emotion too completely mastered him for the moment. It was but momentary. He arose and commenced to pace the floor again. 'My Mary! you too sacrificed! O, fiend! fiend! But my vengeance shall be terrible! To-night I shall be free from my oath!' He walked up to the table and drank. Curly Tom watched him intently as he resumed his unsteady walk.

'He little dreams that I can enter his very chamber at any hour. Oh! coward, fool, dolt, that I have been, to delay my just revenge on the word of that old pirate. I believe him,—some paid minion of this proud man; for he has them in every guise, perhaps the very appointment made three years ago in the West Indies, was a trap, perhaps,—even this clod is a spy and accomplice;' he took a pistol from an inner pocket and cocking it, pressed it to the ear of his companion. 'Tom,' said he, 'if I thought you would betray me.' The ruffian possessed that brute indifference to danger too often mistaken for true courage,—he did not tremble, though a slight paleness was visible on his repulsive countenance as he felt the touch of the iron barrel. 'Whoy! Measter Horace,' said he, 'didn't you save moy old mawther from being drowned by the boys vor a witch, noa, noa,—I be true, and hate yearl and lawyer, and all the great volk.'

'I believe you,' said the other, replacing the pistol, 'but' he began to mutter indistinctly, took a few steps in a wild, uncertain way;—'I feel dizzy,—d——nation,' he staggered to a seat and dropped his head upon the piece of rock that served them for a table;—the opiate had done its work.

Curly Tom cautiously arose, and walking up to him, looked upon him long and steadily, listening to the heavy breathing,—he wished to remove his arms, but the position Hunter was lying in, prevented his doing so. The ruffian felt no remorse; it was true that Hunter had saved the wretch's mother from being abused and ill-treated, perhaps murdered, by the superstitious villagers: true that he had regularly allowed the poor old woman support till her death,—while her ruffian son was pursuing his career of crime,—but the villain knew his own neck was in danger, and being conscious of perfidy, now hated Hunter for his momentary suspicion. As he leaned over the insensible man, his light, bleary eyes gleaming with ferocious satisfaction, his lank, shambling figure, and yellow, matted hair hanging in elf locks round his sharp visage, he looked like an unclean bird of prey hovering over a carcase. And a carcase it was over which he bent his head; dead now to every honorable hope, worse than useless to his kind, a hunted outcast, a mass of decaying matter, kept alive only by the fiery hope of vengeance that burnt within. The ruffian had hitherto been faithful, and procured Hunter those necessaries that he could not venture in quest of himself, for he was a deserter from that service, which kidnaps men to do its work, and hunts down the poor slaves when they escape, even in the land whose inhabitants are singing, 'Britons ever will be free.' Bitter, mockery of freedom. Curly Tom now held up his hand, and cautiously the officers emerged from their hiding place, slowly they came forward, anticipating an easy capture; they were mistaken. The opiate, as it frequently does on excitable natures, had only partially stupefied him, and the first effect wearing off, it now began to act as a stimulant;—the officers had traversed about half the distance to the rock on which Hunter's head reclined, when he started up and looked wildly around him,—for a moment he seemed stupefied, and passed his hand before his face as if to assure himself he was not dreaming—the officers rushed forward. He saw it all now,—he drew a pistol, but Curly Tom threw his long arms round him,—too late to prevent the explosion, however. The ball whizzed by the side of the foremost officer, and struck the agent in the leg—he fell. Curly Tom possessed more strength than his lank figure promised,—but Hunter, thoroughly sobered by his danger; tore his hold away, and striking the ruffian a tremendous blow with the butt end of the discharged pistol, felled him to the ground,—and snatching a knife from the rock close at hand, stabbed the foremost officer to the heart,—he fell with a heavy groan, and the next moment the remaining officer, a man of herculean strength had closed upon him. Terrible was now the struggle—the officer had dexterously struck the knife from his hand as he closed with him, but he could not draw his pistols. Locked in each other's grasp they wrestled together for life: each one well knew that death would be the lot of the vanquished,—the officer burning to revenge his comrade's death:—Hunter struggling for life and his cherished vengeance. Gradually they approached the spot where the agent sat watching the conflict with terrible anxiety, so absorbing as to make him forgetful of the pain of his wound; here, by a tremendous effort the officer succeeded in throwing his antagonist; falling, however, with him. Hunter made desperate efforts to rise, but getting within reach of the agent in the struggle, Lambert seized his hair, and held his head firmly down; to master his hands now, and slip a pair of handcuffs over his wrists, was, to the powerful and practised officer, the work of a moment,—and furious with passion, but exhausted by the struggle, Hunter lay upon the earth, a captive.