o armies with the imperial firman hanging round
his neck, and summoned the vassals to take up arms against the Pasha,
the whole camp went over to Gaskho Bey. Alone, without the smallest
escort, Sulaiman, Ali Pasha's youngest son, fled without having had
the opportunity of testing his father's sword, and they captured him
on the road.

Still he had the other two. Mukhtar Bey, with a powerful fleet, lay in
the Gulf of Durazzo, and Vely Bey, wroth though he might be with his
father, was a valiant warrior, and his son was in Lepanto, and save
him he must and would.

But not only his son, some one else was there also. On that cruel,
murderous day when Ali Pasha drowned the harems of his sons in the
lake, one person among so many escaped, and this was Xelianthe. The
damsel loved Vely as much as he loved her, and contrived to let him
know that she was alive. Vely Bey sent her to Lepanto, and kept her in
hiding there with his little son in order that she might be far from
his father.

And now the bey himself hastened to Lepanto, arrived at night in the
neighborhood of the town, and perceived already from afar that the
citadel in which he had concealed his darlings was in flames.

What if he had arrived too late!

With the fury of a savage wild tiger he flung himself upon the
besieging Pehlivan, and in a midnight battle routed him beneath the
walls of Lepanto, the Albanians fighting desperately by the side of
their leader. But what was the use of it? The fortress was saved,
indeed, but it was already in flames. Vely, roaring with grief and
pain, flung himself on the gate, scarcely recognizing again the place
he had quitted so short a time ago.

He reached the pavilion where he had concealed his wife and child. It
was built entirely of wood, except the roof, which was of copper. A
curious mass of molten dark-red metal gleamed among the fire-brands.
Vely rushed bellowing to the spot, and his soldiers, tearing aside the
charred beams and rafters, came upon two skeletons burned to cinders.
A coral necklace lying there, which the fire had been unable to
calcine, told him that these were the remains of his wife and son.

Not a word did Vely say to a living soul; but he plunged his sword
into its sheath, and that same night he rode unarmed into the camp of
the discomfited Pehlivan Pasha and surrendered himself to the enemy.

His army, utterly demoralized, immediately fled back to Janina,
bringing the tidings to his father tha