he slayers,
and the shrieks of agony, the groans, the prayers, and curses of their
victims.

All this Sir Crispin saw and heard, and in the misery of it all, he
for the while forgot his own sorry condition, and left unheeded the
pike-butt wherewith the Puritan at his heels was urging him along.

They paused at length in a quarter unknown to him before a tolerably
large house. Its doors hung wide, and across the threshold, in and out,
moved two continuous streams of officers and men.

A while Crispin and his captors stood in the spacious hall; then they
ushered him roughly into one of the abutting rooms. Here he was brought
face to face with a man of middle height, red and coarse of countenance
and large of nose, who stood fully armed in the centre of the chamber.
His head was uncovered, and on the table at his side stood the morion he
had doffed. He looked up as they entered, and for a few seconds rested
his glance sourly upon the lank, bold-eyed prisoner, who coldly returned
his stare.

"Whom have we here?" he inquired at length, his scrutiny having told him
nothing.

"One whose offence is too heinous to have earned him a soldier's death,
my lord," answered Pride.

"Therein you lie, you damned rebel!" cried Crispin. "If accuse you must,
announce the truth. Tell Master Cromwell"--for he had guessed the man's
identity--"that single-handed I held my own against you and a score of
you curs, and that not until I had cut down seven of them was I taken.
Tell him that, master psalm-singer, and let him judge whether you lied
or not. Tell him, too, that you, who--"

"Have done!" cried Cromwell at length, stamping his foot. "Peace, or
I'll have you gagged. Now, Colonel, let us hear your accusation."

At great length, and with endless interlarding of proverbs did Pride
relate how this impious malignant had been the means of the young man,
Charles Stuart, making good his escape when otherwise he must have
fallen into their hands. He accused him also of the murder of his son
and of four other stout, God-fearing troopers, and urged Cromwell to let
him deal with the malignant as he deserved.

The Lord General's answer took expression in a form that was little
puritanical. Then, checking himself:

"He is the second they have brought me within ten minutes charged with
the same offence," said he. "The other one is a young fool who gave
Charles Stuart his horse at Saint Martin's Gate. But for him again the
young man had been