a moment as
that of exquisite liberty.

Our readers may with us imagine what it is to taste the free, fresh air
of heaven, after being long pent up, as he, Charles Holland, had been,
in a damp, noisome dungeon, teeming with unwholesome exhalations. They
may well suppose with what an amount of rapture he now found himself
unrestrained in his movements by those galling fetters which had hung
for so long a period upon his youthful limbs, and which, not
unfrequently in the despair of his heart, he had thought he should
surely die in.

And last, although not least in his dear esteem, did the rapturous
thought of once more looking in the sweet face of her he loved come
cross him with a gush of delight.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, as he quickened his pace; "yes! I shall be able to
tell Flora Bannerworth how well and how truly I love her. I shall be
able to tell her that, in my weary and hideous imprisonment, the thought
alone of her has supported me."

As he neared the Hall, he quickened his pace to such an extent, that
soon he was forced to pause altogether, as the exertion he had
undertaken pretty plainly told him that the imprisonment, scanty diet,
and want of exercise, which had been his portion for some time past, had
most materially decreased his strength.

His limbs trembled, and a profuse perspiration bedewed his brow,
although the night was rather cold than otherwise.

"I am very weak," he said; "and much I wonder now that I succeeded in
overcoming that villain Marchdale; who, if I had not done so, would most
assuredly have murdered me."

And it was a wonder; for Marchdale was not an old man, although he might
be considered certainly as past the prime of life, and he was of a
strong and athletic build. But it was the suddenness of his attack upon
him which had given Charles Holland the great advantage, and had caused
the defeat of the ruffian who came bent on one of the most cowardly and
dastardly murders that could be committed--namely, upon an unoffending
man, whom he supposed to be loaded with chains, and incapable of making
the least efficient resistance.

Charles soon again recovered sufficient breath and strength to proceed
towards the Hall, and now warned, by the exhaustion which had come over
him that he had not really anything like strength enough to allow him to
proceed rapidly, he walked with slow and deliberate steps.

This mode of proceeding was more favourable to reflection than the wild,
rapid on