e stand the bards!" cried Hello.

But now there rushed among the crowd a haggard figure, trickling with
blood, and wearing a robe, whose edges were burned and blacked by
fire. Wielding a club, it ran to and fro, with loud yells menacing
all.

A noted warrior this; who, distracted at the death of five sons slain
in recent games, wandered from valley to valley, wrestling and
fighting.

With wild cries of "The Despairer! The Despairer!" the appalled
multitude fled; leaving the two kings frozen on their throne, quaking
and quailing, their teeth rattling like dice.

The Despairer strode toward them; when, recovering their senses, they
ran; for a time pursued through the woods by the phantom.

CHAPTER XXXVII
Taji Still Hunted, And Beckoned

Previous to the kings' flight, we had plunged into the neighboring
woods; and from thence emerging, entered brakes of cane, sprouting
from morasses. Soon we heard a whirring, as if three startled
partridges had taken wing; it proved three feathered arrows, from
three unseen hands.

Gracing us, two buried in the ground, but from Taji's arm, the third
drew blood.

On all sides round we turned; but none were seen. "Still the avengers
follow," said Babbalanja.

"Lo! the damsels three!" cried Yoomy. "Look where they come!"

We joined them by the sumach-wood's red skirts; and there, they waved
their cherry stalks, and heavy bloated cactus leaves, their crimson
blossoms armed with nettles; and before us flung shining, yellow,
tiger-flowers spotted red.

"Blood!" cried Yoomy, starting, "and leopards on your track!"

And now the syrens blew through long reeds, tasseled with their
panicles, and waving verdant scarfs of vines, came dancing toward us,
proffering clustering grapes.

"For all now yours, Taji; and all that yet may come," cried Yoomy,
"fly to me! I will dance away your gloom, and drown it in inebriation."

"Away! woe is its own wine. What may be mine, that will I endure, in
its own essence to the quick. Let me feel the poniard if it stabs."

They vanished in the wood; and hurrying on, we soon gained sun-light,
and the open glade.

CHAPTER XXXVIII
They Embark From Diranda

Arrived at the Sign of the Skulls, we found the illustrious lord
seigniors at rest from their flight, and once more, quaffing their
claret, all thoughts of the specter departed. Instead of rattling
their own ivory iii the heads on their shoulders, they were rattling
their dice in the