the
house in clanking chains.

The preacher's duty was one of unusual difficulty, for, besides these
peculiar interruptions and the exclamations of surprised friends, the
sympathy of his own heart nearly choked his utterance more than once.
But Totosy was equal to the occasion. His heart was on fire, his lips
were eloquent, and the occasion was one of a thousand, never to be
forgotten. Despite difficulties, he held his audience spell-bound while
he discoursed of the "wonderful words of God" and the shower of blessing
which had begun to fall.

Suddenly, during a momentary pause in the discourse, the clanking of a
very heavy chain was heard, and a man was seen to make his way through
the crowd. Like Saul, head and shoulders above his fellows, gaunt,
worn, and ragged, he had been standing near the door, not listening,
apparently, to the preacher, but intent on scanning the faces of the
congregation. Discovering at length what he looked for, he forced his
way to the side of Reni-mamba, sank at her feet, and with a profound
sigh--almost a groan--laid his head upon her lap!

Mamba, grown to a giant, seemed to have come back to her. But it was
not her son. It was Andrianivo, her long-lost husband! For one moment
poor Reni seemed terrified and bewildered, then she suddenly grasped the
man's prematurely grey head in both hands and covered the face with
passionate kisses, uttering every now and then a shriek by way of
relieving her feelings.

Great though the preacher's power was in overcoming the difficulties of
his position, Reni-Mamba's meek spirit, when thus roused, was too much
for him. He was obliged to stop. At the same moment the gaunt giant
arose, gathered up Reni in his great arms as if she had been a mere
baby, and, without a word, stalked out of the meeting to the music of
his clanking chains. A Malagasy cheer burst from the sympathetic
people.

"Praise the Lord! Let us sing!" shouted the wise Totosy, and in a few
seconds the congregation was letting off its surplus steam in tremendous
and jubilant song, to the ineffable joy of Ebony, who must have burst
out in some other way had not this safety-valve been provided.

But there were more surprises in store for that singular meeting. After
the sermon the preacher announced that two marriages were about to be
solemnised by him in the simplest manner possible. "My friends," he
said, "one of the bridegrooms is only half a Malagasy, the other half of
hi