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Gowanscs Cosmopolitan Library. No. 5

French Section

THE TWELVE BEST SHORT STORIES
IN THE FRENCH LANGUAGE

THE TWELVE BEST
SHORT STORIES
IN THE
FRENCH LANGUAGE

SELECTED BY
AUGUSTE DORCHAIN

GOWANS & GRAY, Ltd.
5 Robert Street, Adelphi, London, W.C.
58 Cadogan Street, Glasgow
1915

First Edition, Demy 8vo, June, 1915.
Second Edition, Small Fcap. 8vo, September, 1915.

PREFACE

French literature is perhaps more abundant than any other in those short works of imagination that are called in France contes or nouvelles, in order to contrast them with those extended narratives for which the name of romans is reserved. As far back as the Middle Ages, during the period of the interminable chansons de geste, then of the romances of chivalry, not less diffuse, which succeeded them, the French took pleasure in telling short stories, of which some, such as Aucassin and Nicolette, still retain, for those whom their antiquated language does not repel, much interest and charm. In like manner, when the Renaissance ends, in the period of the ample burlesque epic of Rabelais, the Queen of Navarre, in the tales of her Heptameron, vies with the novellieri of Italy. In the following century, during which Spanish influence prevailed, we hardly find any more short stories appearing in separate form, but novelists, in the manner of Cervantes in his Don Quixote, interpolate some here and there in the plot of their main works of fiction, as halts and resting-places for the mind of the reader: like D’Urfé in his Astrea, or Madame De La Fayette in Zaïde; like, again, Le Sage in his Gil Blas at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Later on, the eighteenth century will come to restore the genre to its sway, and Voltaire will be a master in it; nevertheless he will hardly cultivate it without making it serve philosophical purposes. Along with him, more than one minor story-teller of merit, such as the Chevalier De Boufflers, could be named, but not without regret that their wit and elegance should be employed in the service of a somewhat libertine morality.

From the rapid sketch which precedes, the reasons, whether of substance or of form, which prevent us from including in our selection any of the short stories which were written before the nineteenth century, will easily be deduced. Besides, it is only then that the genre flourishes in all directions, and that the writers who cultivate it produce the most numerous, finished and varied nouvelles and contes. The names of the twelve authors selected were obviously all imposed upon us; but our embarrassment commenced when it was necessary to choose one single tale from their works. It is certain, for instance, that we might have preferred, in the case of Alphonse Daudet, a page in which his trembling sensibility was expressed, and not one of those into which he has rather put his witty Provençal gaiety; and some people may regret that Guy de Maupassant is represented here by a sentimental tale rather than one of those stories into which he has poured his bitter realism and his black pessimism. To those who might be inclined to reproach us, we would answer that we have been guided, not only by the wish to present always the most characteristic work of each author, but by that of giving to our selection the greatest variety of tone among the narratives thus placed in juxtaposition, and also by the desire never to lose sight of any moral proprieties. We have only imposed upon ourselves one absolute rule: only to offer here perfect, indisputable masterpieces. We hope that no one will question our success in this.

A. D.

CONTENTS

PUBLISHERS’ NOTE

The third, fifth to seventh, and ninth to twelfth inclusive, of these stories have been translated by Mr. William Metcalfe; the second and fourth by Miss Measham; the eighth by Miss Lyons; while for the first an anonymous translation has been used, which was originally published in 1826, but has been considerably revised for this volume by Mr. Adam L. Gowans.

It should be remembered that M. Dorchain’s selection was restricted by the plan of the series to the works of authors no longer living and to stories not exceeding 15,000 words in length. It should also be borne in mind that the notes in the present volume are, without exception, those of the original authors, the translators having done nothing more than translate carefully without omission or addition.

