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escape us to-night, we must take care to way-lay them to-morrow."
"True! true!" said Baptiste; "Marguerite, have you given the sleeping-draught to the waiting-women?"
She replied in the affirmative.
"All then is safe. Come, come, boys; whatever falls out, we have no reason to complain of this adventure. We run no danger, may gain much, and can lose nothing."
At this moment I heard a trampling of horses. Oh! how dreadful was the sound to my ears! A cold sweat flowed down my forehead, and I felt all the terrors of impending death. I was by no means reassured by hearing the compassionate Marguerite exclaim, in the accents of despair,
"Almighty God! they are lost."
Luckily the woodman and his sons were too much occupied by the arrival of their associates to attend to me, or the violence of my agitation would have convinced them that my sleep was feigned.
"Open!"
