rked violently by the starting of the horses.
As they dashed across Walnut at Seventh came the fusillade. Virginia
leaned out of the window. Down the vista of the street was a mass of
blue uniforms, and a film of white smoke hanging about the columns of
the old Presbyterian Church Mr. Brinsmade quietly drew her back into the
carriage.

The shots ceased, giving place to an angry roar that struck terror to
her heart that wet and lowering afternoon. The powerful black horses
galloped on. Nicodemus tugging at the reins, and great splotches of
mud flying in at the windows. The roar of the crowd died to an ominous
moaning behind them. Then she knew that Mr. Brinsmade was speaking:--
"From battle and murder, and from sudden death--from all sedition, privy
conspiracy, and rebellion,--Good Lord, deliver us."

He was repeating the Litany--that Litany which had come down through the
ages. They had chanted it in Cromwell's time, when homes were ruined and
laid waste, and innocents slaughtered. They had chanted it on the dark,
barricaded stairways of mediaeval Paris, through St. Bartholomew's
night, when the narrow and twisted streets, ran with blood. They had
chanted it in ancient India, and now it was heard again in the New World
and the New Republic of Peace and Good Will.

Rebellion? The girl flinched at the word which the good gentleman had
uttered in his prayers. Was she a traitor to that flag for which her
people had fought in three wars? Rebellion! She burned to blot it
forever from the book Oh, the bitterness of that day, which was prophecy
of the bitterness to come.

Rain was dropping as Mr. Brinsmade escorted her up her own steps.
He held her hand a little at parting, and bade her be of good cheer.
Perhaps he guessed something of the trial she was to go through that
night alone with her aunt, Clarence's mother. Mr. Brinsmade did not go
directly home. He went first to the little house next door to his. Mrs.
Brice and Judge Whipple were in the parlor: What passed between them
there has not been told, but presently the Judge and Mr. Brinsmade came
out together and stood along time in, the yard, conversing, heedless of
the rain.

CHAPTER XXI. THE STAMPEDE

Sunday dawned, and the people flocked to the churches. But even in the
house of God were dissension and strife. From the Carvel pew at Dr.
Posthelwaite's Virginia saw men and women rise from their knees and
walk out--their faces pale with anger. At St. Mark's t