THE TWELVE BEST SHORT STORIES IN THE FRENCH LANGUAGE

THE ADVENTURES OF THE LAST OF THE ABENCERRAGES
VISCOUNT CHATEAUBRIAND

ADVERTISEMENT

The Adventures of the last of the Abencerrages were written nearly twenty years ago; the portrait which I have sketched of the Spaniards explains sufficiently why this story could not be printed under the Imperial government. The resistance of the Spaniards to Buonaparte, of a defenceless nation to the conqueror, who had vanquished the best soldiers of Europe, excited at that time the enthusiasm of every heart susceptible of being affected by great devotedness and noble sacrifices. The ruins of Saragossa were still smoking, and the censorship would not have suffered the publication of eulogiums, in which it would have discovered, rightly enough, a concealed interest for the victims. Pictures of the ancient manners of Europe, recollections of the glory of former times, and those of the court of one of our most distinguished monarchs, would not have been more agreeable to the censorship, which besides began to repent having so often allowed me to speak of the ancient monarchy, and of the religion of our fathers: these departed subjects, which I was incessantly recalling, excited too powerfully the thoughts of the living.

It is a frequent practice, in pictures, to place some unseemly personage for the purpose of bringing out more the beauty of others: in this story, my idea has been to paint three men of equally elevated character, but not out of the usual course of nature, and retaining, along with the passions, the manners and even the prejudices of their country. The character of the female is also drawn in the same proportions. The world of imagination, when we transport ourselves thither, should at least make us amends for the world of reality.

It will readily be seen that this story is the composition of a man who has felt the pangs of exile, and whose heart is entirely wrapt up in his country.

The views, so to speak, which I have given of Granada, of the Alhambra, and of the ruined mosque transformed into a church, were taken upon the spot. The latter is nothing else than the cathedral of Cordova. These descriptions are therefore a kind of addition to the following passage of the Itinerary. “From Cadiz, I repaired to Cordova; I admired the mosque which is now the cathedral of that city. I traversed the ancient Betica, described by the poets as the abode of happiness. I ascended as far as Andujar, and retraced my steps in order to see Granada. The Alhambra appeared to me well worthy of being looked at, even after the temples of Greece. The valley of Granada is delightful, and reminds one very much of that of Sparta; that the Moors should have regretted such a country may be easily conceived.”—(Itinerary, part VII. and last).

There are frequent allusions in this story to the history of the Zegris and the Abencerrages; this history is so well known, that I have thought it superfluous to give any sketch of it in this advertisement. Besides, the story itself contains sufficient details to make the text easily understood.

When Boabdil, the last king of Granada, was compelled to abandon the kingdom of his forefathers, he halted on the top of Mount Padul. That elevated spot commanded a view of the sea, on which the unfortunate monarch was about to embark for Africa; from it also could be discovered Granada, the Vega, and the Xenil, on the banks of which were erected the tents of Ferdinand and Isabella. At the sight of this beautiful country, and of the cypresses which still marked here and there the tombs of the Mussulmans, Boabdil began to shed tears. The sultana Ayxa, his mother, who accompanied him in his exile, along with the grandees who formerly composed his court, said to him: “Weep now like a woman, for the loss of a kingdom, which thou hast been unable to defend like a man.” They descended from the mountain, and Granada disappeared from their eyes for ever.

The Moors of Spain, who shared the fate of their sovereign, dispersed themselves throughout Africa; the tribes of the Zegris and the Gomeres settled in the kingdom of Fez, which was their aboriginal country; the Vanegas and the Alabeses took up their abode upon the coast, from Oran to Algiers; finally the Abencerrages established themselves in the environs of Tunis; they formed, within sight of the ruins of Carthage, a colony, which, even in our own times, is distinguished from the Moors of Africa, by its elegant manners, and the mildness of its laws.

These families carried into their new country the remembrance of their old one. The Paradise of Granada lived constantly in their memory, the mothers repeated its name to their children at the breast. They lulled them to sleep with the romances of the Zegris and the Abencerrages. Prayers were repeated in the mosque every five days, with the face turned towards Granada; and Allah was implored to restore to his chosen people that land of delights. In vain did the country of the Lotos-eaters present to the exiles its fruits, its waters, its verdure, and its glorious sun; far from the Vermilion Towers,[2] there were neither pleasant fruits, limpid springs, fresh verdure, nor sun worthy to be looked at. If any one shewed the plains of Bagrada to an exile, the latter only shook his head, and exclaimed with a sigh: “Granada!”

