this occur I do not believe we lost more than a stroke
or two, and were already well out into the stream, nothing except our
narrow stern pointing toward the bank, where some of the soldiers--we
judged from their voices--were reloading for a second volley, the
others searching the shore after some boat in which to begin the
pursuit. It was a hard pull, especially upon my part, as I chanced to
sit on the lower side, having full sweep of the current tugging against
my oar, while De Noyan headed the boat as directly as possible for the
western shore. The soldiers, completely swallowed in the gloom, made
no further attempt to fire; possibly, having seen the fall of the
black, they believed their work done. Nor did other sounds reach us
evidencing pursuit; for that moment at least we were free. It was then
I watched the coming of the dawn.

There was a slight, scarcely perceptible, shading into a lighter tinge
of the clinging black shadows that veiled the eastern sky, dimly
revealing misty outlines of white, fleecy clouds extending above the
faint horizon line, until they assumed a spectral brightness, causing
me to dream of the fairies' dwellings which my mother pictured to me in
childhood. Gently the delicate awakening spread along the wider
expanse of sky, which became bluish gray, gradually expanding and
reflecting its glow along the water, until this also became a portion
of the vast arch, while the darker borderland, now far astern, formed
merely a distant shade, a background to the majestic picture. The east
became gradually a lighter, more pronounced gray; rosy streaks shot
upward through the cloud masses, driving them higher into an
ever-deepening upper blue like a flock of frightened birds, until at
last the whole eastern horizon blushed like a red rose, while above the
black line of distant, shadowy trees, the blazing rim of the sun itself
uplifted, casting a wide bar of dazzling gold along our wake. Gazing
thus, every thought of our surroundings, our dangers, and fatigue
passed from memory. Bending to the oar, my soul was far away upon a
voyage of its own.

Some unusual movement served to attract attention from this
day-dreaming, my eyes falling suddenly upon De Noyan. His face, turned
partially away from the rising sun, was gray with anxiety, and I noted
he shivered in his wet clothes. Yet his smile and speech seemed
jauntily unconcerned as ever.

"Yonder was to have been my last sunrise," he remar