"No.

How far are we from home?"

"A league and a half, at least," he answered. "Darkness will soon overtake us.

"Verily, it will."

(6 'How will we see?"

"We shall light a pine knot."

He did not have long to search among those woods before he found a knot, and with his tinder box he quickly lighted the torch; but the rain was falling in torrents, and no torch would long burn. In a few moments the torch was snuffed out by the gust of wind. A slave threw a cloak about the mademoiselle, to keep her from the rain. was pitch dark and to follow the road to Grand Pre was utterly impossible. In this dilemma, what was to be done? They were yet some distance from the house, and no aid seemed near.

It

I

"There is," said the Coureur des Bois, "a hunter's cabin about a mile off. It has been long deserted; but I could find it, I am quite sure. can bring you there, where you might have shelter until the storm has passed."

66

Take us there as soon as you can," said the mademoiselle.

The cavalcade started along the narrow path through the woods, but were compelled to grope their way.

The storm, as great storms usually do, lingered

in the distance, rumbling, roaring and threatening, as if to give every one an opportunity to escape its wrath. Already it had grown so dark that even the experienced eyes of the Coureur des Bois could not see the path through the wood, save when one of those vivid flashes of lightning painted the glare of perdition on the sky, the reflection of which gave to the forest a momentary brilliance greater than the noonday's sun.

De Bray continued to urge his jaded steed forward at a trot, and the others followed. The storm was coming on in their rear, and once more a volley of rain-drops fell among the leaves.

This was but the skirmish line of the storm. The heavy battle lines were not far in their rear. Just as the storm seemed gathering in all its fury in their rear, the guide uttered a shout, and a light suddenly burst on their view. It was not three hundred paces away, and De Bray cried:

"Some one is stopping at the old hut! Come on!"

Their horses, seeming to have regained new life, bounded forward at a gallop toward the light.

At this moment there came a tremendous crash overhead, and a hemlock, not thirty paces on the left of Adele, was shivered to splinters from its topmost branches to its roots. Her horse, stunned by the shock, for a moment quivered and sank

beneath her. She was powerless to urge the animal forward; but one of the servants struck the beast a sharp blow with his whip, which made it bound forward.

Adele was bewildered, hardly conscious of whither she was going, while crash after crash overhead and all about them made the earth tremble. Heaven's artillery had begun to play in earnest, and the giants of the forest were falling on every side.

answer.

She heard voices calling to her, but could not Her horse, mad with fright, leaped into the clearing, and was bounding past the hunter's cabin to the wood beyond, with the speed of the wind, when a tall man leaped suddenly from the door and at half a dozen bounds was at the side of the flying steed. The angry lightning, playing in spiral whirls about them, revealed the handsome features of a young man, dressed in garments once genteel, but now worn and shabby. His hand of iron seized the steed and hurled it to its haunches, while angry flames of electric fire flashed all about them, seeming to set the world ablaze.

She was partially conscious of falling, then of some one catching her in his arms, and of being carried tenderly into some sort of shelter, and all was a blank.

When she recovered consciousness, a pine knot,

stuck into the dark wall of a log hut, gave forth some light, and a great deal of smoke. Overhead could be heard the roar of the storm, the crash of thunders and the falling rain; but who was that man bending over her? Surely she was dreaming still, and on the wings of the tempest she seemed to hear the soft refrain:

66 L'amour me réveille."

It was no dream, for a voice, which was of more substantial stuff than dreams, asked:

"Mademoiselle, are you better?"

"What has happened, Monsieur?" she asked, starting up, to find herself on a pile of skins and furs.

"Nothing, save that you were caught in a

She recalled all in a moment and, gazing about her, discovered her servants standing in a group near a broad fireplace in which blazed a few pine sticks.

"Do not be alarmed, Mademoiselle," said the young man. "You are out of danger; the storm will soon be over, and then you can resume your journey home."

66 Do you live here, Monsieur?"

"I am only a temporary sojourner at this hut, Mademoiselle."

"Are you a hunter?"

"Not by profession."

She was now able to sit up on the bed of skins. "Is Mademoiselle better?" he asked.

"Thank you, yes," she answered.

When she sat up, the light from the torch fell on the face of her preserver, and she started back, clasping her hand over her heart and murmuring: "It is he!"

"Is Mademoiselle ill?"

"No, Monsieur."

She could say no more for several minutes, and then she asked in a feeble voice:

"Have you been here long?"

"From along the borders of the St. Lawrence." She was silent; but her eyes drooped for a few moments, and then, fixing them on his face, she noted how pale and care-worn it was. "Have you been ill?"

"I had no physician, or nurse, save the Indians." "You have suffered?"

“I am a man, Mademoiselle, and I do not mur