English trenches prevented further inquiry; but Talbot held the circumstance in his recollection, and determined to keep a sharp watch on that part of the walls next night.

Morning, as had been expected, developed the further operations of the besiegers. Just at sunrise the first embrasure of the new battery was thrown open, and the black mouth of a piece of heavy cannon appeared frowning through the unexpected aperture. In rapid succession five other portions of the concealing rampart fell away, disclosing each its gun, all pointed towards the centre of the north wall of the castle, where it was weakest, as well in masonry as in its flanking defences. Maynooth castle consisted of the keep, a huge, square pile in the centre of the court-yard and its quadrangular outworks. These were flanked at intervals by other towers, of mean proportion when compared with the great donjon they surrounded, but many of them equal in size to the chief keeps of strong castles. It was against the north side of these outer walls that the English battery had now been opened. The first salvo was fired the moment the masking stuff had been cleared away, and a heavy fall of masonry announced with how formidable an effect. It was not, however, any part of the main wall that had yielded thus suddenly. As in the case of Dublin castle, when battered by the rebel troops the year before, the rampart was but stripped of a watch turret, the base of which overhung the ditch. The fall of stones and timber rattling against the foot of the rampart, and plunging into the displaced waters with such a crash, spread a moment's consternation among the Irish; but when the smoke cleared off, and they saw their main defences uninjured, they gave a bold reply to the English shot, and thenceforth till midday the battery and walls blazed with the fires of an equal cannonade. It was a sight to make the heart of a soldier bound, about mid-day, to see that side of Maynooth castle. The wall was stripped of all its battlements and turrets-cornice and corbel beaten elean off the face of the masonry, and covering the rampart foot with scattered ruins that sent up clouds of dust and spray, as each new fall beat out

the lime from their disjointed masses, or drove them, with sliding banks of earth and rolling timbers, thundering and flashing into the ditch beneath. Still the main wall itself, although thus scared and naked, stood unshaken and swarmed with defenders. Every embrasure and loophole poured forth its shower of shot and arrows, and the cannon from the flankers and north angle of the barbican thundered incessantly. On the other side the battery sent forth its vollies at intervals; but each salvo shook the air with such a report as drowned all other noises, till the ear recovering, could catch the crash of falling fragments and the roar of shouting men again. The smoke lay in the calm air like a thick bank of mist above the ditch and trenches, or boiled up round the walls in slow fleecy volumes as each successive explosion from beneath heaved up its stifling canopy; for the light atinosphere did not permit it to ascend, nor was the gentle breeze that bore it from the walls strong enough to dissipate it when it settled down. Amid this scene of unnatural darkness and devastation, the great keep of Maynooth stood stern and undisturbed in the calm face of heaven, like a grave warrior, conscious of his strength, awaiting victory. The Geraldine banner displayed from its summit scarce rustled upon the tall flag-staff, or if it did occasionally unroll a portion of its field in the light wind, it was but to be kissed by the sunshine and return to its folds, as if in calm scorn of the uproar underneath. But these below had no eyes for the quiet security of the rest of the castle; theirs was fierce labour, and a perilous footing among blood and ruin-plying their shot over broken parapets and through half-choked embrasures, treading amid prostrate men, loose fragments from the wall, dismounted guns and broken carriages, with the din and clamor of hell resounding in their ears, and death flying from their hands in flame and thunder. It was enough to make a coward join the struggle of his own accord to see the reeking tumult on the long platform, and hear the answering shouts of the combatants as they cheered their comrades on in the hot and panting labour. "Saint George! Saint George! huzza!" resounded from the English trenches after each volley.

"Farragh! Croom Aboo!" was the cry at every shot from the walls.

nion;

"Tomàs-an-teeda go bragh !" shouted the son of Connogher, as he stood by the side of his smoking culverin, with outstretched neck marking the effect of his last shot; "Dar lamh mo choirp, I hit within a foot of the saker's trunhad I been three hands' breadths nearer she was dismounted: but I've choked the embrasure; I can see it through the smoke half filled with rubbish, and there are two of the churls down. Hand me a crowbar, till I lay her an inch lower," he cried, shifting the wedge under the breech of his gun. By the hand of my gossip, the old wall stands it well!" he continued, as another salvo from the breaching battery rebounded from the unshaken rampart.

