The column of police was formed scarcely two hundred strong. Merwyn, as a new recruit, was placed in its rear, a position that he did not mean to keep when the fight should begin. Like the others, he was armed with a locust-club, but he had two revolvers on his person, and these he knew how to use with fatal precision. From an open window Superintendent Acton shouted, "Inspector Carpenter, my orders are, Make no arrests, bring no prisoners, but kill--kill every time." It was to be a life-and-death struggle. The mob would have no mercy: the officers of the law were commanded to show none. As Carpenter went forward to the head of his column, his face as dark with his sanguinary puipose as the lowering west, Merwyn saw that Mr. Vosburgh, quiet and observant, was present. The government officer, with his trained instincts, knew just where to be, in order to obtain the most vital information. He now joined Merwyn, and was struck by his extreme pallor, a characteristic of the young fellow under extreme emotion. "Mr. Merwyn," he said, hastily, "you have done enough for two to-day, You need rest. This is going to be a desperate encounter." "Forward!" shouted Carpenter. A proud smile lighted up Merwyn's features, as he said: "Good-by. Thank you for such faith as you have had in me;" and he moved off with the others. Mr. Vosburgh muttered, "I shall see this fight, and I shall solve that embodied mystery whom we have thought a coward;" and he followed so near as to keep Merwyn under his eye. A black, sulphurous cloud was rising in the west. This little dark blue column approaching from the east, marching down Bleecker Street, was insignificant in comparison, yet it was infinitely the more dangerous, and charged with forces that would scatter death and wounds such as the city had never witnessed. No words were spoken by the resolute men. The stony pavement echoed their measured, heavy tread. Turning into Broadway they saw the enemy but a block and a half away, a howling mob, stretching northward as far as the eye could reach. It was sweeping the thoroughfare, thousands in line. Pedestrians, stages, vehicles of all kinds, were vanishing down side-streets. Pallid shopkeepers were closing their stores as sailors take in sail before a cyclone. Carpenter halted his command, and sent small detachments up parallel side-streets, that they might come around and fall upon the flanks of the mob. As these men were moving off on the double-quick, Merwyn left his squad and said to Carpenter: "I am a citizen, and I stipulated that I should fight as I chose. I choose to fight with you." "Well, well, so long as you fight," was the hasty answer. "You shall have plenty of it, if you keep near me." Then he added, sternly: "Mark you, young fellow, if you show the white feather I'll knock you over myself. Those devils yonder must be taught that the one thing this force can't do is run."