truck the next prisoner to
him, who also fell instantly weltering in his blood.

"Ought a brother to be blood thirsty?" asked Edmond.

"He ought well be so," cried Ravanel turning angrily towards him: "Oh
my friend, he, who has once tasted the pleasure of stretching an enemy
at his feet, becomes like a lion after the palatable sweetness,
scarcely able to spare his keeper. I am feeble and weak when I am long
without seeing blood; it ascends like the smoke of a lamp in the
mournful twilight, as the rosy dawn after the darkness of night."

Cavalier reprimanded the enthusiast for his cruelty, and Catinat led
the remaining prisoners to the brink of a precipice, when they fell
under the swords of the Camisards. Their leader the fiercest among them
all, only remained alive. He now called out in a powerful voice: "Stay!
far be it from me to beg for my life, I would not for once owe an
obligation to such pitiable people, though, what I require, you may
grant me without prejudice to yourselves."

"What dost thou require, knave?" asked Cavalier, while the others
clustered still closer round him, "That you unbind my arms," said the
fierce, wild man with an expression of the most profound contempt:
"that I may once more, and for the last time, put my flask to my
parched lips, which has been a friend and comforter to me in all my
sorrows, and that you will afterwards be careful to deliver me speedily
from such contemptible society as yours."

The Camisards murmured and would have cut him down, but at a sign from
Catinat, they drew back, he himself unloosed the arms of the prisoner,
and watched him with his drawn sword in his hand, lest despair,
perhaps, might at the moment of his death, impel him to some fool-hardy
attempt. But the powerful old man looked round him with the greatest
composure, shook his arms and shoulders that he might feel his freedom
after the restraint he had endured, then took a flask of wine from his
bosom and emptying it jocosely, dashed it against the rock, where it
broke in pieces, then turned to the bystanders, baring his neck as he
said: "Now, if it please you!" Even Ravanel measured him with a look of
surprise; and Edmond, who had watched all his movements, felt himself
impelled by an inexplicable feeling to save the life of so ruthless a
man. "Strange as I may appear to you, beloved brethren," cried he aloud
advancing into the circle, "I entreat you nevertheless by the high
esteem with which you hono