“Yes; perhaps I was foolish to suppose that one man, and that myself, could do any good at such a moment; but I think one has a natural desire to be in the thick of everything, and I knew that I should not come to harm, if Saul Tresithny could help it. I went down and out into the street. The noise told me that the carriage could not be far away, and very soon I had forced myself into the thick of the fight, hoping, when I got between the combatants, to induce Saul on the one side to draw off his men, whilst I urged those of our own supporters who had joined in the scrimmage to retire from the unseemly disturbance. But things had gone much too far for any pacific endeavours on my part. I do not know exactly in whose possession the carriage was at the moment when I reached it; and the press round it and the fighting was so fierce and indiscriminate that I could hardly move or breathe, let alone trying to make my voice heard. And soon I was recognised by one great fellow as an enemy, and a new element of fury was added to the struggle; but what really made the danger, and caused the damage at last, was a sudden shout raised at the back of the crowd that the soldiers were coming.” “Ah!” breathed Bride softly. “I suppose the man on the box of the carriage saw over our heads that it was true, for he suddenly deserted his post, and flung himself down to the ground; whilst the horses, feeling the sudden jerk of the reins, and then the slackness which followed, set to plunging and kicking wildly, scattering the mob right and left, and knocking down at least half-a-dozen of the crowd, as they swerved and tried to turn, before bolting off in their terror. Saul saw the peril to every one, rushed forward and made a gallant spring at their heads; but he was knocked down and trampled upon in a fearful way, before I and a few others could come to his assistance and get to the heads of the horses. When we brought them to a standstill at last, I had got my arm crushed, I shall never know exactly how; and the other fellows had all got bruises or cuts of one sort or another. As for poor Tresithny, he lay on the ground like one dead, his head bleeding, one foot so crushed that I fear he will never walk again, and with other injuries of quite as grave a character. But the mob had scattered helter-skelter by that time, and the soldiers, with their bayonets fixed, were quietly bearing down through the street, clearing a path before them, as a gale of wind clears away the fog wreaths through a valley.” “They did not hurt the people--they did not fire?”