Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/343

 *change of blows. The guard had entirely lost control of the crowd collected about the scaffold, which immediately seized its opportunity of getting even with the law. Not only did it offer the rebel and his escort every facility to escape, but was at equal pains to impede the soldiers, the Sheriff, and the officials of the gaol in their efforts to arrest the condemned man's flight. And this they succeeded very well in doing. A bodyguard of hard-hitting rogues formed about the rescued rebel and hurried him at a double through the friendly mob, that gave way right gallantly before them.

It made me almost wild with joy to behold my young lover and his company of sturdy dogs cleave through the kind-intentioned press till they came in safety to the door of the very house in which I was. At the moment that he approached the threshold, I wheeled about, and almost overturned a lord as I ran from the chamber and darted down the stairs. His liberators, faithful to the implicit instructions of Mr. Snark, had already got him in the house.

There was a great press of people on his heels pouring in through the open door as I came down the stairs. However, I was able to breast my progress through the throng, and fervently clasp my intrepid lover's hand.

"Quick! quick!" I whispered. "Do not dally. Get through to the back. A horse awaits you. Do not draw rein till you are at the 'White Hart,' Dover. Here's a purse to meet your needs; and