his eyes snapping and glaring like red coals above the black water.  Harold braced himself as well as he could upon the yielding sand, and held his poignard, Oriana’s welcome gift, with a steady grasp.  The dog came so close that his fetid breath played upon Harold’s cheek; then he aimed a swift blow at his neck, but the brute dodged it like a fish.  Harold lost his balance and fell forward into the water, but in falling, he launched out his left hand and caught the tough loose skin above the animal’s shoulder.  He held it with the grasp of a drowning man, and over and over they rolled in the water, like two sea monsters at their sport.  With all his strength, Harold drew the fierce brute toward him, circling his neck tightly with his left arm, and pressed the sharp blade against his throat.  The hot blood gushed out over his hand, but he drove the weapon deeper, slitting the sinewy flesh to the right and left, till the dog ceased to struggle.  Then Harold flung the huge carcass from him, and struck out, breathless as he was, for the schooner.  It was time, for already his pursuers were upon the bank, aiming their pistol shots at the black spot which they could just distinguish cleaving through the water.  But a few vigorous strokes carried him beyond their vision and they ceased firing.  Soon he heard the sound of muffled oars and a dark shape seemed to rise from the water in front of him.  The watch on board the schooner, alarmed by the firing, had sent a boat’s crew to reconnoitre.  Harold divined that it was so, and hailing the approaching boat, was taken in, and ten minutes afterward, stood, exhausted but safe, upon the schooner’s deck.

CHAPTER XXIX.

With the earliest opportunity, Harold proceeded to Washington, and sought an interview with the President, in relation to Arthur’s case.  Mr. Lincoln received him kindly, but could give no information respecting the arrest or alleged criminality of his friend.  “There were so many and pressing affairs of state that he could find no room for individual cases in his memory.”  However, he referred him to the Secretary of War, with a request that the latter would look into the matter.  By dint of persistent inquiries at various sources, Harold finally ascertained that the prisoner had a few days previously been released, upon the assurance of the surgeon at the fort, that his failing health required his immediate removal.  Inquiry had been made into the circumstances leading to his arrest; made too late, however, to benefit the victim of a State mistake, whose delicate health had already been too severely tried by the discomforts attendant upon his situation.  However, enough had been ascertained to leave but little doubt as to his innocence; and Arthur, with the ghastly signs of a rapid consumption upon his wan cheek, was dismissed from the portals of a prison, which had already prepared him for the tomb.