om vessel to vessel. There was no longer any hope
of saving a single ship; and the crews, climbing hastily across from
one to the other till they reached those nearest to the shore, leaped
overboard. Although now more than half a mile below the city the flames
lit up the walls with a bright glare, and the shouts of the exulting
Franks rose loud and continuous.

The sudden shouting which had broken out among the Danes had alarmed
the watchmen, who, ignorant of the cause, called the citizens to arms,
and these on reaching the walls had stood astonished at the spectacle.
The flames were already rising from the three groups of ships which
they had regarded with so much anxiety on the previous evening, and by
the light they could see the river below covered with a mass of
drifting vessels. Then they saw the tower-ships float away from the
bank, and the figures on their decks leap into three small boats, which
at once rowed with all speed across the river.

That they were friends who had wrought this destruction was certain,
and Count Eudes threw open the gate, and with the Abbe Ebble ran down
to meet them. They were astonished when Edmund with his Saxons leaped
to land.

"What miracle is this?" the count exclaimed.

"A simple matter, Sir Count," Edmund answered. "My kinsman and I,
seeing that the townspeople were troubled by yonder towers, determined
to destroy them. We have succeeded in doing so, and with them I trust
fully half of the Danish fleet will perish."

"You are the saviour of our town, my brave young Saxon," Count Eudes
cried, embracing him. "If Paris is saved it will be thanks to the
valiant deed that you have accomplished this night. But let us to the
walls again, where we may the better see whether the Danes can remove
their ships from those great furnaces which are bearing down upon them."

The sight from the walls, when the fire-ships reached the fleet and the
flames spread, was grand in the extreme, for in half an hour nigh three
hundred vessels were in flames. For some time the three towers rose
like pillars of fire above the burning mass; then one by one they fell
with a crash, which could be plainly heard, although they were now near
a mile away.

Paris was wild with joy at the destruction of the towers which had
menaced it, and the conflagration of nigh half the Danish fleet, laden
with the spoil of northern France. Edmund and his Saxons were conducted
in triumph by a shouting crowd to the palac