"Hola, brothers!" Montbarts shouted in a powerful voice; "Halt, if you please." The filibusters instantaneously became motionless. "And now, you fellows," the Admiral continued, addressing the soldiers; "throw down your arms, unless you wish to be immediately shot." All the lances and swords fell on the ground with a unanimity which proved the desire of the soldiers not to have the menace carried into effect. "Surrender your sword, sir," Montbarts said to the Count. "Never!" the latter exclaimed, as he made his horse curvet, and advanced with upraised blade on the adventurer, from whom he was only three paces distant. At the same instant a fusil was discharged and the sword blade, struck within an inch of the guard, was shivered; the Count found himself disarmed. With a sudden movement Montbarts seized the horse's bridle with one hand, and with the other hurled the Count from the saddle and laid him prostrate on the ground. "Patatras!" Lepoletais said laughingly, while reloading his fusil; "What a deuced funny idea to try alone to resist five hundred men." The Count rose quite confused by his fall; a livid pallor covered his face, and his features were contracted by anger; all at once his eyes fell upon the Countess. "Ah!" He yelled with the cry of a tiger, as he darted towards her, "At least I shall avenge myself." But Montbarts seized him by the arm and rendered him motionless. "One word, one gesture, and I blow out your brains like the wild beast you are," he said to him. There was such an accent of menace in the filibuster's words; his interference had been so rapid that the Count, involuntarily cowed, fell back with his arms folded on his chest and remained apparently calm, although a volcano was at work in his heart, and his eyes were obstinately fixed on the Countess. Montbarts gazed for a moment at his enemy with an expression of pity and contempt. "You have desired, sir," he at length said to him ironically; "to try your strength with the filibusters and will soon learn the cost; while impelled by a mad desire of vengeance and inspired by an imaginary jealousy, you were virulently pursuing a lady whose noble heart and brilliant virtues you are incapable of appreciating, one half of the island of which you are the governor has been torn forever from the power of your sovereign, by my companions and myself; Tortuga, Leogane, San Juan de Goava, and your hatto del Rincón, suddenly surprised, have fallen without a blow." The Count drew himself up, a feverish flush covered his face, he advanced a step and cried in a voice choking with passion,-- "You lie, villain; however great your audacity may be, it is impossible that you have succeeded in seizing the places you mention." Montbarts shrugged his shoulders.