a giant in height, towering nearly a head above Adalo's
tall figure, was a man of singular appearance. The immense framework of
his body appeared to belong to a much older race of men. His deep-set
gray eye--the left one had been destroyed by a stone from a Balearican
sling long before, and the empty socket had a sinister expression--was
under a bushy, prominent arched brow; its fire was by no means dimmed,
but curbed by the long habit of self-control. This ever perceptible
rule of passions blazing fiercely in his breast gave the mighty man,
who in spite of his sixty-five winters could not be called old, an air
of mysterious majesty. His people looked up to him with reverence, with
timid expectation, nay, with a slight fear of what he was planning in
rigid secrecy. His eagle eye was inscrutable when he half closed it;
when open, the flash that blazed from it was fairly blinding. The
expression of the mouth was concealed by the magnificent silvery-white
beard, sweeping over the breast-plate to the bronze belt, which framed
the cheeks and mingled with the thick locks of hair of the same hue.

Like the eye, the strong, deep, resonant voice revealed, no matter how
quietly the mighty man spoke, the sense of power held in check. He
rarely moved his muscular limbs, and all his gestures had a calmness
which was the result of long training. So he sat without a helmet, with
his ample blue cloak floating from his shoulders, his bearing one of
dignified composure. The majestic beauty of his finely formed head was
plainly visible as he rested it against the tent-pole, listening
intently. An immense spear rested in the curve of his right arm, its
brass top rising above his shoulder, as the end touched the floor; he
often stroked with a gentle, almost loving touch of the hand the runes
of victory inscribed on the back of the ash handle.

"I am usually glad to greet you, son of Adalger," said the Duke's other
guest, with a frowning brow, "but now I am most unwilling. I pleaded
for peace--" The Duke remained silent. "Now you come and you--I know
it--dream of nothing day and night save war with Rome."

Adalo measured him with a wrathful glance. "The ancient foe of our
people is in the country, and a king of the Alemanni counsels peace?
Ebarbold, son of Ebur, fear was alien to your kinsmen--"

The other laid his hand on the curved knife in his belt. Adalo did not
see it: he was under the spell of Hariowald's eye. A warning glance
from