edge! There was no murder in the case! We
fought with swords; and there," said he, drawing the weapon, "there's
the blade that pierced his heart! and here" (tearing open his vest and
shirt)--"and here the wound he gave me in return. The outrage for which
he died well merited the penalty; but if there be guilt, it is mine, and
mine only!"

A fit of choking stopped his utterance. He tried to overcome it; he
gasped convulsively twice or thrice; and then, as a cataract of bright
blood gushed from nostrils and mouth together, he fell back and rolled
heavily to the ground--dead.

So exhausted was nature by this last effort that the body was cold
within an hour after.

[Illustration: 208]

CHAPTER XVII. A FRIEND'S TRIALS

The day of my beloved father's funeral was that of my birth! It is not
improbable that he had often looked forward to that day as the crowning
event of his whole life, destining great rejoicings, and planning every
species of festivity; and now the summer clouds were floating over the
churchyard, and the gay birds were carolling over the cold grave where
he lay.

What an emblem of human anticipation, and what an illustration of his
own peculiar destiny! Few men ever entered upon life with more brilliant
prospects. With nearly every gift of fortune, and not one single adverse
circumstance to struggle against, he was scarcely launched upon the
ocean of life ere he was shipwrecked! Is it not ever thus? Is it not
that the storms and seas of adverse fortune are our best preservatives
in this world, by calling into activity our powers of energy and of
endurance? Are we not better when our lot demands effort, and exacts
sacrifice, than when prosperity neither evokes an ungratified wish, nor
suggests a difficult ambition?

The real circumstances of his death were, I believe, never known to my
mother, but the shock of the event almost killed her. Her cousin, Emile
de Gabriac, had just arrived at Castle Carew, and they were sitting
talking over France and all its pleasant associations, when a servant
entered hastily with a letter for MacNaghten. It was in Fagan's
handwriting, and marked "Most private, and with haste."

"See," cried Dan, laughing,--"look what devices a dun is reduced to, to
obtain an audience! Tony Fagan, so secret and so urgent on the outside,
will be candid enough within, and beg respectfully to remind Mr.
MacNaghten that his indorsement for two hundred and something pounds
will fall