vessel.  But hold! another boat is now quitting the ship’s side.  See, how manfully they give themselves to the oars:  in a few minutes they will be here.  Come, Clara, let us fly!” and again he caught her in his arms, and bore her across the room.  “Hark, hear you not the exulting yellings of the monsters?  They are forcing the outer door:  mark how they redouble their efforts to break it open!  That passed, but one more barrier remains between us and inevitable and instant death.”

“And my cousin, my uncle!” shrieked the unhappy girl, as the officer now bore her rapidly down the back staircase.

“Oh, ask me not!” exclaimed Baynton:  “were I to linger again on all I have witnessed, I should go mad.  All, all have perished! but, hark!”

A tremendous yell now bursting from the passage, announced at once, the triumph of the savages in having effected an entrance into the bed-room, and their disappointment at finding their pursuit baulked by a second door.  Presently afterwards their heavy weapons were to be heard thundering at this new obstacle, in the most furious manner.  This gave new stimulus to the exertions of the generous officer.  Each winding of the staircase was familiar to him, and he now descended it with a rapidity which, considering the burden that reposed against his chest, could only have been inspired by his despair.  The flight terminated at a door that led directly upon the rampart, without communicating with any of the passages of the building; and in this consisted the principal facility of escape:  for, in order to reach them, the savages must either make the circuit of the block-house, or overtake them in the course they were now following.  In this trying emergency, the presence of mind of the young officer, wounded and bleeding as he was, did not desert him.  On quitting the larger apartment above, he had secured the outside fastenings of a small door at the top of the stairs, and having now gained the bottom, he took a similar precaution.  All that remained was to unclose the bolts of the ponderous door that opened upon their final chance of escape:  this was speedily done, but here the feelings of the officer were put to a severe test.  A rude partition divided him from the fatal council-room; and while he undid the fastenings, the faint and dying groans of his butchered brother officers rung in his ears, even at the moment that he felt his feet dabbling in the blood that oozed through the imperfectly closed planks of which the partition was composed.  As for Clara, she was insensible to all that was passing.  From the moment of the Indian yell, announcing their entry into the bed-room, she had fainted.