at as a
spur urged on his jaded steed. At last we reached the outskirts of the
village, and dashed through. Blackened beams, ruined houses, dead men
and women, met our horrified gaze on every side.

At the well-known turn of the road, where the bypath joined it, Dobri
vaulted from his horse, and let the animal go, while he ran towards his
dwelling. We also dismounted and followed him. Then a great and
terrible shout reached our ears. When we came to the cottage we found
the scout standing motionless before his old home, with his hands
clasped tightly, and his eyes riveted to the spot with a glare of horror
that words cannot describe.

Before him all that had been his home was a heap of blackened ashes, but
in the midst of these ashes were seen protruding and charred bones. It
did not require more than one glance to show that recognition of the
remains was impossible. Everything was reduced to cinders.

As we gazed an appalling cry rang in our ears, and next moment a young
woman darted out from behind a piece of the blackened walls with a knife
in her hand.

"Hah! are you come back, you devils?" she shrieked, and flew at Dobri,
who would certainly have been stabbed, for he paid no attention to her,
if I had not caught her wrist, and forced the knife from her grasp.
Even then she sprang at him and fastened her fingers in his neck while
she cried, "Give me back my child, I say! give me my child, you fiend!"

She stopped and looked earnestly in his face, then, springing back, and
standing before him with clenched hands, she screamed--

"Ha, haa! it is you, Dobri! why did you not come to help us? traitor--
coward--to leave us at such a time! Did you not hear the shrieks of
Marika when they dragged her from your cottage? Did you not see the
form of little Dobri quivering on the point of the Circassian's spear?
Were you deaf when Ivanka's death-shriek pierced my ears like--. Oh!
God forgive me, Dobri, I did not mean to--"

She stopped in the torrent of her wrath, stretched both arms
convulsively towards heaven, and, with a piercing cry for "Mercy!" fell
dead at our feet.

Still the scout did not move. He stood in the same half-shrinking
attitude of intense agony, glaring at the ruin around him.

"Dobri," said I at last, gently touching his arm, and endeavouring to
arouse him.

He started like one waking out of a dream, hurled me aside with such
violence that I fell heavily to the ground, and rushed from