to her feet. There was an interval
of hideous silence, but no reply. She called again. There was a sudden
deepening roar, the blast of a fiery furnace swept through the opening,
a thousand luminous points around her burst into fire, and in an
instant she was lost in a whirlwind of smoke and flame! From the onset
of its fury to its culmination twenty minutes did not elapse; but in
that interval a radius of two hundred yards around the hidden spring
was swept of life and light and motion.

For the rest of that day and part of the night a pall of smoke hung
above the scene of desolation. It lifted only towards the morning, when
the moon, riding high, picked out in black and silver the shrunken and
silent columns of those roofless vaults, shorn of base and capital. It
flickered on the still, overflowing pool of the hidden spring, and
shone upon the white face of Low, who, with a rootlet of the fallen
tree holding him down like an arm across his breast, seemed to be
sleeping peacefully in the sleeping water.

* * * * *

Contemporaneous history touched him as briefly, but not as gently. "It
is now definitely ascertained," said "The Slumgullion Mirror," "that
Sheriff Dunn met his fate in the Carquinez Woods in the performance of
his duty; that fearless man having received information of the
concealment of a band of horse thieves in their recesses. The
desperadoes are presumed to have escaped, as the only remains found are
those of two wretched tramps, one of whom is said to have been a
digger, who supported himself upon roots and herbs, and the other a
degraded half-white woman. It is not unreasonable to suppose that the
fire originated through their carelessness, although Father Wynn of the
First Baptist Church, in his powerful discourse of last Sunday, pointed
at the warning and lesson of such catastrophes. It may not be out of
place here to say that the rumors regarding an engagement between the
pastor's accomplished daughter and the late lamented sheriff are
utterly without foundation, as it has been an _on dit_ for some time in
all well-informed circles that the indefatigable Mr. Brace, of Wells,
Fargo & Co.'s Express, will shortly lead the lady to the hymeneal
altar."

AT THE MISSION OF SAN CARMEL.

PROLOGUE.

It was noon of the 10th of August, 1838. The monotonous coast line
between Monterey and San Diego had set its hard outlines against the
steady glare of the Californian s