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They might as well pitch their shot into the face of the Scalp," said Barry Oge, ramming down the charge as he spoke; "I remember them having to break a hole under the platform stair for a sewer in the old earl's time; and you might as well have tried to pick through the solid whinstone; it is a perfect quarry, twelve feet, if it be

an inch. But come, Master Mac Connogher, are you levelled ?”

"Stand clear," cried Art, "I have them covered; so, under God and the blessed Patrick, here's for the churls once more: farrah! Ah, dioul, dioul! he cried the moment after, "I have levelled too high by half a fathom."

"Give me a pinch at the gun," cried Talbot, who had been gazing at the scene from a bench in the back of the gallery; and, springing forward at the word, he seized the iron bar, swayed up the culverin, and had levelled again, before he for a moment recollected his situation.

"By the band of my body, Sir John!" exclaimed Art exultingly, "I knew you could not hold back much longer. Stand clear, you sons of unfortunate fathers, till his nobleness lays the gun. Staff of Patrick! but 'tis proud I am to serve under your father's son once more, a vic wasail mo chree" But the knight, with a sigh, and a bitter pang to remember that he was no longer entitled to take a part on either side, laid down the match which he had just raised to apply to the touch-hole. "I

are three churls down under the car"Their riage," exclaimed a second. battery is all in confusion," cried a third. Farrah! Talbot aboo."" shouted Art. Noble Sir John, take the command of us. Here we are, as ready to stand by you as ever! Come on, mo vouchalee! don't you hear how they are cheering him from the platform? What do we care for the cowardly warden? Talbot aboo!" The men

joined vehemently in the shout, and Talbot stood for a moment half irresolute: his blood was all on fire; his foot unconsciously advanced, and his hand, with instinctive eagerness, griping to the shaft of a rammer: but what right had he to rush into gratuitous danger, while every shot, even sheltered as he was, went to the heart of his wife with such a pang as her faint voice and imploring eyes had too well attested when he last left her side? “I dare not do it, Art," he exclaimed; but I must leave you; for if I remain here I cannot keep my hand from the work." He turned, with a strong effort; but just as he made the first step to go away, a shot from the English trenches came in through the embrasure, and, after breaking a piece of metal off the lip of their gun, struck the wall, and, in its rebound, killed one of the men, and dreadfully shattered the leg of another. A burst of rage followed from all parts of the gallery, and the rest of the company, careless of who their commander might be, began to work their cannon

again with all the furious eagerness of revenge. Talbot dragged out the wounded man from the midst of the tumult. He was one of his own old troop. All the bone below the knee was crushed and shattered: the man was fainting with pain and loss of blood. "If I can take no part in the battle, I will, at least, see my wounded friends cared for," said the knight; and, lifting the soldier in his arms, he bore him out by a side door to the platform, at the further end of which the hospital had been established. This was the main scene of battle, and it was with considerable difficulty that Talbot made his way, under such a load, through the tumult that filled it from end to end. This, too, was Parez's post; but the knight had forgotten him in the excitement of the moment. He had not, however, advanced more than a few steps when he saw the warden: he was pacing backwards and forwards on a little spot of clear ground, protected by the height of the parapet, which was there without embrasure, and bore a light wooden gallery overhead for musqueteers: his step was unequal and impatient, and his countenance full of gloom. He did not observe Talbot, for his eyes were fixed on the ground during all the time the knight was in sight, except once, and then they were raised with a quick suspicious look, liker the furtive glance of a spy than the calm survey of a general on his own walls. The knight could not but remark with surprise the little interest he seemed to take in the defence; and, as he proceeded, he overheard from more than one the expression of similar astonishment. He gained the hospital unhurt, and duly committed his charge to the care of the attendants. He had now to return by the same way, to regain the barbican where Ellen was, and had again to pass the warden. While staggering under the weight of the wounded man, and toiling through the wreck of the platform, with such difficulty as he had experienced in crossing to the hospital, the knight had not observed so much the various missiles that fell on or over the narrow road he trod: but, as he was without armour, he had now a much quicker eye for the flight of an arrow or the fall of a round shot; for, although the whole force of the breaching bat

