comrade."

Fast and furious grew the combat, during which the terrified children
made the woods echo with their shrieks. The result was not long
doubtful. Michael soon proved himself the better swordsman; and his
antagonist, stumbling from fatigue, broke his own weapon in the fall.
Defenceless and exposed, the uplifted sword of his adversary was raised
for his destruction, when suddenly the arm of the ruffian was arrested,
the weapon snatched from his grasp, and a female figure habited in a
dark and coarse vestment stood between the combatants. Her brow was
bare, and her dark full eye beamed on them with a look of pity and of
anger. Her naturally pale cheek was flushed; but it betrayed not the
agitation she endured. Erect and unbending she stood before them, and
the quailing miscreant crouched at her feet.

"Away to thy master!--thy blood, too worthless even for thine own
steel"----

She hurled away the weapon as she spoke.

Burning with revenge at his late defeat, Anthony flew after the falling
brand: seizing it, he renewed the attack. Michael fled towards the
bridge. With the bound of a bereaved tiger Anthony sprung upon his prey.
Just where the root of the trunk rested on the bank they closed, after a
desperate lunge parried by the unprotected arm of Michael. It was
disabled--but he still clung to his enemy. Anthony strove to disengage
himself; but the other, aware that life or death depended on the issue
of that struggle, hung on him with a convulsive tightness that rendered
the advantage he had gained of no avail. The sword was useless. Anthony
threw it into the boiling gulf at his feet. Both hands being now free,
whilst one arm of his opponent hung powerless and bleeding at his side,
he had greatly the advantage. He wrenched the other arm of Michael from
its hold, lifted him from his narrow footing-place, and with a malignant
shout of triumph shook him over the abyss. One startling plunge, and the
wretch sank in the rolling waters. An agonising yell, and but one,
escaped him, as he hung quivering over that yawning portal to eternity;
the next cry was choked by the seethe of the boiling foam. The waves
whirled him round for a moment like some huge leviathan tossing its
prey. He sank into its gorge, and the insatiate gulf swallowed him up
for ever. Anthony drew back. He turned from the horrid scene, with some
yet lingering tokens of compunction, in the expectation of rejoining his
companions; but in vain--the b