up two
train-bands to storm Glen Doone, and they were beaten off with
considerable loss. Then I took the matter up, just when the Doones were
emboldened by their victory to commit fresh crimes; or rather, the
leadership was thrust upon me. Carver Doone and one of his men entered
the house of Kit Badcock, one of my neighbours, and killed his baby and
carried off his wife. Kit wandered about half crazy, and the people came
flocking about me, and asked me to lead them against the Doones. I
resolved on a night-assault, and divided the men into two parties. The
Doone-gate was, I knew, impregnable, and it was there that the train-
bands had failed. I pretended to attack it, but led my best fighters up
the waterfall. The earliest notice the Doones had of our presence was
the blazing of the logwood house where lived that villain Carver.

By the time they came from Doone-gate all the village was burning, and
as soon as they got into easy distance we shot them down in the light of
the flaming houses. I did not fire. I cared to meet none but Carver, and
he did not appear. He was the only Doone that escaped. Every man I had
with me had some wrong to avenge; some had lost their wives, others
their daughters; the more fortunate had had all their sheep and cattle
carried off, and every man avenged his wrong. I was vexed at the escape
of Carver. It was no light thing to have a man of such power and
resource and desperation left at large and furious. When he saw all the
houses in the valley flaming with a handsome blaze, and throwing a fine
light around, such as he had often revelled in when he was the attacker,
he turned his great black horse, and spurred it through Doone-gate, and
he passed into the darkness before the yeomen I had posted there could
bring him down.

_V.--The Duel at Wizard's Slough_

The only thing which pleased me was that Lorna was taken to London
before I led the assault on Glen Doone. Jeremy Stickler, a man with much
knowledge of the law, discovered that she was a great heiress, and that
her true title was Lady Lorna Dugal. She was related to the Doones, and
they had carried her off when a little child, and on her all the
ambition of Sir Ensor Doone had turned. The marriage he designed between
her and Carver would have brought the outlaws the wealth necessary to
retrieve their fortunes and recover their position in the world. This
strange news explained many things in their conduct towards Lorna, but
it ma