bar,--and beside him, almost within arm's reach, a great billiard-table
swaying, and a dead woman clinging there, and ... the child.

A moment more, and Feliu has lifted himself beside the waifs ... How
fast the dead woman clings, as if with the one power which is strong as
death,--the desperate force of love! Not in vain; for the frail
creature bound to the mother's corpse with a silken scarf has still the
strength to cry out:--"Maman! maman!" But time is life now; and the
tiny hands must be pulled away from the fair dead neck, and the scarf
taken to bind the infant firmly to Feliu's broad shoulders,--quickly,
roughly; for the ebb will not wait ...

And now Feliu has a burden; but his style of swimming has totally
changed;--he rises from the water like a Triton, and his powerful arms
seem to spin in circles, like the spokes of a flying wheel. For now is
the wrestle indeed!--after each passing swell comes a prodigious
pulling from beneath,--the sea clutching for its prey.

But the reef is gained, is passed;--the wild horses of the deep seem to
know the swimmer who has learned to ride them so well. And still the
brown arms spin in an ever-nearing mist of spray; and the outer
sand-bar is not far off,--and there is shouting Mateo, leaping in the
surf, swinging something about his head, as a vaquero swings his noose!
... Sough! splash!--it struggles in the trough beside Feliu, and the
sinewy hand descends upon it. Tiene!--tira, Miguel! And their feet
touch land again! ...

She is very cold, the child, and very still, with eyes closed.

--"Esta muerta, Feliu?" asks Mateo.

--"No!" the panting swimmer makes answer, emerging, while the waves
reach whitely up the sand as in pursuit,--"no; vive! respira todavia!"

Behind him the deep lifts up its million hands, and thunders as in
acclaim.

IV.

--"Madre de Dios!--mi sueno!" screamed Carmen, abandoning her
preparations for the morning meal, as Feliu, nude, like a marine god,
rushed in and held out to her a dripping and gasping
baby-girl,--"Mother of God! my dream!" But there was no time then to
tell of dreams; the child might die. In one instant Carmen's quick,
deft hands had stripped the slender little body; and while Mateo and
Feliu were finding dry clothing and stimulants, and Miguel telling how
it all happened--quickly, passionately, with furious gesture,--the kind
and vigorous woman exerted all her skill to revive the flickering life.
Soon Feliu came to ai