er. `Enemy?' I shouted `no--no--not an
enemy--he--he's a--a--' but I got no further than that, for I didn't
know what to say, and I wouldn't lie, so I took to foaming and stamping
again! At last I said, `Don't speak to me about him--excuse me, my
friends; I can't stand it--and--and the rice is nearly ready. You must
be hungry!' I said this with a look and tone as if another fit was
coming on. They excused themselves. `No,' they said, `we are not
hungry, and we have yet far to go this day before the sun descends. The
Queen's orders will not wait.' And off they went, glad to get out of my
way. Truly, if it is sinful to get in a rage, it is useful sometimes to
act it! So now, my friends, eat--eat--while you have the chance, and
fear not the return of the spies!"

"Tell me," said the guide, anxiously, "are you sure that Rafaravavy is
still safe?"

"She is still safe--but no one knows how long that may be, for she is
fearless, and utters the forbidden prayers even in the presence of the
Queen. If it had not been for the love that Ranavalona bears her, she
would have been tossed from the `rock of hurling' long ago."

"Faithful, even unto death," said the guide, with a look and tone in
which pathos and triumph were strangely blended.

"She has not yet been tried to that extent, but if she is, God will
enable her to stand firm," said Fisatra, whose grave child-like
sincerity, when talking of religious subjects, was not less impulsively
honest and natural than were the outbursts of his fun when another
humour stirred his feelings.

The "rock" to which he alluded was a frightful precipice at one side of
the city from which criminals were usually hurled--a spot which is
hallowed by the blood of many Christian martyrs who perished there
during the long reign of that tyrant queen Ranavalona.

"Has then the queen forbidden the Christians to pray?" asked Ravonino.

"Have you not heard?--but of course you have not, being an outlaw and
having only just returned. Recently a very bad fit has come over the
Queen. You know that for some years past there have been a few French
people living in Antananarivo, who by their knowledge and skill in
mechanics and mercantile matters have made themselves useful to our
government. These men lately tried to dethrone the Queen, on pretence
of delivering the country from her cruelties, and establishing a `French
Protectorate.' They gained over some of our chief men, collected in on