the pleasure to aid Miss Vernon's good sense and virtuous feeling in
extricating her from your infamous toils."

I think his dark eyes flashed actual fire at this home-taunt, and yet his
voice retained the same calm expressive tone with which he had hitherto
conducted the conversation.

"I had other views with respect to you, young man," was his answer: "less
hazardous for you, and more suitable to my present character and former
education. But I see you will draw on yourself the personal chastisement
your boyish insolence so well merits. Follow me to a more remote spot,
where we are less likely to be interrupted."

I followed him accordingly, keeping a strict eye on his motions, for I
believed him capable of the very worst actions. We reached an open spot
in a sort of wilderness, laid out in the Dutch taste, with clipped
hedges, and one or two statues. I was on my guard, and it was well with
me that I was so; for Rashleigh's sword was out and at my breast ere I
could throw down my cloak, or get my weapon unsheathed, so that I only
saved my life by springing a pace or two backwards. He had some advantage
in the difference of our weapons; for his sword, as I recollect, was
longer than mine, and had one of those bayonet or three-cornered blades
which are now generally worn; whereas mine was what we then called a
Saxon blade--narrow, flat, and two-edged, and scarcely so manageable as
that of my enemy. In other respects we were pretty equally matched: for
what advantage I might possess in superior address and agility, was fully
counterbalanced by Rashleigh's great strength and coolness. He fought,
indeed, more like a fiend than a man--with concentrated spite and desire
of blood, only allayed by that cool consideration which made his worst
actions appear yet worse from the air of deliberate premeditation which