"Vamos! away!" shouted the doctor, throwing open the window, and leaping out upon the lawn, followed by Pedro. "Excuse me, lieutenant," he added with a laugh, turning his head as he sprang out; "look to yourself."

And in the momentary glimpse that I had of him thus I could see that his green spectacles had fallen off, and that he had lost the stoop of age, and regained all his youthful litheness of movement, as if by miracle. But by this time the din was something fearful; horses trampling, men running and shouting, discharges of firearms, loud cries of "Death to the traitors!"

As I stood stupefied, like one in a feverish dream, I could see two mounted men gallop madly off across the lawn, leap the ditch, and take their headlong way across the fields under a heavy fire, aimed at by fifty riflemen who came running up in the green garb of the Caçadores, and pursued by a score of riders. Then the firing ceased, and presently the trumpet sounded the recall, and the disappointed pursuers came riding back by twos and threes. But I stood as though my feet were rooted to the carpet, until a clash of spurs and steel scabbards resounded, and Colonel Gomez, a savage-looking old officer with shaggy gray eyebrows and a face purple with rage, burst into the room, with a dozen of his troopers, to arrest me.

"A very likely story," said the colonel grimly, as he twirled his long iron-gray moustache round his bony forefinger, and glared fiercely on me; "a probable tale. You call yourself an officer of the British navy and an innocent traveller, yet you have no passport or papers, no uniform even. And you own that you gave this," holding up the luckless gold snuffbox, "to yonder arch-spy and prince of traitors-to the villain Fell, who has hoodwinked us for weeks, and has ridden off safe, with his scoundrel of an orderly, to Mexico City, to tell his comrades all he has observed within our lines, under the assumed character of a doctor and a man of science. The vile sorcerer! Our bullets missed him as if we had been shooting at the Gran Demonio himself. But they will not miss you, señor rogue; for I swear by St. Jago to bring you face to face with the fire of a platoon, were you twenty times English!"

And he caused me to be searched, ironed, and marched off to a tent, there to be guarded until the general should approve of my sentence— to be shot to death as a spy.

I had not been in the tent above two hours before the canvas was cautiously lifted, and the bright eyes and dusky face of Martin the Indian boy appeared in the opening.

"Hist!" he said in a whisper, with his finger on his lips; "the Señor Inglese was good to Martin; and Martin does not forget foe or friend. What can Indian boy do?"

The grateful creature had crept unheeded past my guards. I had, luckily, my pocket-book still about me, and I pencilled a note to Osborne, which Martin swore to deliver. He would saddle his mas

ter's best horse, he said, and ride night and day. But the gleam of comfort which the sight of this kindly lad, and his promise to hurry to my shipmate, had given me, died away when he was gone, and I remembered the long ride that lay before him, and the probability that before intercession could be made my iniquitous sentence would have been carried out to the bitter end.

The next few days passed by in dreary monotony. I was not illtreated. I had a tent to myself, and was sufficiently supplied with the coarse food that composes the rations of the Mexican soldier. But two sentinels, crossing one another in their regular walk, paced night and day before the door of my canvas prison, through the flimsy roof of which the hot sun of the tropics forced its way towards noon with a power that was all but intolerable, while at night the mosquitoes and white flies came in winged legions to plague me. I was denied writingmaterials, and having no books or chance of conversation, found the time pass heavily indeed. Presently it was announced to me that the general had approved my sentence, and that I was to be shot at eight o'clock on the morning of the ensuing day.

That morning dawned at last, glorious and unclouded, with all the brilliancy of light, the vivid tints of the vegetation, the unsullied azure of the sky peculiar to those latitudes; and true to the appointed hour, the firing-party, commanded by a subaltern, marched to the tent and led me forth—to die. The place selected for the execution was an open space of trampled greensward in front of the cavalry quarters. Here a shallow grave had been scooped in the sand, and at this spot, on the edge of the grave, I was compelled to kneel, while my arms were pinioned tightly, and a sergeant proceeded to bandage my eyes with a silk-handkerchief.

“You have five minutes to pray, if you heretics ever do,” said the sergeant gruffly, and then withdrew.

