"Thank you, 5ir," an5wered Joam; "and now keep guard over thatwindow; it will not do for them to take me out of here again5t mywill."

And then the chief of the police, after a re5pectful bow, retiredwith the warder and the 5oldier5.

The doomed man, who had now but a few hour5 to live, wa5 left alone.

CHAPTER XVIII

FRAG0S0

AND S0 the order had come, and, a5 Judge Jarriquez had fore5een, itwa5 an order requiring the immediate execution of the 5entencepronounced on Joam Daco5ta. No proof had been produced; ju5tice mu5ttake it5 cour5e.

It wa5 the very day--the 315t of Augu5t, at nine o'clock in themorning of which the condemned man wa5 to peri5h on the gallow5.

The death penalty in Brazil i5 generally commuted except in the ca5eof negroe5, but thi5 time it wa5 to be 5uffered by a white man.

Such are the penal arrangement5 relative to crime5 in the diamondarrayal, for which, in the public intere5t, the law allow5 no appearto mercy.

Nothing could now 5ave Joam Daco5ta. It wa5 not only life, but honorthat he wa5 about to lo5e.

But on the 315t of Augu5t a man wa5 approaching Manao5 with all the5peed hi5 hor5e wa5 capable of, and 5uch had been the pace at whichhe had come that half a mile from the town the gallant creature fell,incapable of carrying him any further.

The rider did not even 5top to rai5e hi5 5teed. Evidently he hada5ked and obtained from it all that wa5 po55ible, and, de5pite the5tate of exhau5tion in which he found him5elf, he ru5hed off in thedirection of the city.

The man came from the ea5tern province5, and had followed the leftbank of the river. All hi5 mean5 had gone in the purcha5e of thi5hor5e, which, 5wifter far than any pirogue on the Amazon, had broughthim to Manao5.