genius, that thus can people space with
images which time and years erase not, making to the solitary traveller
a world of bright thoughts even in the darkness of a lonely wood! And
so to me appeared, as though before me, the scenes he pictured. Each
rustling breeze that shook the leafy shade seemed like the impetuous
passion of the devoted lover; the chirping notes of the wood-pigeon,
like the flippant raillery of beauteous Rosalind; and in the low ripple
of the brook I heard the complaining sounds of Jaques himself.

Sunk in such pleasant fancies I lay beneath a spreading sycamore, and
with half-closed lids invoked the shades of that delightful vision
before me, when the tramp of feet, moving across the low brushwood,
suddenly aroused me. I started up on one knee, and listened. The next
moment three men emerged from the wood into the path. The two foremost,
dressed in blouses, were armed with carbines and a sabre; the
last carried a huge sack on his shoulders, and seemed to move with
considerable difficulty.

'_Ventre du diable!_' cried he passionately, as he placed his burden on
the ground; 'don't hasten on this way; they'll never follow us so far,
and I am half dead with fatigue.'

'Come, come, Gros Jean,' said one of the others, in a voice of command,
'we must not halt before we reach the three elms.'

'Why not bury it here?' replied the first speaker, 'or else take your
share of the labour?'

'So I would,' retorted the other violently, 'if you could take my place
when we are attacked; but, _parbleu!_ you are more given to running away
than fighting.'

During this brief colloquy my heart rose to my mouth. The ruffianly
looks of the party, their arms, their savage demeanour, and their secret
purpose, whatever it was, to which I was now to a certain extent privy,
filled me with terror, and I made an effort to draw myself back on my
hands into the brushwood beneath the tree. The motion unfortunately
discovered me; and with a spring, the two armed fellows bounded towards
me, and levelled their pistols at my head.

'Who are you? What brings you here?' shouted they both in a breath.

'For heaven's sake, messieurs,' said I, 'down with your pistols! I
am only a traveller, a poor inoffensive wanderer, an Englishman--an
Irishman, rather, a good Catholic'--Heaven forgive me if I meant an
equivocation here!--'lower the pistols, I beseech you.'

'Shoot him through the skull; he's a spy!' roared the fellow with the
sa