The Abencerrages, particularly, preserved the most tender and faithful remembrance of their country. They had quitted, with the most poignant anguish, the theatre of their glory, and the banks which they had made so often ring with the war-cry of “Honour and love.” Being no longer able to lift the lance in the deserts, or to wear the helmet in a colony of farmers, they had devoted themselves to the study of simples, a profession in equal estimation among the Arabs with that of arms. Thus did that race of warriors, which formerly inflicted wounds, now make its occupation that of healing them. In this particular, it retained something of its original genius, for the knights themselves frequently dressed the wounds of the enemies they had overthrown.

The cottage of that family, which formerly possessed palaces, was not placed in the hamlet of the other exiles, at the foot of Mount Mamelife; it was built amidst the very ruins of Carthage, on the sea-shore, in the place where St. Louis expired on the ashes, and where a Mahometan hermitage is now to be seen. Along the walls of the cottage were hung bucklers made of lions’ skins, bearing, impressed upon a field of azure, two figures of savages breaking down a town with a club; round the device was this motto: “It is but little!” the coat of arms and device of the Abencerrages. Lances adorned with white and blue pennons, burnouses, and cassocks of slashed satin, were ranged by the side of the bucklers, and figured in the midst of scimitars and poniards. Here and there also were suspended gauntlets, bits ornamented with precious stones, large silver stirrups, long swords, whose sheaths had been embroidered by the hands of princesses, and golden spurs, with which the Iseults, the Guineveres and Orianas were wont of old to invest gallant knights.

Beneath these trophies of glory, were placed upon tables the trophies of a life of peace. These were plants culled on the summits of Mount Atlas, and in the desert of Sahara; many of them had even been brought from the plain of Granada. Some were intended to relieve the ailments of the body; others were supposed to mitigate the severity of mental suffering. The Abencerrages regarded as most valuable those which were useful in calming vain regrets, in dissipating foolish illusions, and the ever-reviving, ever-deceived, hopes of happiness. Unfortunately these simples possessed qualities of an opposite nature, and the sweet odour of a flower of their own country frequently acted as a sort of poison to the illustrious exiles.

Twenty-four years had passed away since the taking of Granada. In that short space of time, fourteen Abencerrages had perished, by the effects of a new climate, the accidents of a wandering life, and principally through grief, which imperceptibly undermines the strength of man. One single descendant was the sole hope of that illustrious family. Aben-Hamet bore the name of that Abencerrage, who was accused by the Zegris of having seduced the sultana Alfayma. In him were united the beauty, the valour, the courtesy and the generosity of his ancestors, with that mild lustre and slight tinge of melancholy which adversity, nobly supported, inspires. He was only twenty-two years of age when he lost his father; he then determined to make a pilgrimage to the land of his ancestors, in order to gratify the secret longing of his heart, and to execute a plan which he carefully concealed from his mother.

He embarked at the port of Tunis; a favourable wind carried him to Carthagena, where he landed, and immediately proceeded on the road to Granada. He gave himself out for an Arabian physician, who had come to collect plants amid the rocks of the Sierra Nevada. A quiet mule bore him slowly along in the country where formerly the Abencerrages were carried with the swiftness of the wind on warlike coursers; a guide walked before, leading two other mules ornamented with bells and parti-coloured woollen tufts. Aben-Hamet crossed the large heaths and woods of palm-trees of the kingdom of Murcia; from the great age of these trees, he conjectured that they must have been planted by his ancestors, and his heart was pierced by regret. There rose a tower in which the sentinel, in former times, kept watch, during the wars of the Moors and Christians; here appeared a ruined building whose architecture proved its Moorish origin; a fresh subject of grief to Aben-Hamet! He dismounted from his mule, and, on pretence of seeking for plants, hid himself for a few moments, in the ruins, in order to give free vent to his tears. He then proceeded on his road, in a state of reverie, which was encouraged by the noise of the mule-bells, and the monotonous song of his guide. The latter only interrupted his long-winded ditty, in order to quicken the pace of his mules by giving them the names of beautiful and brave, or to scold them by the epithets of lazy and obstinate.

