The gun dropped from the nerveless grasp of young Moseley.  Emily sank in insensibility by the side of her preserver.  Mrs. Wilson and Jane stood speechless and aghast.  The colonel alone retained the presence of mind necessary to devise the steps to be immediately taken.  He sprang to the examination of Denbigh; the eyes of the wounded man were open, and his recollection perfect:  the first were fixed in intense observation on the inanimate body which lay at his side.

“Leave me, Colonel Egerton,” he said, speaking with difficulty, and pointing in the direction of the little run of water, “assist Miss Moseley—­your hat—­your hat will answer.”

Accustomed to scenes of blood, and not ignorant that time and care were the remedies to be applied to the wounded man, Egerton flew to the stream, and returning immediately, by the help of her sister and Mrs. Wilson, soon restored Emily to life.  The ladies and John had now begun to act.  The tenderest assiduities of Jane were devoted to her sister; while Mrs. Wilson observing her niece to be uninjured by anything but the shock, assisted John in supporting the wounded man.

Denbigh spoke, requesting to be carried to the house; and Jarvis was despatched for help.  Within half an hour, Denbigh was placed on a couch in the house of Sir Edward, and was quietly waiting for that professional aid which could only decide on his probable fate.  The group assembled in the room were in fearful expectation of the arrival of the surgeons, in pursuit of whom messengers had been sent both to the barracks in F——­ and to the town itself.  Sir Edward sat by the side of the sufferer, holding one of his hands in his own, now turning his tearful eyes on that daughter who had so lately been rescued as it were from the certainty of death, in mute gratitude and thanksgiving; and now dwelling on the countenance of him, who, by bravely interposing his bosom to the blow, had incurred in his own person the imminent danger of a similar fate, with a painful sense of his perilous situation, and devout and earnest prayers for his safety.  Emily was with her father, as with the rest of his family, a decided favorite; and no reward would have been sufficient, no gratitude lively enough, in the estimation of the baronet, to compensate the protector of such a child.  She sat between her mother and Jane, with a hand held by each, pale and oppressed with a load of gratitude, of thanksgiving, of woe, that almost bowed her to the earth.  Lady Moseley and Jane were both sensibly touched with the deliverance of Emily, and manifested the interest they took in her by the tenderest caresses, while Mrs. Wilson sat calmly collected within herself, occasionally giving those few directions which were necessary under the circumstances, and offering up her silent petitions in behalf of the sufferer.  John had taken horse immediately for F——­, and Jarvis had volunteered to go to the rectory and Bolton.  Denbigh inquired frequently and with much anxiety