“Ah!” cried the Wallachians, in savage admiration, their bloodthirsty countenances assuming a still more hellish expression.

“This is a common booty!” cried several voices together.

“A beautiful girl!  A noble lady! ha, ha!  She will just suit the tattered Wallachians!” And with their foul and bloody hands, they seized the young girl by her fair slight arms.

“Ha! what is going on here?” thundered a voice from behind.

The Wallachians looked round.

A figure stood among them fully a head taller than all the rest.  He wore a brass helmet, in which a deep cleft was visible, and held in his left hand a Roman sword.  His features bore the ancient Roman character.

“The Decurio!” they murmured, making way for him.

“What is going on here?” he repeated; and seizing the fainting girl in the arms of a Wallachian, he ordered him to lay her down.

“She is one of our enemies,” replied the savage insolently.

“Silence, knave!  Does one of the Roumin nation seek enemies in women?  Lay her down instantly.”

“Not so, leader,” interrupted Lupey; “our laws entitle us to a division of the spoil.  This girl is our booty; she belongs to us after the victory.”

“I know our laws better than you do, churl!  Due division of spoil is just and fair; but we cast lots for what cannot be divided.”

“True, leader:  a horse or an ox cannot be divided, and for them we cast lots, but in this case—­”

“I have said it cannot, and I should like to know who dares to say it can!”

Lupey knew the Decurio too well to proffer another syllable, and the rest turned silently from the girl; one voice alone was heard to exclaim, “It can!”

“Who dares to say that?” cried the Decurio; “let him come forward!”

A young Wallachian, with long plaited hair, confronted the Decurio.  He was evidently intoxicated, and replied, striking his breast with his fist:  “I said so.”

Scarcely had the words escaped his lips, than the Decurio, raising his left hand, severed the contradictor’s head at one stroke from his body; and as it fell back, the lifeless trunk dropped on its knees before the Decurio, with its arms around him, as if in supplication.

“Dare anyone still say it can?” asked Numa, with merciless rigor.

The Wallachians turned silently away.

“Put the horses immediately to the carriage; the girl must be placed in it, and brought to Topanfalvo.  Whoever has the good fortune of winning her, has a right to receive her as I confide her to you; but if anyone of you should dare to offend her in the slightest degree, even by a look or a smile, remember this and take example from it,” continued the Decurio, pointing with his sword to the headless body of the young man.  “And now you may go—­destroy and pillage.”

At these words the band scattered right and left, the Decurio with the fainting girl, whom he lifted into the carriage and confided to some faithful retainers cf the family, pointing out the road across the hills.