Flocks of sheep, directed by a shepherd like an army, in sere and barren plains, and occasionally a solitary traveller, far from diffusing an appearance of life upon the road, only served, in a manner, to make it more gloomy and desert. These travellers all wore a sword attached to the waist; they were wrapped up in a mantle, and a large slouched hat half covered their faces. As they passed, they saluted Aben-Hamet, who could only make out, in their noble salutation, the names of God, of Señor and of Knight. At the close of day, the Abencerrage took his place in the midst of strangers at the inn, without being troubled by their indiscreet curiosity. No one spoke to him, no one questioned him; his turban, his robe, and his arms, excited no surprise. As it had been the will of Allah, that the Moors of Spain should lose their beautiful country, Aben-Hamet could not help entertaining a feeling of esteem for its grave conquerors.

Emotions still more vivid awaited the Abencerrage at the end of his journey. Granada is built at the foot of the Sierra Nevada, on two high hills, separated by a deep valley. The houses, built on the declivities in the hollow of the valley, give this city the shape and appearance of a grenado half open, from which resemblance it derives its name. Two rivers, the Xenil and the Darro, the sands of the first of which contain gold, and the other silver, wash the feet of the hills, form a junction, and afterwards take a serpentine course in the midst of a charming valley, called the Vega. This plain, which is overlooked by Granada, is covered with vines, with pomegranate, fig, mulberry and orange-trees; it is surrounded by mountains of singularly beautiful form and colour. An enchanting sky, a pure and delicious air, affect the soul with a secret languor, from which even the passing traveller finds it difficult to preserve himself. Every one feels that, in this country, the tender passions would have very soon stifled the heroic ones, if true love did not always feel the wish to have glory as its companion.

As soon as Aben-Hamet discovered the tops of the first buildings of Granada, his heart beat so violently, that he was obliged to stop his mule. Crossing his arms over his breast, and fixing his eyes on the holy city, he remained speechless and immovable. The guide halted in his turn; and, as elevated sentiments are easily understood by a Spaniard, he appeared affected, and conjectured that the Moor’s feelings were excited by the sight of his former country. The Abencerrage at last broke silence.

“Guide!” said he, “be happy! hide not the truth from me, for the waves were calm, and the moon entered into her crescent, on the day of thy nativity. What are these towers which shine like stars over a green forest?”

“That is the Alhambra,” answered the guide.

“And the other castle upon the opposite hill?” said Aben-Hamet.

“It is the Generalife,” replied the Spaniard. “In that castle there is a garden planted with myrtles, where it is said the Abencerrage was surprised with the sultana Alfayma; farther off, you see the Albaycin, and nearer to us the Vermilion Towers.”

Every word which the guide uttered pierced the heart of Aben-Hamet. How cruel it is to be obliged to have recourse to strangers for information respecting the monuments of our ancestors, and to have the history of our family and friends related to us by indifferent persons! The guide, putting an end to the reflections of Aben-Hamet, exclaimed: “Let us proceed, Sir Moor; it is the will of God! Do not be downcast. Is not Francis I., even now, a prisoner in our Madrid? It is the will of God!” He took off his hat, crossed himself with great fervour, and drove on his mules. The Abencerrage, spurring on his, exclaimed in his turn: “It was thus written;” [3] and they descended towards Granada.

They passed close to the great ash-tree, memorable as the scene of the battle between Musa and the grand-master of Calatrava, in the time of the last king of Granada. They made the circuit of the Alameda walk, and entered the city by the gate of Elvira. They reascended the Rambla, and arrived shortly after at a square, surrounded on all sides by buildings of Moorish architecture. A khan was opened in this square for the Moors of Africa, whom the trade in silks of the Vega attracted in crowds to Granada. Thither the guide conducted Aben-Hamet.

