fiendish inhabitants.

With the symbol of Christianity in his mind, Lane turned toward
the giant cactus, which he had heretofore regarded chiefly in the
aspect of a flagpole, and saw in its columnar trunk and opposing
branches a distinct resemblance to a cross. The plant was dead,
and dry as punk. Suddenly there flashed into his mind a hideous
suggestion. More cruel than even the Romans, the inventors of
crucifixion, the Apaches are wont to bind their captives to these
dead cacti, which supply at once scourging thorns, binding stake,
and consuming fuel, and, kindling a fire at the top, leave it to
burn slowly down to the victim, and, long before it despatches
him, to twist his body and limbs into what appear to the Apache
sense of humor to be exquisitely ludicrous contortions.

With his mind occupied by these horrible apprehensions, Lane
looked at the rattlesnake upon the sahuaro whose struggles by
this time had diminished to a movement of the tail.

"Poor old rattler," he thought. "I wish I could spare a
cartridge to put you out of your misery."

At length, as Lane peered up the mountainside, he saw a bush on a
ledge a little to the left of the trail quiver, as if stirred by
a passing breath of wind. He aimed his Winchester through a
crack in the wall at the spot, and when a moment later an Apache
rose up from the ground and leaped toward the shelter of a rock
below, Lane fired, and the savage fell crumpling. Like an echo
of the explosion a rifle on the right spoke, and a bullet struck
the rock by Lane's head. He marked the spot whence the shot