ttany, as my elder
brother, Gonthran, is in Auvergne."

"And you will not forget to endow the Church."

"I shall not be ungrateful to the priests, good father. I shall employ a
part of the booty in building a chapel to St. Martin, for whom our
family has ever entertained a particular devotion. Could you, who are
well acquainted with the customs of the Bretons, tell me what corners
they hide their money in? It is claimed that they remove all their
treasures when they are forced to flee from their houses, and that they
bury them in inaccessible hiding places. Is that so?"

"When we shall have arrived in the heart of the country, I shall
acquaint you with the means to discover those treasures, which are,
almost always, concealed at the foot of certain druid stones, for which
these pagans preserve an idolatrous reverence."

"But where shall we find those stones? By what signs are they to be
recognized?"

"That is my secret, Neroweg. It will become _ours_ after we shall have
reached the heart of the country."

Thus conversing, the monk and the Frankish chief slowly ascend the
craggy slope of the defile. From time to time, some of the horsemen, or
foot soldiers, detached as scouts, ride back to acquaint Neroweg with
their observations. Finally, Hugh himself returns and informs his master
that there is nothing to cause any apprehension on the score of an
ambuscade. Completely reassured by these reports, and by the
explanations of the monk, Neroweg gives the order for the advance of his
troops, the footmen first, the horsemen next, then the baggage, and last
of all a rear corps of foot soldiers.

The army corps breaks up and enters the pass that is so narrow as to
allow a passage to only four men abreast. The long and winding column of
men covered with iron, crowded together, and moving slowly, presents a
strange spectacle from the top of the rocks that dominate the narrow
route. It might be taken for some gigantic serpent with iron scales,
deploying its sinuous folds in a ravine cut between two walls of
granite. The misgivings of the Franks, somewhat alarmed when they first
began threading their way through a passage so propitious to an ambush,
are presently removed and make place for unquestioning confidence.
Already the vanguard that precedes Neroweg and the monk is drawing near
the issue of the defile, while at the other end the baggage wagons,
drawn by oxen, begin to set themselves in motion followed by the rear
g