The Abencerrage was too agitated to enjoy much rest in his new habitation; the idea of his country tormented him. Unable any longer to master the feelings which preyed upon his heart, he stole out, in the middle of the night, to wander about the streets of Granada. He attempted to recognize, with his eyes or with his hands, some of the monuments which the elders of his tribe had so frequently described to him. Perhaps the lofty edifice, whose walls he could only half distinguish through the darkness, was formerly the residence of the Abencerrages; perhaps it was in this solitary square that those splendid carousals were given, which raised the glory of Granada to the skies. There it was that the troops of horsemen, superbly dressed in brocade, marched in procession; there advanced the galleys loaded with arms and with flowers, the dragons darting out fire, and carrying illustrious warriors concealed in their sides; ingenious inventions of pleasure and gallantry.

But alas! in place of the sound of anafins, of the noise of trumpets, and of songs of love, the deepest silence reigned around Aben-Hamet. This mute city had changed its inhabitants, and the victors reposed on the couches of the vanquished. “They sleep then, these proud Spaniards,” exclaimed the young Moor with indignation, “under the roofs from which they have banished my ancestors! And I, an Abencerrage, I wake, unknown, solitary and forsaken, at the gate of my fathers’ palace.”

Aben-Hamet then reflected upon the destinies of man, on the vicissitudes of fortune, on the fall of empires, lastly on Granada itself surprised by its enemies in the midst of pleasures, and exchanging all at once its garlands of flowers for chains; he pictured to himself its citizens forsaking their homes in gala dresses, like guests, who, in the disorder of their attire, are suddenly driven from the chambers of festivity by a conflagration.

All these images, all these ideas, crowded on one another in the soul of Aben-Hamet; full of grief and anguish, his thoughts were principally turned to the execution of the project which had brought him to Granada. Day surprised him in his reverie; the Abencerrage had lost his way: he found himself far from the khan, in a remote suburb of the city. All was yet asleep: no noise disturbed the silence of the streets; the doors and windows of the houses were still shut; the clarion of the cock alone proclaimed, in the habitation of the poor, the return of labour and of hardship.

After wandering about for a long time, without being able to find his way, Aben-Hamet heard a door open. He saw a young female come out, dressed nearly like the Gothic queens which we see sculptured on the monuments of our ancient abbeys; her black corset trimmed with jet tightened her elegant waist. Her short petticoat, narrow and without folds, discovered a beautiful leg and charming foot; a mantilla, also black, was thrown over her head; with her left hand she held this mantilla crossed and drawn up close like a stomacher under her chin, in such a manner that nothing was seen of her face but her large eyes and rosy mouth. A duenna walked by her side; a page preceded her, carrying a prayer-book; two footmen in livery followed at some distance the beautiful unknown; she was repairing to morning prayers, which were announced by the ringing of a bell in a neighbouring monastery.

Aben-Hamet fancied he saw the angel Israfel, or the youngest of the houris. The Spanish maiden, not less surprised, looked at the Abencerrage, whose turban, robe and arms set off to still greater advantage his noble countenance. Recovering from her first astonishment, she beckoned to the stranger to approach, with the grace and freedom peculiar to the women of that country. “Sir Moor,” said she to him, “you appear to have recently arrived at Granada; have you lost your way?”

“Sultana of flowers,” replied Aben-Hamet, “delight of men’s eyes, Christian slave more beautiful than the virgins of Georgia, thou hast rightly guessed! I am a stranger in this city: having lost myself amidst its palaces, I was unable to find my way back to the khan of the Moors. May Mahomet touch thy heart, and reward thee for thy hospitality!”

“The Moors are renowned for their gallantry,” replied the lady with the sweetest smile; “but I am neither sultana of flowers, nor a slave, nor desirous of being recommended to Mahomet. Follow me, Sir knight, I will lead you back to the khan of the Moors.”

