"By what shall I know where to halt the main body of my picquet, major?" asked Ronald, looking rather blankly towards the waste expanse of desert plain, which extends for more than seven leagues around Badajoz. "It is as level as the very sea: nothing bounds it but the distant heights of Albuera." "March _on_ that star," said W—— technically, as he raised himself in his stirrups, and pointed towards a bright planet which was twinkling where the lingering streaks of yellow edged the dark horizon, glowing like heated bars of gold through openings in the dusky masses of clouds, which appeared to rest o’er Albuera, the position of Graham. "You will march straight upon it, and halt your picquet where you find a man’s head stuck upon a pole." "Upon a pole!" "Ay. Queer mark, is it not?" "Very. I am to halt there?" "A dismal thing to have beside one for a whole night,—in a place as dreary, and eerie too, as the pass of Drumouchter." "Is it the head of a murderer?" "Yes. His body is buried beneath it,—a common practice in this part of the country, I believe." "A man’s head used to be quite a common mark when I was in Egypt with Sir Ralph Abercrombie," chimed in Campbell, who had stretched himself on the dewy grass near. "I have seen a corps of turbaned Turks, reviewed near Alexandria, using the spiked heads of Frenchmen as we do our red camp-colours, as points to wheel on." "You had better take up your ground, Mr. Stuart," said the brigade major, to cut short any intended story, "and remember carefully to make yourself master of your situation, by examining, not only the space you actually occupy, but the heights within musquet-shot, the roads and paths leading to or near the post, ascertaining their breadth and practicability for cavalry and cannon, and to ensure a ready and constant communication with the adjoining posts and videttes,—in the day by signals, in the night by patrols," &c.; and the old fellow did not cease his long quotation from the "Regulations," which he had gotten by rote, until compelled to do so by want of breath. When he made an end, and had ridden off, Ronald marched his picquet in the direction pointed out, keeping as a guide the star already mentioned. He soon found the halting-place, and there, sure enough, was a human head placed upon a pole about ten feet high; and a more grisly, hairy, ferocious, and terrible face than it presented, human eyes never beheld. In ferocity its expression was that of Narvaez Cifuentes, but it was fixed and rigid,—the eyes glassy and bursting from the sockets,—the jaws wide and open, displaying a formidable row of large white teeth. It was much decayed by the heat of the weather, although it had been only three days exposed; and as the breeze blew swiftly past, it caused the long damp tresses of black hair to wave around the livid brow with an effect at once strange and terrible.