“Take courage!” said Dagobert:  “I dare say it was only a scratch, as the general calls it.  Formerly, he used to call wounds, which did not disable a man from fighting, blank wounds.  There was no one like him for such sayings.”

“Djalma, seeing me wounded,” resumed Rose, wiping her eyes, “made use of his heavy carbine as a club, and drove back the soldiers.  At that instant, I perceived a new assailant, who, sheltered behind a clump of bamboos which commanded the ravine, slowly lowered his long gun, placed the barrel between two branches, and took deliberate aim at Djalma.  Before my shouts could apprise him of his danger, the brave youth had received a ball in his breast.  Feeling himself hit, he fell bark involuntarily two paces, and dropped upon one knee:  but he still remained firm, endeavoring to cover me with his body.  You may conceive my rage and despair, whilst all my efforts to disengage myself were paralyzed by the excruciating pain in my thigh.  Powerless and disarmed, I witnessed for some moments this unequal struggle.

“Djalma was losing blood rapidly; his strength of arm began to fail him; already one of the irregulars, inciting his comrades with his voice, drew from his belt a huge, heavy kind of bill-hook, when a dozen of our mountaineers made their appearance, borne towards the spot by the irresistible current of the battle.  Djalma was rescued in his turn, I was released, and, in a quarter of an hour, I was able to mount a horse.  The fortune of the day is ours, though with severe loss; but the fires of the English camp are still visible, and to-morrow the conflict will be decisive.  Thus, my beloved Eva, I owe my life to this youth.  Happily, his wound occasions us no uneasiness; the ball only glanced along the ribs in a slanting direction.”

“The brave boy might have said:  “‘A blank wound,’ like the general,” observed Dagobert.

“Now, my dear Eva,” continued Rose, “you must become acquainted, by means of this narrative at least, with the intrepid Djalma.  He is but just eighteen.  With one word, I will paint for you his noble and valiant nature; it is a custom of this country to give surnames, and, when only fifteen, he was called ’The Generous’—­by which was, of course, meant generous in heart and mind.  By another custom, no less touching than whimsical, this name was reverted to his parent, who is called ’The Father of the Generous,’ and who might, with equal propriety, be called ‘The Just,’ for this old Indian is a rare example of chivalrous honor and proud independence.  He might, like so many other poor princes of this country, have humbled himself before the execrable despotism of the English, bargained for the relinquishment of sovereign power, and submitted to brute force—­but it was not in his nature.  ’My whole rights, or a grave in my native mountains!’—­such is his motto.  And this is no empty boast; it springs from the conviction of what is right and just.  ‘But you will be crushed in the struggle,’