g him to get
upon his knees. To work upward through the fallen wall would, he knew,
be an impossibility. He therefore worked horizontally for some time,
throwing the rubbish between his legs behind him, as, we presume, the
moles are accustomed to do. Then he passed his hand along over his
head, and found that the solid wall was no longer above him,--only
disjointed bricks and beams.

With renewed hope and redoubled effort he now worked his way upwards,
although well-nigh suffocated by dust, as well as by smoke arising from
fires which had broken out in many places all over the ruined town.
Suddenly, while thus engaged, he heard voices faintly. He shouted with
all his might, and listened. Yes, he was not mistaken; he heard voices
distinctly, and they appeared to be speaking in Spanish. With something
like a bounding of the heart he repeated his shout, and renewed his
labours.

If he had known the character of the persons who had thus encouraged
him, his hopes would not have been so strong.

We have said that the entire town had been levelled by one tremendous
convulsion, and that in many places fires had broken out among the
ruins. These fires sent up dense volumes of smoke, which naturally
attracted people from all quarters of the surrounding country. Among
them came bands of desperate and lawless characters, who fastened on the
ruins as vultures seize on carrion. They resembled the unclean birds in
more respects than one, for they went about as long as there was
anything of value to be seized, long after other people had been forced
to quit the place owing to the horrible stench of the hundreds of
corpses decaying, and in many cases burning, among the ruins. (See note
1.)

It was the voices of some of these lawless ruffians that Lawrence had
heard. He soon became aware of their character by the terrible oaths
which they used, and the fiendish laughter in which they indulged
whenever he called for help. Knowing that he had nothing to hope from
such miscreants, he ceased to call out, but toiled none the less
vigorously to effect his deliverance. At last he managed to scrape
through to the upper world; and a feeling of inexpressible relief filled
his breast as a bright ray of sunshine shot into his prison.

That it was daylight did not surprise him, for the many hours which he
had spent under ground seemed to him like weeks. But he soon found that
he was not yet free. The hole which he had scraped was