tery was directed against the face of the wall, the guns of the more remote trenches had not yet ceased to throw frequent shot into the platform and court-yard beyond. But they were the archers who chiefly galled this posi tion, and it was trying enough to the courage of an unarmed man to see their shafts glancing up from the sea of smoke, and flashing in the sunbeams, like so many separate pencils of light, as they fell thick, dazzling, and almost inevitable, around him. As the knight gazed up and down, watching for such as came his way, he observed one arrow rise from the smoky cover of the trenches with a slow and irregular flight, very unlike the rapid curve of a shaft shot in anger. He marked its course it came waveringly through the air towards him; and, ere it dropped, he saw that, in place of the goose-wing, it was feathered with a billet. He snatched it up: the letter was addressed to the hands of the warden. "By my honour," cried Talbot, as he plucked the paper out of its slit in the wood, "I was right when I guessed there was some foul play in the bowshot from the flanker last night! Parez is in correspondence with the English: it was he I saw. By Heaven, I will charge him with his treason face. to face!" He rushed forward with the sealed billet in his hand; but, before he had pressed through more than half the obstacles that lay between him and Parez's post, the word was passed along to send forward the letter from the warden's spy, that had just been shot in. From the warden's spy!" cried Talbot. "Have we, then, a spy in the English trenches?"

"It would appear so," said the old soldier who took the letter-for Talbot rendered it the instant he heard it thus voluntarily acknowledged; "but our warden is not fond of telling us of these things before their fit time."

"It was expecting this, belike, that kept him so anxious for the last hour," said another.

"Most like, indeed. God send the news may be good; for if we had got but good information of their designs this morning, we might have had their battery silenced before now."

"Ay, and, with the help of God and the blessed Patrick, will have it silenced before the sun sets. There are

two of their best pieces dismounted already. Farrah!"

Talbot did not wait to hear more: he pushed through the crowd, anxious to ascertain whether he had really injured the warden in his suspicions or not. He found himself again in Parez's presence, just as the billet was put into his hand; for the bearer had been hurt by the way, and the delivery delayed. The face of the warden flushed deeply as he broke the seal, and the unaccustomed blood did not leave his cheek till after he had read the letter through: his eye grew full of triumphant speculation, and his step became rapid and firm as he paced to and fro for a minute after, apparently meditating on its contents. It was an unusual thing for those around to see a smile on the pale countenance of their warden; yet, though all present argued satisfactory intelligence from such a symptom, there still lurked somewhere on his features an expression that no man there could behold with pleasure.

"So please your nobleness, I trust the news is good," at length said the captain of the platform, who had been ordered to attend, and who awaited the communication in marked impatience.

Parez started. "The news, O'Madden!" he said, hurriedly thrusting the crumpled billet into his bosom, where he kept handling it under his doublet for a moment. "By my hand of valour, the news is good: we shall give the sally shortly. Ha, mo vouchalee," he exclaimed, with an animation such as he had not displayed during the siege before, "we shall have knocks at close quarters before the sun goes down! Who here has the cleanest knack of cutting the throats of churls? Let him get his skene in order; for he will have work enough within the hour, if my spy deceive me not. Ha, O'Madden; I did not show you the knave's billet. Mark what an account he has given of their loss in the trenches." So saying, he plucked it forth, and handed it to his officer. O'Madden perused the paper with evident satisfaction, and it passed from hand to hand among those who stood about the warden, some reading, and some commenting on the contents. Slain in the battery, fifteen men and a sergeant; wounded, three-andtwenty."

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"And in the trenches?"

"In about an hour from the present time."

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By the blessed bells of Saint Woolstan's, Master Parez is a good man in the gap, after all! He is going to head the sally in person."

Talbot felt the blood burning upon his cheek for having entertained suspicions so unworthy even of an enemy. He cast his eyes to the ground, in the confusion of an ingenuous spirit; for, although he had not given utterance to a single imputation of treachery, he felt ashamed to look the warden in the face, without some reparation for the injury done him even in thought. He now, too recollected that, while a prisoner in the fortress, his own presence there, uncalled, might well excite just animadversion. He moved away, with an air, as he felt, of more conscious condemnation than he ever remembered to have exhibited before. His uneasy steps were arrested by the voice of Parez; but the tone of the first word more than made amends to the knight's conscientiousness, for the warden addressed him with a loud levity, that was not less unexpected than offensive. "Ho, ho, Sir Knight," he cried; and Talbot, looking up, encountered his glance, which was full of insolent triumph, yet why he could not conjecture. Ho, ho, Sir Knight, we give the sally shortly. Shall we count on you as a volunteer?"

