towards us. They told the police that one of their number had gone into
the drain, but had not returned. He had gone in only shortly before we
had, and, if lost, could hardly be far off. They asked help to seek him,
so we turned back. They tried to prevent me going, but I insisted. It
was a new excitement, and had I not recovered my ring? Not far did we go
till we came on something. There was but little water, and the bottom of
the drain was raised with brick, rubbish, and much matter of the kind.
He had made a fight for it, even when his torch had gone out. But they
were too many for him! They had not been long about it! The bones were
still warm; but they were picked clean. They had even eaten their own
dead ones and there were bones of rats as well as of the man. They took
it cool enough those other--the human ones--and joked of their comrade
when they found him dead, though they would have helped him living. Bah!
what matters it--life or death?'

'And had you no fear?' I asked her.

'Fear!' she said with a laugh. 'Me have fear? Ask Pierre! But I was
younger then, and, as I came through that horrible drain with its wall
of greedy eyes, always moving with the circle of the light from the
torches, I did not feel easy. I kept on before the men, though! It is a
way I have! I never let the men get it before me. All I want is a chance
and a means! And they ate him up--took every trace away except the
bones; and no one knew it, nor no sound of him was ever heard!' Here she
broke into a chuckling fit of the ghastliest merriment which it was ever
my lot to hear and see. A great poetess describes her heroine singing:
'Oh! to see or hear her singing! Scarce I know which is the divinest.'

And I can apply the same idea to the old crone--in all save the
divinity, for I scarce could tell which was the most hellish--the harsh,