"Ah! then _you_ understand me. And now"--this with a gesture that enforced obedience--"now let us go back to that which we were speaking of. I was saying that King Dranoa desires that you and Ulama should be wedded without delay. To spare the feelings of the maiden, and give her time, so that the matter may not come upon her too suddenly, I have named a day two weeks hence. There will be no pageant, no public _fête_; only the necessary ceremony, quiet and solemn." "I should prefer it so," murmured Leonard. "Then that is arranged; and it will take place in the great Temple of the White Priests that has been closed for so many years. Workmen are engaged upon it, and it is now being cleansed and renovated. It will be ready in time. "The next thing I have to tell you is that Coryon has suffered his punishment, and is dead." "Coryon dead?" the other two exclaimed in a breath. "He is dead," Monella repeated solemnly. "It seems that during the night after we left, there were dreadful scenes in the amphitheatre. Those large reptiles--they are called 'myrgolams' here--came out of their pool and attacked the half-dead wretches entangled in the tree. But the branches tried hard to retain their victims, and so--well, you can almost imagine what took place. The creatures carried off the miserable beings in scraps; tore them piece by piece from the clutches of the branches till nothing was left!" He paused for a moment, and his listeners shuddered. "Thus it came about that the greedy tree was, after all, baulked of most of its intended victims; all, indeed, save three or four; though the deaths the others met with were not less horrible. Yesterday, finding the monster had no victims in its grasp, I ordered the separating door to be withdrawn. In a moment, Coryon was seized and carried up into its awful gorge. With that, the tale of this terrible tree must end. I have no heart to devote more criminals to it; though there are some among the prisoners who are scarcely less guilty than was Coryon. But these Sanaima will deal with; he will punish them as seems best to him; and I have set men to work to dig a mine from one of the cells so as to get underneath the tree. Then it can be blown up with gunpowder. And I designed to ask you to superintend the work for me," turning to Templemore. "That I will gladly do. And--the--reptiles?" Templemore was doubtful of the name.