rolled from their lips.  One of these, from his distorted face, rendered momently visible in the vivid flashes of the lightning, and from his voice, though loud and disguised by passion, she at once knew to be her husband.  His antagonist was not so strong a man, but he was more active, and seemed much cooler.  Each had in his hand an open Spanish knife, and both were striking, plunging, and parrying thrusts with the most malignant fury.  It was an awful sight to look upon.  Two human beings striving for each other’s lives amid the fury of a terrible storm, the lightnings of which glanced sharply upon their glittering knives, revealing their fiend-like countenances for an instant, and then leaving them in black darkness.

For a few moments, Mrs. Warburton stood fixed to the spot, but, recalling her scattered senses, she rushed towards the combatants, calling upon them to pause, and repeating the name of her husband in a voice of agony.  The result of the strife was delayed but an instant longer, for with a loud cry her husband fell bleeding at her feet.  His antagonist passed out of sight in a moment.

Lifting the apparently lifeless form of her husband in her arms, Mrs. Warburton carried or rather dragged him into the house, and placed him upon the bed, where lay their sleeping boy.  She then hurried off for the nearest physician, who was soon in attendance.

The first sound that met the ear of Mrs. Warburton, on her return, was the voice of her dear child, eagerly calling, “Pa! pa! wake up, pa!”—­And there was the little fellow pulling at the insensible body of his father, in an (sic) extacy of infantile joy at his return.

“Pa come home!—­Pa come home, mamma!” And the little fellow clapped his hands, and shook the body of his father in the effort to wake him.

The mother gently lifted her child from the bed.  His little face instantly changed its expression into one of fear, when he looked into his mother’s countenance.  “Pa’s very sick, and little Charles must keep still,” she whispered to the child, and sat him down in the next room.

When the physician arrived, he found that the knife had entered the left breast just above the heart, but had not penetrated far enough to destroy life.  There were also several bad cuts, in different parts of his body, all of which required attention.  After dressing them, he left the still insensible man in the care of his wife and one of his assistants, with directions to have him called should any alarming symptom occur.  It was not until the next morning that there was any apparent return of consciousness on the part of the wounded man.  Then he asked in a feeble voice for his wife.  She had left the bed but a moment before, and hearing him speak, was by his side in an instant.

“Julia, how came I here?  What is the matter?” said he, rousing up, and looking anxiously around.  But overcome with weakness from the loss of blood, he sank back upon the bed, and remained apparently insensible for some time.  But he soon showed evidence of painful recollection having returned.  For his breathing became more laboured, under agitated feelings, and he glanced his eyes about the room with an eager expression.  After a few minutes he buried his face in the bed-clothes and sighed heavily.  Distinct, painful consciousness had returned.