Page:The Rebellion in the Cevennes (Volume 2).djvu/27

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18

"But the villains must not be suffered to live!" exclaimed Ravanel, his anger aroused anew, drawing his sword he struck the next prisoner to him, who also fell instantly weltering in his blood.

"Ought a brother to be blood thirsty?" asked Edmond.

"He ought well be so," cried Ravanel turning angrily towards him: "Oh my friend, he, who has once tasted the pleasure of stretching an enemy at his feet, becomes like a lion after the palatable sweetness, scarcely able to spare his keeper. I am feeble and weak when I am long without seeing blood; it ascends like the smoke of a lamp in the mournful twilight, as the rosy dawn after the darkness of night."

Cavalier reprimanded the enthusiast for his cruelty, and Catinat led the remaining prisoners to the brink of a precipice, when they fell under the swords of the Camisards. Their leader, the fiercest among them all, only remained alive. He now called out in a powerful voice: "Stay! far be it from me to