anionship with the traitor and the coward--goodbye
forever." He pressed the purse into the poor fellow's hand; nor was it
without a struggle he could compel him to accept it. A few minutes after
the boat was cleaving her way through the dark water, her prow turned to
the land which Mark had left for ever.

Seated on the deck, silent and thoughtful, Mark seemed indifferent to
the terrible storm, whose violence increased with every moment, and
as the vessel tacked beneath the tall cliffs, when every heart beat
anxiously, and every eye was fixed on the stern rocks above them, his
glance was calm, and his pulse was tranquil; he felt as though fate had
done her worst, and that the future had no heavier blow in store for
him.

CHAPTER XLIX. THE END.

The storm of that eventful night is treasured among the memories of the
peasantry of the south. None living had ever witnessed a gale of such
violence--none since have seen a hurricane so dreadful and enduring: for
miles along the coast the scattered spars and massive timbers told of
shipwreck and disasters, while inland, uptorn trees and fallen rocks
attested its power.

The old castle of Carrig-na-curra did not escape the general calamity;
the massive walls that had resisted for centuries the assaults of war
and time, were shaken to their foundations, and one strong, square
tower, the ancient keep, was rent by lightning from the battlements to
the base, while far and near might be seen fragments of timber, and even
of masonry, hurled from their places by the storm. For whole days after
the gale abated, the air resounded with an unceasing din--the sound of
the distant sea, and the roar of the mountain torrents, as swollen and
impetuous they tore along.

The devastation thus wide spread, seemed not to have been limited to
the mere material world, but to have extended its traces over man:
the hurricane was recognized as the interposition of heaven, and the
disaster of the French fleet looked on as the vengeance of the Almighty.
It did not need the superstitious character of the southern peasants'
mind to induce this belief: the circumstances in all their detail
were too strongly corroborative, not to enforce conviction on sterner
imaginations; and the very escape of the French ships from every portion
of our channel fleet, which at first was deemed a favour of fortune, was
now regarded as pointing out the more signal vengeance of Heaven. Dismay
and terror were depicted