She walked lightly before the Abencerrage, led him to the door of the khan, to which she pointed with her hand, then passed on to the back of a palace, and disappeared.

To what then is the repose of life attached? His country no longer occupies solely and exclusively the mind of Aben-Hamet; Granada is no longer in his eyes deserted, forsaken, widowed and solitary; she is dearer than ever to his heart, but it is a new glamour which embellishes her ruins; with the recollection of his ancestors is now mingled another charm. Aben-Hamet has discovered the burial-place where the ashes of the Abencerrages repose; but while he prays, throws himself on the ground, and sheds a flood of filial tears, he fancies that the young Spanish maiden has sometimes passed over these tombs, and he no longer considers his ancestors as so unfortunate.

In vain does he wish to occupy himself with nothing but his pilgrimage to the land of his fathers; in vain does he scour the hills of the Darro and the Xenil to gather plants from them at the morning-dawn; the young Christian lady is the flower which he is now in search of. What fruitless efforts he has already made to discover the palace of his enchantress! How many times has he attempted to retrace the ground over which his divine guide conducted him! How many times has he fancied that he has recognized the same bell, and the same cock-crow, which he had heard near the house of the Spanish lady! Deceived by similar sounds, he runs immediately to the side from which they proceed; but the magic palace nowhere presents itself to his eyes! Frequently also the uniformity of the female dress at Granada gave him a moment of hope: at a distance every Christian female resembled the mistress of his heart; when close to him, not one possessed her beauty or her grace. Finally, Aben-Hamet had made the round of the churches, in order to discover the stranger; he had even penetrated to the tomb of Ferdinand and Isabella, but this was the greatest sacrifice which he had yet made to love.

One day he was herborizing in the valley of the Darro. The flowery declivity of the southern hill supported the walls of the Alhambra, and the gardens of the Generalife; the northern hill was adorned with the Albaycin, with smiling orchards, and with grottoes, inhabited by a numerous population. At the western extremity of the valley, were descried the spires of Granada, which rose in groups from the midst of holm-oaks and cypresses. At the other extremity, towards the east, the eye rested upon points of rocks, convents and hermitages, some of the ruins of the ancient Illiberia, and in the distance the heights of the Sierra Nevada. The waters of the Darro rolled along in the middle of the vale, and presented on the margin of its course newly erected mills, noisy waterfalls, the broken arches of a Roman aqueduct, and the remains of a bridge of the time of the Moors.

Aben-Hamet was neither miserable enough, nor happy enough, to enjoy properly the charms of solitude; he roamed over these beautiful banks with absence and indifference. In the course of his random walk, he struck into an alley of trees which wound round the declivity of the hill of the Albaycin. A country-house, surrounded by a grove of orange-trees, soon presented itself to his view; as he approached the grove, he heard the sounds of a voice and a guitar. Between the voice, the features and looks of a woman there are relations which never deceive a man whom love possesses. “It is my houri!” said Aben-Hamet, and he listened with a beating heart; at the name of the Abencerrages several times repeated, his heart beat still quicker. The fair unknown was singing a Spanish romance retracing the history of the Abencerrages and the Zegris. Aben-Hamet was no longer able to resist his emotion; he darted through a hedge of myrtle, and found himself in the midst of a party of young ladies, who were alarmed at his appearance, and, with loud screams, fled in all directions. The Spanish lady who had been singing, and who still held the guitar, exclaimed: “It is the Moorish gentleman!” and called back her companions. “Favourite of the genii,” said the Abencerrage, “I sought thee as an Arab searches for a spring at the heat of noon. I heard the sound of thy guitar; thou wert singing the heroes of my country. I discovered thee by the beauty of thy accents, and I come to lay at thy feet the heart of Aben-Hamet.”

“And it was with thoughts of you,” replied Donna Blanca, “that I was repeating the romance of the Abencerrages: ever since I saw you, I have fancied that these Moorish knights resembled you.”

