ces of the forest. Through the groves where the
spirit of Donna Marina--the lost love of the marauder--was said to
wander, shrieked the round shot, shells and grape. Through tangled
shrubberies, bright with flowers and colored berries, pierced the
discharge of canister; the air, fragrant at the dawn with orange
blossom and starry jessamine, was noisome with suffocating,
sulphurous fumes, and, beneath the fetid shroud, figures in a fog
heedlessly trampled the lilies, the red roses and "flowers of the
heart."

From the castle on the summit--mortal trespass upon the immortal pale
of the gods!--the upward shower was answered by an iron downpour, and
two storming parties, with ladders, pick-axes and crows, advanced,
one on each side of the hill, to the attack. Boom! boom! before one of
the parties, climbing and scrambling to the peak, belched the iron
missives of destruction from the concealed mouths of heavy guns,
followed by the rattling shower from small arms.

Surprised, they paused, panting from the swift ascent, some throwing
themselves prone upon the earth, while the grape and canister passed
harmlessly over them, others seeking such shelter as rocks, trees and
shrubs afforded. Here and there a man fell, but was not suffered to
lie long exposed to the fire of the redoubt which, strongly manned,
held them in check midway to the summit. Doggedly their comrades
rescued the wounded and quickly conveyed them to the rear.

"They've set out their watch-dogs," remarked the general commanding
the assault on that side of the hill, to one of his officers, as he
critically surveyed the formidable defense through the tangled
shrubbery. "Here is a battery we hadn't reckoned on."

"It was to be expected, sir," responded the officer. "They were sure
to have some strong point we couldn't locate."

"Yes," grumbled the general; "in such a jumble of foliage and
rocks it would take an eagle's eye to pick out all their miserable
ambuscades."

"I have no doubt, sir, the men are rested now," ventured the other.

"No doubt they are," chuckled the general, still studying the
situation, glancing to the right and the left of the redoubt. "The
more fighting they get the more they want. They are not so band-boxy
as they were, but remind me of an old, mongrel dog I once owned. He
wasn't much to look at--but I'll tell you the story later." A sudden
quick decision appearing on his face. Evidently the working of his
mind had been foreign to h