sally was made upon the
barricade. It was a hail of fire meeting a slighter rain of fire--a cry
of coming victory cutting through a sullen roar of despair. The square
in which the convicts were massed was a trench of blood and bodies;
but they fought on. There was but one hope--to break out, to meet the
soldiers hand to hand and fight for passage to the friendly jungle and
to the sea, where they might trust to that Providence who appears to
help even the wicked sometimes. As Shorland looked upon the scene he
thought of Alencon Barre's words: "It is always the same with France,
always the same."

The fight grew fiercer, the soldiers pressed nearer. And now one clear
voice was heard above the din, "Forward, forward, my children!" and some
one sprang upon the outer barricade. It was the plotter of the revolt,
the leader, the manager of the "Underground Railway," the beloved of the
convicts--Gabrielle Rouget.

The sunlight glorified her flying hair and vivid dress-vivid with the
blood of the fallen. Her arms, her shoulders, her feet were bare; all
that she could spare from her body had gone to bind the wounds of her
desperate comrades. In her hands she held a carbine. As she stood for an
instant unmoving, the firing, as if by magic, ceased. She raised a hand.
"We will have the guillotine in Paris," she said; "but not the hell of
exile here."

Then Henri Durien, the convict, sprang up beside her; the man for whom
she had made a life's sacrifice--for whom she had come to this! His head
was bandaged and clotted with blood; his eyes shone with the fierceness
of an animal at bay. Close after him crowded the handful of his frenzied
compatriots in crime.

Then a rifle-crack was heard, and Henri Durieu fell at the feet of
Gabrielle. The wave on the barricade quivered, and then Gabrielle's
voice was heard crying, "Avenge him! Free yourselves, my children! Death
is better than prison!"

The wave fell in red turmoil on the breakers. And still Gabrielle stood
alone above the body of Henri Durien; but the carbine was fallen from
her hands. She stood as one awaiting death, her eyes upon the unmoving
form at her feet. The soldiers watched her, but no one fired. Her face
was white; but in the eyes there was a wild triumph. She wanted death
now; but these French soldiers had not the heart to kill her.

When she saw that, she leaned and thrust a hand into the bleeding bosom
of Henri Durien, and holding it aloft cried: "For this blood