Waterbury evening Democrat., 1906-11-28

and they had been 1gn1ng all day with hardly bite or sup. Even when face to face with death Nature still cried out for her dues, and the hungry men turned savagely upon the loaf, the ham and the cold wild duck. A little cluster of wine bottles stood upon the buffet, and these had their necks knocked off and were emptied down parched threats.
 For four hours sounds of riot, of dancing and of reveling rose up from the storehouse, and the smell of the open brandy casks filled the whole air. More than once the savages quarreled and fought among themselves, and 1t seemed as if they had forgotten their enemies above, but the besieged soon found that if they attempted to pre- sume upon this they were as closely watched as ever. The major domo, Theuriet, passing between loophols and light, was killed instantly by bullet from the stockade, and both Amos and the old seigneur had narrow escapes.
 Slowly the light crept up the eastern sky, little line of pearl, then band of pink, broadening, stretching, spread ing, until it shot it's warm color across the heavens, tingeing the edges of the drifting clouds. De Catinat stood at the window looking out when suddenly his eyes fell on dark spot upon the river to the north of them.
 ''There is canoe coming up!' he cried.
 In an instant they had all rushed to the opening, but Du Lhut sprang after them and pulled them angrily toward the door. Do you wish to die before your time?' he cried.
 "Aye, ayew said Captain Ephraim, who understood the gesture if not the words. We must leave watch on deck. Amos, lad, lie here with me and be ready if they show" :.
 The two Americans and the old pio- neer held the barricade, while the eyes of all the others were turned upon the approaching boat. A groan broke sud denly from the only surviving censi- taire.
 Tt is an Iroquois canoe" he cried.
 'Impossiblew
 "Alas, your excellency, it is so, and 1t is the same one which passed us last night"
 "Ah, then the women have escaped them"
 q trust so But, alas. seigneur, I fear that there are more in the canoe now than when they passed us."
 The little group of survivors waited in breathless anxiety while the canoe sped swiftly up the river, with line of foam on either side of her and n long forked swirl in the waters behind. They could sec that she appeared to be very crowded, but they remembered that the wounded e the other boat were aboard of her. On she came, and on, until as she came abreast of the fort she swung round, and the rowers raised their paddles and burst into a shrill yell of derision. The stern of the canoe was turned toward them now, and they saw that two women were seated in it. The one was Omega and the other Adele.
 Charles de la Noue, seigneur de Ste. Marie, was hard and self contained man, but groan and bitter curse burst from him when he saw his h. dian wife in the hands of her kinsmen, from whom she could hope for little mercy. Yet even now his old fashioned courtesy to his guest had made him turn to De Catinat with some words of sympathy, when there was a clatter of wood, something darkened the light of the window, and the young soldier was gone. Without word he had lowered the ladder and was clambering down 1t with frantic haste. Then, as his feet touched the ground, he signaled to his comrades to draw 1t up again, and. dashlng into the river, he swan toward the canoe Without arms and without a plan, he had but the one thought, that his place was by the side of his wife In this the hour of her danger.
 But there was another whose view of duty led him from safety into the face of danger. All night the Franciscan had watched De Catinat as miser watches his treasure, filled with the thought that this heretic was the one little seed which might spread and spread until 1t choked the chosen vine yard of the church. He. too. clambered down at the very heels of his prisoner and rushed into the stream not ten paces behind him.
 And so the watchers at the window saw the strangest of sights. There in midstream lay the canoe. with Its bur den of dark warriors. and the two wo- men crouchlng in the midst of them. Swimming madly toward them was De Catinat, rising to the shoulders with the strength of every stroke, and be- hind him again was the tonsured head of the friar, with his dark capot and long trailing gown floating upon the surface of the water. But in his zeal he had thought too little of his own powers. He was good swimmer, but he was weighed and hampered by his unwieldy clothes. Slower and slower grew his stroke and lower and lower his head until at last, with a great shriek of Tn manus tuas. Dominew he threw up his hands and vanished In the swirl of the river. A minute later the watchers. hoarse with screaming to him to return, saw De Catinat pulled