THE BITTERNESS OF DEATH.

From that old, dismantled farmhouse, built on to the tower, there sloped down, toward where a small stream ran some four hundred yards away, a long stretch of bare land, covered sometimes in the summer heat by short, coarse grass, while in the winter time it was, if any of it were left uneaten by the sheep, frost-bound or snow-covered. It was so now on this clear, cold winter night, its surface being dotted by innumerable folds and pens into which those sheep had once been driven, but which, since the mountaineers had been forced into revolution and had raided the place, were empty. They were so on this night, of sheep. Yet not of other living things, unless the moon played strange tricks with the eyes of those regarding the pens. Instead, were being filled rapidly with human forms creeping like Indians or painted snakes toward them, wriggling their bodies beneath the hurdles they were composed of, entering by that way into the ready-found ambush--the forms of the Miquelets, the most hated by the Camisards of all the troops which had been sent against them; the men whose extermination was more vowed and determined than the extermination of either dragoon, chevau-léger, or milice.

"You see?" whispered Le Leopard to Cavalier and Montbonneux as they stood together sheltering themselves from observation behind the great stone posts of the farmhouse's antique stoop, "you see? They first, then next the cavalry. Observe, beyond the stream; look through the trunks of the trees across it. The moon sparkles on breast and back and the splints of the gorgets. You see?" Then added, "And hear?"

For from down toward where Le Léopard had directed the other's attention there rang that which told beyond all doubt that the foe was lurking there; discovered them to the surrounded, hemmed-in Camisards. The neigh of a horse, long, loud, and shrill, taken up a moment later by others in their company and answered.

After that no need for further disguise or hiding. The presence of the enemy was made known. An instant later the trumpets rang out the "Advance!" Across the stretch of bare land the cavalry of Montrevel were seen riding fast.

"To arms! To arms!" sounded Cavalier's voice on the night air, it rivalling almost in distinctness the clear sounds of the royal trumpeters. "To arms! The tyrants are upon us. To arms! I say," and ere, with one wild shriek in unison from the throats of the Miquelets, the latter sprang from their ambush, the Protestants had leaped from the floors where they had flung themselves and were in the open, face to face with the Pyrenean wolves.

Instantly the whole surface of the earth beneath the bright rays of the moon was changed. Soon no moon was seen. The smoke from countless firelocks covered, obscured her. Smoke dispelled for an instant now and again by volleys of flame belched forth from fusil and carabine, flame that showed Miquelets dashing at huge mountaineers' throats, their long knives in their hands or 'twixt their teeth as they so sprang and clutched; that showed, too, these savage creatures forced to release their grasp, hurled to the earth, their brains clubbed out by butt and stock. Showed also the dragoons in the midst of all, sabring, thrusting, cutting down, overriding ally and foeman indiscriminately, reeling back themselves over their chargers' haunches as, from the windowless apertures of the tower, came hail after hail of bullets from Camisards ensconced therein.

But still the battle raged. Still from the Protestants' throats rang their war cry, "For God and his children!" from those of the royalists, "For God and the King!" from those of the Miquelets, in their hideous shrieking falsetto, "Guerra al Culchielo!" "Guerra al Morté!"

"Save yourself and her," cried Cavalier, rushing back for a moment to the farmhouse kitchen and stumbling over the dead body of the treacherous peasant, Guignon, who had been poniarded by Le Léopard the moment he was certain that the man had betrayed them, "save yourself--and her. There is a backway by the fosse to an ancient passage 'neath the old castle; save yourselves. We are lost, lost! Outnumbered! Save yourselves!"

Then in a moment he saw that neither Martin nor Urbaine were there. Gone! either to destruction or safety, he knew not which, yet gone. And he rushed back to his doomed band; rushed back to see that the tower was in flames, that all of his men who were in it were beyond earthly salvation. Already it seemed to rock beneath the great spouting flames that leaped forth from roofless summit and openings where windows might once have been. Doomed!

Le Léopard came near him at this moment, an awful spectacle--bleeding from a dozen wounds, his vast and iron-gray beard crimson, yet with his eyes glaring as ever. Came near, staggering, reeling, yet able to gasp:

"To the fosse, to the fosse! You can save some that way. To the fosse!"

"Come you also," muttered Cavalier, "Come----"

"I come!" Le Léopard exclaimed. "Nay, never more. See!" and he tore open his rough coat, showing on his breast a hideous gaping wound. And as he did so he reeled more heavily than before, then fell across the body of a dragoon lying close by.

But still, all around, the fight went on; the sabres swung and the volleys rattled, while from the tower there rose now the death song of those within it. Above all else that was heard a hymn of praise to the God of Battles, the God also of the outcasts--a hymn blessing and magnifying his name. And as it rolled through the fumes and the grime there came next an awful roar, a vast uprising of a monstrous sheet of fresh flame, and, with a crash, the tower came to earth, burying beneath its ruins not only those within it, but also many others around, Camisards and royalists.

"They are bringing their culverins," cried one now above all the tumult, "to play upon the house," and in answer there rang out now another voice which all knew, the voice of Cavalier, the words he shouted being: "Disperse, disperse, my brethren! Children of the mountains and the clouds, disperse as do the clouds themselves. Not to-night is our triumph, yet it will come. It must come."

He spoke truly. The triumph was to come ere long now. The Camisards were to gain their cause at last, but it was not to be to-night, nor by the sword. Instead, by the gentle mediation and mercy of one whose name is still spoken gently in the Cévennes--the name of the great and good Villars.

"You can go no farther?" Urbaine said an hour later to Martin Ashurst, "no farther. Oh, my God, my God, that it should come to this! And for me, for my sake!"

"Nay, dear one, what matter? We are together to the last. And you love me. What more is there to ask?"

"Alas! Alas! I can not live without you, stay behind alone. My love, my love, you must not leave me. Shall not go before. If you die, then mu............