ously awaited the result of the conference.

At last the leader of the horsemen, turning to me, said, "Senor, it is
decided that I shall take you to the army, where your words can be
proved. If your story is not true, you will be shot as spies."

"All right; we agree!" I exclaimed joyfully, for it was a delightful
thought that we were to escape the strange beings who spent their time
in running about the rocks.

"We shall start early," he continued, "so you had better get some
rest." Which we did, as soon as our excited state permitted.

"Bravo!" exclaimed Alzura, after breakfast the next morning; "this is
an improvement. Fancy being on horseback again! This will be better
than trudging on foot, Juan, eh?"

"What about the men who have lent us their horses?"

"Oh," said he merrily, "I believe they would as soon walk as ride, and
I'm sure they could keep up longer than the animals."

By this talk you will understand we had been provided with a couple of
horses; and taking leave of our original captors, we rode off with our
new ones. Of course, both Alzura and I were unarmed, and the leader,
in a quiet way, so arranged that we were never very far from a man with
a musket.

He was rather a lively fellow for an Indian, and having made sure we
could not escape, talked with us freely. He told us the men we had
just left were very useful, having already sent in a great deal of
valuable information to the Patriot army. He also said that Bolivar
had crossed the Andes with a large army, and that a decisive battle was
expected at any time. He was very curious about our escape, and could
barely credit that we had crossed the morass without assistance.

"It has been done before," he said, "but only once or twice, and then
by natives."

"We shan't do it again," laughed Alzura. "It nearly turned our hair
white. It was the nastiest experience I have ever had--worse than when
the Royalists cut us up at Torata."

"Were you in that battle, senor? Wasn't it terrible?" and the man
looked at my comrade with renewed interest.

Indeed, from that time he treated us both with increased respect, and
the journey passed quite pleasantly in his company. During the second
day we met several groups of mounted Indians, and a detachment of
regular soldiers; which showed that we could not be far from the main
encampment, on the plain between Rancas and Pasco. Our guide expected
to reach it that night, but we did not get in till