things are an insult to the King my master, and he will expect me to take notice of them. I am not going to punish you all, for I can see that you have been misled by some foolish firebrand amongst you. But if you want me to consider any further grievancesthe charter, for example, which you spoke of—you will have to do something for your Viceroy in return. I shall require you to deliver up your leader to my justice, as a reward for all my goodness to you." He leered down fatuously upon the people.

While a man might have counted half a score, the crowd seemed stupefied. Not one of us but grew hot and cold by turns, whilst a mist rose up before us and obscured our vision. Then suddenly a yell flew from our throats which sent the Viceroy cowering to shelter.

"Viva Masaniello! Muioja il mal governo!"

And even while the echo lingered some one flung a stone, and in a twinkling a shower of missiles had shivered the glass behind the Duke to fragments. With a shrill scream of mortal agony he flung himself headlong back into the convent.

Donna Claudia was standing by me tense and motionless.

"Let the old fool squawk," she muttered. "Surrender Masaniello! Holy Mother! How long shall men continue to be governed by these Spaniards!" A quiver shook her, and she gripped me by the arm so that I started. "The saints have mercy! What is this, signore!"

His brow streaming with perspiration and his shirt awry, Masaniello sprang out before the populace.

"It is well. It is well that one man should die to save the people. Citizens of Naples, we have fought a good fight and we have conquered. The charter! The charter! I surrender myself willingly for you and for your children."

He battered clamouring upon the gate. "Let me live in your memories, my people. Ho, Duke of Arcos, I yield me to your justice that liberty may

come upon these my countrymen. A single life-and liberty."

Quick as I was, Salvator Rosa reached him first and held him.

"This is midsummer madness," he bellowed. "This is folly. Body of a dog! If you take another step, I stab you. Your pledges, Maso, and your country! The charter first and then the sacrifice!" He grappled with him in the doorway, and I took up the cry and shouted: "We are no rebels. We want and need no pardon."

There was an answering plaudit from the populace. With sudden revulsion Masaniello swayed and faltered. "My people!" he cried brokenly. "My people!" And dropping upon his knees, he tore from off his neck a square of linen with a picture of the Madonna worked upon it, and raised it to his lips and kissed it frantically.

Carried away by my excitement I shook my fist up at the balcony.

"Old fox!" I shouted. "Give us first the charter. Men of Naples, it is not one tax only but a hundred. It is liberty we strive for and not promises. It is freedom, the freedom of the suffering and starving.

"And who may you be, sir, that descant so glibly about freedom?" said a stern voice quietly beside me. I turned and the vast assemblage had fallen on its knees.

Unperceived by me, the Cardinal had entered the piazza. I heard the sound of a familiar lisp behind him.

"Ah, the butcher!" said the bastard, with a laugh tinged with the ring of true amusement.

CHAPTER XIV

THE BISHOP'S MOVE

THE heart soon accustoms itself to that existence which is called living on a volcano, yet it is not too much to say that the spectacle of that hushed piazza burned itself upon my brain, so that for half, a minute I stood there like some clown irresolute, while my throat grew dry, and my tongue was struggling incoherently for utterance. A turbulent mob reduced in the very climax of its frenzy to such silence-silence so deep that when one knave let fall his dagger, the sound cracked like a pistol-shot a sea of heads bent lowly, bloodstained, scarcely human faces moving their lips inaudibly with one accord in outward devotion as they knelt expectant of the benediction of His Eminence: Masaniello prostrated humbly, his hand still clinging to his scapulary, his eyes aflame, his clothes torn and dishevelled: Salvator Rosa kneeling by him carelessly and casting a stealthy sidelong glance upon me: the Cardinal erect and dignified in his robe of scarlet, with an imperious frown upon his features: nearly concealed behind him, smiling with sunny impudence at my bewilderment, the popinjay figure of Ercole. Church had succeeded State; the Bishop had made his first move on the chess-board.

"Well, sir!"

The tone more than the words destroyed the spell. As I too dropped to my knees, His Eminence raised his right hand slowly, so that the light caught up and played with the ring upon his finger.

"Immutemur habitu," he thundered, "let us change. our garments; in ashes and sackcloth let us fast

and lament before the Lord. Emendemus melius, let us amend for the better, ne subito praeoccupati die mortis, quaeramus spatium poenitentiae, et invenire non possimus."

Then suddenly throwing aside all reserve, and with a rapidity of utterance and a torrent of eloquence which overwhelmed his hearers, he hurled the vengeance of the Church against those who were responsible for the licentious orgies in the city.

"Are you for God or against God! You do violence to God. You wound God and His Mother."

He paused as if to watch the effect he had produced, and amidst the swaying of the excited crowd, and a half-stifled cry and murmur: "What! Is Hell let loose among you, men of Naples! Ay, you who but this moment have raised the hand of sacrilege against God's House, against this convent. Shall I deny the Sacrament to Naples until this evil thing be purged!'

A thrill ran through the multitude from end to end. Masaniello had hidden his face between his hands; Salvator Rosa was gazing straight before him with lips. compressed, and a gentle twitching of his eyebrows. But I, with the devil in me, and forgetting all things, sprang up to my feet and shouted.

"Sacrilege!" I cried. "In very truth a sacrilege! That the House of God should offer refuge to a tyrant. Have we not bodies, Eminence, as well as souls! Which is the greater sacrilege-to fling a stone against a stone or to starve God's human likeness!"

The eyes of the Cardinal breathed fire. Then seeing that my outburst had passed almost unnoticed by the crowd-and indeed nothing short of an earthquake would have availed to arouse that mass of hanging heads-he controlled himself and waved me angrily aside. I heard a whisper from Salvator Rosa. "Pazienza! Pazienza! Non tutti dormono quelli che hanno serrati gli occhi!" And my comrade motioned to me so that I took the hint and slunk back sulkily to my position. With a rapid glance in my direction the Cardinal

continued: the tone of his voice betrayed no sign of irritation. Sternly and impressively in ringing accents he exhorted the people to repentance.

"I know," he concluded solemnly, and I saw that a tremor seemed to be shaking Salvator Rosa while he listened, "I know, none better, that you have suffered grievously, my children, that a heavy burden has been laid upon you. The Church is not wont to close her breast to him who seeks refuge beneath her sacred cloak, and she will pardon you for having shaken from your necks the yoke of Tyranny. Let us give ourselves to Holy Church, and asking pardon for our great offences seek, without violence, through her the remedy for our oppressions."

Sobbingly, tearfully, almost painfully, the crowd recited the prayer of humiliation after him. The Cardinal looked down upon the kneeling people sadly.

"I, Ascanio, Cardinal Archbishop of this city, have I not ever been your friend and your protector, and shall I now desert you in your hour of necessity. Fear not that the mighty monarch who defends and watches over them that walk the path of the Just will give us strength and spirit firmly to implant among us the blessed state of liberty. Children of Holy Church, I go myself to intercede with His Excellency the Viceroy on your behalf. It is I, your Cardinal, who will mediate between you."

Masaniello struggled forward and lifted the hem of the scarlet robe to his lips wildly.

"Eminence," he cried, "by the charter of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, is it not forbidden to impose upon us a tax on the necessaries of life? Sacardo there has seen it, written in golden characters, among the archives. Bring us the charter, Eminence, read it aloud to us, that we may judge for ourselves if we are rebels. We ask the ancient privileges conferred upon our city. We are loyal subjects, Eminence, but we are starving. We demand no more than our just rights and liberties."

The Cardinal patted him kindly on the shoulder.