But Langford still bore him on till they had reached the doorway, and passed out under the arch which projected beyond the building. There, relaxing his hold, he suffered the Earl to regain his feet; but, still supporting him by the arm, led him onward, after giving a moment to recover breath, towards a spot on the terrace where all those who had escaped from the fire, were assembled, and, as too usual on such occasions, were standing with inactive wonder and selfish thankfulness for their own deliverance. Further on, indeed, there were two or three people engaged in raising with difficulty a long ladder towards the high tower where Langford had been confined. But a cry of "The Earl! the Earl!" which burst from the nearest group as the two approached, caused them to pause, and the woman Bertha, who had been directing their movements, ran up in haste. The Earl, leaning on the arm of him who had saved him, gazed up for an instant upon the splendid mansion of his ancestors, while in some parts wide black vacuities, fringed with fire, and in others a mass of flame and a blaze of light, crowned by a pyramid of red sparks and smoke, showed him the state of that building from the midst of which he had been borne. The sight thus presented to his eyes, the memory of all that night's events, the sudden wakening up of old, and dear, but painful, associations, the renewal of feelings that had been extinct, and the struggle of wonder and uncertainty with joy and conviction, were overpowering to a frame weakened as his had been. He turned from the burning mansion to his recovered son; he gazed for a moment, earnestly, intensely, on his countenance, and then, casting his arms around his neck, he exclaimed, "It is--it is--my son! my child! my deliverer! But my eyes grow dizzy; my heart feels sick." And as he spoke, he fainted with the loss of blood and the manifold emotions which thronged into his heart. CHAPTER XXIV. "He acknowledges him! he acknowledges him as his own child!" exclaimed the voice of Bertha, who had run up in haste from the other group. "Bear witness all! bear witness every one! you Henry, you Jones, you Moreton; he acknowledges him as his son even at the moment of his death!" "Hush! hush! he is not dead!" exclaimed the deep full voice of Langford; "he is but fainting from loss of blood. Some one seek a surgeon speedily. Give me something to bind up his wounds. Cannot some one fetch a cup of water?"