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"Master Parez, I am here a prisoner," said Talbot.

"Ay, and will continue so till latter Lammas, if you count on being enlarged by the Gunner," replied the warden, with a mocking, ghastly laugh.

Talbot turned to go, without making any reply; for he felt that he could not do so without betraying irritation, which every motive now urged him to repress, as the warden's authority was evidently on the increase, and it seemed doubt

ful, should the sally he meditated prove successful, whether Art himself would much longer be able to contend against it. Parez regarded him, as he went, with another glance of ominous meaning, and the knight returned to his quarters more anxious and perplexed than ever. He had not been long here when, from his apartment, where he sat calming the fears of his wife, he heard the warden's voice in the gallery without. His amazement was much increased to hear the tone of cordiality in which he spoke with Art and his company. The reason, however, soon appeared; he was inviting volunteers for the sally; but so great was the willingness of the men, that, instead of requiring the inducement of fair words to go, it needed all the warden's authority to oblige a sufficient number to remain. Foremost of those who offered themselves and were accepted was Art; the best men of his company followed under Redmond and Barry Öge; while Gillaspike was obliged, much against his will, to remain as captain of the gun. Singing and shouting, the volunteers descended to the court-yard, and Talbot again came forth, and took his station by a deserted loophole, to be a spectator of their sally. On the left flank of the English position, and occasionally disclosed, as the skirts of the great cloud of smoke were rolled back or lifted by the breeze, stood a single gun behind a temporary breastwork of gabions and sand-bags: it had been brought forward to supply the loss of one of the dismounted pieces in the battery, and was planted here until a place on the breaching platform should be cleared for it: but the breast work of the breaching battery was now one shapeless mound of earth, all its embrasures beaten down, and the ground, for ten yards in front, quite ploughed with the fire from the walls; this, however, slackening as the men were withdrawn for the sally, gave an opportunity to the English to repair the damage; and when Talbot looked forth, their sappers were swarming over the face of the half-levelled rampart, clearing away the rubbish of the fallen parapet, and piling up a new breast work under the covering fire of the detached gun that has been mentioned, and of a second, similarly planted, on the other flank, both aided

by a constant discharge of small arms and archery from the main trenches behind. Talbot had just time to observe these features of the scene below when the noise of the descending drawbridge announced the issuing of the gallowglass. They sallied in two bodies, one led by the son of Connogher, the other by the warden. Parez's company took the safer service of covering the drawbridge and securing the retreat; while the division led by Art came down along the edge of the fosse with the noise and impetuosity of a torrent, and never slackened their speed till they had swept the field clean over the temporary battery, which they trampled into rubbish, on to the foot of the main breastwork itself: up it they went like a wave of the sea, and over, and down among the bristling array of the defenders in the trench behind, with a roar of shouting men and a crush of iron, that made the knight leap to his feet, and involuntarily join in the cheer of encouragement that rung from all the walls. For some minutes the strugglers were concealed by the intervening rampart; but the storm of mingling weapons overhead was still visible above the breast work-sword and battleaxe flashing bright through the smoke as every blade caught the sunshine, and the whole flickering and whirling tumult swaying backwards and forwards with the eddying impulses of alternate victory. At length the tide of conflict set in steadily in one direction, and the whirling sweep of the axe fell fast and faster through the thinned array of spear and broadsword, as the Irish drove their antagonists in one tumultuous mass out of the choked trenches in upon the area and platform of the breaching battery. Here, under and over the silent guns, they now plied their work with the cold steel, while the gradually dissipated smoke of the gunpowder was replaced by a steaming cloud of dust, tossed up from the reeking labour of two hundred grappling combatants. At last the battery also was abandoned by its defenders, and the Irish, dragging away the bodies that encumbered every gun, prepared to turn their momentary success to advantage; for although they were now alone upon the ensanguined platform, they had still to make good the