Maston.

"Who is it?"

"Captain Nicholl!"

"Nicholl!" cried Michel Ardan, whose heart almost stopped beating.

"Nicholl disarmed! Then he had nothing more to fear from his adversary?"

"Let us go to him," said Michel Ardan; "we shall know how it is."

But his companion and he had not gone fifty steps when they stopped to
examine the captain more attentively. They imagined they should find a
bloodthirsty and revengeful man. Upon seeing him they remained
stupefied.

A net with fine meshes was hung between two gigantic tulip-trees, and in
it a small bird, with its wings entangled, was struggling with plaintive
cries. The bird-catcher who had hung the net was not a human being but a
venomous spider, peculiar to the country, as large as a pigeon's egg,
and furnished with enormous legs. The hideous insect, as he was rushing
on his prey, was forced to turn back and take refuge in the high
branches of a tulip-tree, for a formidable enemy threatened him in his
turn.

In fact, Captain Nicholl, with his gun on the ground, forgetting the
dangers of his situation, was occupied in delivering as delicately as
possible the victim taken in the meshes of the monstrous spider. When he
had finished he let the little bird fly away; it fluttered its wings
joyfully and disappeared.

Nicholl, touched, was watching it fly through the copse when he heard
these words uttered in a voice full of emotion:--

"You are a brave man, you are!"

He turned. Michel Ardan was in front of him, repeating in every tone--

"And a kind one!"

"Michel Ardan!" exclaimed the captain, "what have you come here for,
sir?"

"To shake hands with you, Nicholl, and prevent you killing Barbicane or
being killed by him."

"Barbicane!" cried the captain, "I have been looking for him these two
hours without finding him! Where is he hiding himself?"

"Nicholl!" said Michel Ardan, "this is not polite! You must always
respect your adversary; don't be uneasy; if Barbicane is alive we shall
find him, and so much the more easily that if he has not amused himself
with protecting birds he must be looking for you too. But when you have
found him--and Michel Ardan tells you this--there will be no duel
between you."

"Between President Barbicane and me," answered Nicholl gravely, "there
is such rivalry that the death of one of us--"

"Come, come!" resumed Michel Ardan, "brave men like you may detest one
another, but they respect one another too. You will not figh