r a huge spreading camphor tree, a graceful form was there,
clear cut against the dark foliage, and seeming to float upon the tender
green of the dewy grass. A nymph--a goddess, shyly standing there, was
shading her eyes with one slender hand and gazing down the path toward
the golden East which was bringing to the Lady of his dreams, a flood of
golden sunlight and her secret adorer, the man whose lonely young heart
had throned her as its queen. Hardwicke raised his head quickly as a
wild shriek sounded out upon the still morning air.

The lover with one agonized glance saw the outspread arms of Justine
Delande, and heard again a voice which had thrilled his soul in loving
memory. It appealed for aid. Nadine was shrieking for help.

With one glance, the young soldier gathered his noble steed. There
was but twenty yards for the rally and the raise, but the game old
"Garibaldi" dropped as lightly on the other side of the closed carriage
gate as any "blue ribbon" of the Galway "Blazers."

There was a moment, but one fleeting moment, given to the lover to see
the danger menacing the woman whom he loved. His heart was icy, but
his hand was quick. There, a few feet only from the horribly fascinated
girl, a cobra di capdlo rising and swaying in angry undulations.
The huge snake was angrily hissing with a huge distended puffed hood
swelling menacingly over the dirty brown body. "Standfast!" yelled
Hardwicke in agony.

There was a gleam of steel, the rush of a charger's feet, and as man and
horse swept by the fainting girl--the swing of a saber, and the heavy
trampling of iron-clad hoofs! Only Justine Delande saw the flashing
saber cleaving the air again and again, as Hardwicke gracefully
leaned to his saddle bow, in the right and left cut on the ground. And
Garibaldi's beating hoofs soon completed the work of the circling sword.

And then as the Swiss woman broke her trance and turned to run toward
the house, the young horseman leaped lightly to the ground. "Go on, go
on!" he cried. "The other snake is not far off!" When Simpson and the
frightened domestics rushed out to the veranda in a panic, they only
saw before them a graceful youth with his strong arms burdened with the
senseless form of the woman he loved--the woman whose life he had saved!

And, dangling from his right wrist, by the leather sword-knot, hung
the saber which Colonel Hardwicke had swung in the mad onslaught on the
mutineers' camp at Lucknow.

"Here,