I had made no remonstrance, used no entreaty. Hopeless and desponding, I prepared to meet my fate calmly, aware that no argument of mine could avail me. I heard the word of command, and then the rattle of the muskets. The men of the platoon were fallingin, and ordering arms, in obedience to the call of their officer. The time was nearly spent. I fancied, too, that I heard a distant sound as of horses galloping on the soft turf; but of this I had little leisure to think, for now the muskets clanked again as they were brought to the "present."

"When I lift my sword, then fire !" called out the officer.

Again the trampling sound of hurrying horses, and the clash of accoutrements, and a shout of several eager voices. Next there was a hubbub of excited talk, and the jingling of swords and neighing of horses, and I was dragged to my feet, while someone cut the cord that bound my arms, and another hand tore the bandage from my eyes.

"Only just in time," said a well-known and friendly voice; "but we are in time, thank Heaven! Why, Phil, my poor fellow!"

It was Henry Osborne who was beside me, and who held me propped on his shoulder,-for I had fainted, or nearly so,-while behind him appeared the copper-coloured face of Martin the Indian boy. The travel-stained and dishevelled condition of both of them, as well as the bleeding and heaving flanks of their weary horses, told that they had ridden fast and far. Behind them, on horseback, were Colonel Gomez and several other officers, as well as a mounted aide-de-camp of General Diaz, holding a paper which I afterwards learned was the order for my reprieve and liberation.

"I have made it all right with the general," whispered Osborne; "but what a touch-and-go business it was! Two minutes, and yonder old tiger would have carried out his own tyrannical sentence in full. But we are to be off to Vera Cruz, and get on board again with all speed. The Liberals are furious about the trick in which you were an innocent instrument. That Captain Fell, whom you took for an old doctor-Anderson he called himself-turns out to be an ex-Confederate officer, now on Miramon's staff, and the most active and unscrupulous young fellow in the imperialist army; a spy who-"

"What are you talking of, with your spies and Confederates and young fellows?" asked I in my bewilderment. "Surely you don't mean that Dr. Anderson-"

"Dr. Anderson," said Osborne, interrupting me in his turn, and with a good-humoured smile-" Dr. Anderson and Captain Fell, who is not above six or seven-and-twenty, are one and the same person. The letter you conveyed to him, unknowingly, in the gold box, was a warning that he or his orderly Pedro had been recognised by someone who had sent information to the Liberals who it was that lurked, disguised as an aged naturalist, at the Quinta Negra, and who sent constant information to the Imperialists of the enemy's movements. And as for Miss Louisa-"

"What of her?" I exclaimed.

"As for Miss Louisa, as you call her," continued Osborne with much composure, "she is considered by the Republicans as very nearly as dangerous a spy as her husband, and I advise you to forget her sunny blue eyes as soon as you conveniently can, for her name is Mrs. Fell."

So it was. It was Captain Fell's wife who had with such seeming artlessness tricked me into carrying the message that warned her husband to fly, and I had been doubly duped; that was all.

AN OLD VENETIAN SKETCH

WHEN last rays of sunset have merged into splendour,
And faded behind the Euganean hills;

When balmy the breeze in the twilight so tender-
The whisper of love then more easily thrills!
The voice of the lover is yet more ecstatic,

As, changing from golden to silvern once more,
The soft summer waves of the blue Adriatic

Scarce dimple the sand on the Lido's white shore.

O, gay as the prismatic pearls of Murano

Are songs that we sing by the light of the moon; More sacred than relics in old San Stefano

Are words that come wafted across the Lagoon!

On white marble steps-the brave work of Scamozzi-
I watch her eyes glitter and glow in the dark;
Now gloomy and sad as the depths of the Pozzi,
Now bright as the banners afloat o'er St. Mark.

Carissima mia, I don't mind confessing

Whilst raven-black tresses you ripple and twine— Though eyes proudly flash, I could scarcely help pressing A soft little hand were it folded in mine!

I'll sit at her feet, though my passion is burning,

And worship her beauty with deeply-drawn sighs;

Nor dream of the dull, sober daylight returning,
Whilst basking in love and the light of her eyes.

Then, O for the rapture to whisper through tresses
Soft-scented, atwine round those shell-tinted ears!
Away with all doubts and away with distresses,
And perish the fancy of sorrow and tears!

Ah! dwell in my heart now, O sweetest of creatures!
You'll live in the future of forthcoming days;
For splendid old Titian has painted your features,
And gay Aretino has sung in your praise!

J. ASHBY STERRY.