by that perhaps you may find your way out again. Only promise me, that if you escape safe, you will take me home with you to Greece; for my father will surely kill me, if he knows what I have done."

13. Then Theseus laughed, and said, "Am I not safe enough now?" And he hid the sword in his bosom, and rolled up the clew in his hand; and then he swore to Ariadne, and fell down before her, and kissed her hands and her feet; and she wept over him a long while, and then went away; and Theseus lay down and slept sweetly.

14. And when the morning came, the guards came in, and led him away to the labyrinth.

And he went down into that doleful gulf, through winding paths among the rocks, under caverns, and arches, and galleries, and over heaps of fallen stone. And he turned on the left hand, and on the right hand, and went up and down, till his head was dizzy; but all the while he held his clew. For when he went in he had fastened it to a stone, and left it to unroll out of his hand as he went on; and it lasted him till he met the Minotaur, in a narrow chasm between black cliffs.

15. And when he saw him he stopped awhile, for he had never seen so strange a beast. His body was a man's, but his head was the head of a bull, and his teeth were the teeth of a lion; and with them he tore his prey. And when he saw Theseus he roared, and put his head down, and rushed right at him.

16. But Theseus stepped aside nimbly, and, as he passed by, cut him in the knee; and, ere he could turn in the narrow path, he followed him, and stabbed him again and again from behind, till the monster fled, bel

lowing wildly; for he never before had felt a wound. And Theseus followed him at full speed, holding the clew of silk in his left hand.

17. Then on, through cavern after cavern, under dark ribs of sounding stone, and up rough glens and torrentbeds, and to the edge of the eternal snow, went they.

the hunter and the hunted, while the hills bellowed to the monster's bellow.

18. And at last Theseus came up with him, where he lay panting on a slab among the snow, and caught him by the horns, and forced his head back, and drove the keen sword through his throat.

Then he turned, and went back limping and weary, feeling his way down by the clew of silk, till he came to the mouth of that doleful place, and saw waiting for him, whom but Ariadne!

19. And he whispered, "It is done!" and showed her the sword; and she laid her finger on her lips, and led him to the prison, and opened the doors, and set all the prisoners free, while the guards lay sleeping heavily; for she had silenced them with wine.

20. Then they fled to their ship together, and leaped on board, and hoisted up the sail; and the night lay dark around them, so that they passed through Minos's ships, and escaped all safe to Naxos; and there Ariadne became Theseus's wife.

54. - A TALE OF THE SEA.

PART I.

boat'swain [bō'sn], a petty officer. | la-teen'-rigged, rigged with triancar-ron-ādes', a kind of short can

non.

dog'ged, obstinate.

tion.

gular sails.

line, the equator.
nov'ice, new hand.

e-jac-u-lā'tion, sudden exclama- or'lop, lower deck.

fas-ci-nā'tion, strong influence.

prologue, any thing preceding. treb'le [treb'l], female voice.

gut'tur-al, pertaining to the throat. | vol'ūme, power.

1. Now carmine streaks tinged the eastern sky at the water's edge, and that water blushed; now the streaks turned orange, and the waves below them sparkled. Thence splashes of living gold flew and settled on the Agra's white sails, the deck, and the faces; and, with no more prologue, being so near the line, up came majestically a huge, fiery, golden sun, and set the sea flaming liquid topaz.

Suddenly the look-out at the foretop-gallant masthead hailed the deck below:

"STRANGE SAIL! RIGHT AHEAD!"

2. The strange sail was reported to Captain Dodd, then dressing in his cabin. He came soon after on deck, and hailed the lookout: "Which way is she standing?" "Can't say, sir. Can't see her move any."

Dodd ordered the boatswain to pipe to breakfast, and taking his deck-glass went lightly up to the foretop-gallant cross-trees. There, through the light haze of a glorious morning, he espied a long low schooner, lateen-rigged, lying close under a small island about

nine miles distant on the weather-bow, and nearly in the Agra's course.

"She is hove to," said Dodd, very gravely.

3. At eight o'clock the stranger lay about two miles to windward; and still hove to.

By this time all eyes were turned upon her, and half a dozen glasses. Everybody, except the captain, delivered an opinion. She was a Greek lying to for water; she was a Malay coming north with canes, and short of hands; she was a pirate watching the Straits.

4. The captain leaned silent and somber with his arms on the bulwarks, and watched the suspected craft. "I think he is a Malay pirate," said Mr. Grey.

Sharpe took him up very quickly, and indeed angrily: "Nonsense! And if he is, he won't venture on a craft of this size."

66

'Says the whale to the sword-fish," suggested Fullalove, with a little guttural laugh.

5. The captain, with the glass at his eye, turned half round to the man at the wheel: "Starboard!"

6. The alteration in the Agra's course produced no movement on the part of the mysterious schooner. She still lay to under the land, with only a few hands on deck, while the Agra edged away from her, and entered the Straits, leaving the schooner about two miles and a half distant to the north-west.

7. Ah! The stranger's deck swarms black with men ! His sham ports fall as if by magic, his guns grin through the gaps like black teeth; his huge foresail rises and fills, and out he comes in chase.