The colour mounted slightly to Blanca’s forehead as she pronounced these words. Aben-Hamet felt as if he could have thrown himself at the feet of the young Christian, and declared to her that he was himself the last Abencerrage; but a remnant of prudence restrained him: he was afraid lest his name, too celebrated at Granada, should give uneasiness to the governor. The war with the Moriscoes was scarcely terminated, and the presence of an Abencerrage at that moment might give the Spaniards just cause of apprehension. It was not that Aben-Hamet was alarmed at the prospect of danger; but he trembled at the idea of being obliged to remove himself for ever from the daughter of Don Rodrigo.

Donna Blanca was descended from a family which derived its origin from the Cid de Bivar, and from Ximena, the daughter of Count Gormez de Gormas. The posterity of the conqueror of Valencia the Beautiful, owing to the ingratitude of the court of Castille, was reduced to a state of extreme poverty; it was even believed, for several centuries, to be extinct, such was the obscurity into which it had fallen. But, about the time of the conquest of Granada, a last descendant of the race of the Bivars, the grandfather of Blanca, made himself distinguished, less by his pedigree than by his signal valour. After the expulsion of the infidels, Ferdinand rewarded this descendant of the Cid with the estates of several Moorish families, and created him Duke of Santa Fé. The newly created Duke fixed his residence at Granada, and died while still young, leaving an only son already married, Don Rodrigo, father of Blanca.

Donna Teresa de Xeres, the wife of Don Rodrigo, gave birth to a son, who received, at his birth, the name of Rodrigo, like all his ancestors, but was called Don Carlos, to distinguish him from his father. The great events of which Don Carlos was a witness from his earliest years, the dangers to which he was exposed while yet in his nonage, contributed to render still more grave and severe a character naturally disposed to austerity. Don Carlos was scarcely fourteen years of age, when he followed Cortez to Mexico: he supported all the dangers, and was a witness of all the horrors, of that astonishing adventure; and he was present at the overthrow of the last king of a world until then unknown. Three years after that catastrophe, Don Carlos had returned to Europe, and was present at the battle of Pavia, as if he had come to witness kingly honour and valour sinking under the strokes of fortune. The aspect of a new world, long voyages on seas which had never before been navigated, and the spectacle of the revolutions and vicissitudes of fate, had made a deep impression on the religious and melancholy imagination of Don Carlos. He entered into the knightly order of Calatrava; and, renouncing marriage in spite of Don Rodrigo’s prayers, destined his whole fortune to his sister.

Blanca de Bivar, the only sister of Don Carlos, and much younger than he, was the idol of her father. She had lost her mother, and had just entered into her eighteenth year, when Aben-Hamet made his appearance at Granada. Everything about this enchanting woman was fascination itself; her voice was ravishing and her dancing lighter than the zephyr. Sometimes she delighted in directing a chariot, like Armida; at other times she flew upon the back of the swiftest barb of Andalusia, like those charming fairies who appeared to Tristan and to Galaor in the forests. Athens would have taken her for Aspasia, and Paris for Diana of Poitiers, who was then beginning to shine at the court. But, with the charms of a Frenchwoman, she had all the passions of a Spaniard, and her natural coquetry in no degree diminished the fixity, the constancy, the strength and elevation of the feelings of her heart.

At the noise of the screams, which the young ladies sent forth, when Aben-Hamet rushed into the midst of the grove, Don Rodrigo came running up. “My father,” said Blanca, “this is the Moorish gentleman of whom I spoke to you. He heard me singing, and recognized me; he entered the garden to thank me for having put him in his right road.”

The Duke of Santa Fé received the Abencerrage with the grave and yet unaffected politeness of the Spaniards. One remarks in this nation none of those servile airs, none of those circumlocutory phrases, which reveal the abjectness of ideas, and the degradation of the soul. The language of the first nobleman and of the peasant is the same, the salutation the same, the compliments, habits and customs are the same. In proportion as the confidence and generosity of this people to strangers is unbounded, in the same proportion is its vengeance terrible when betrayed. Of heroic courage, of patience inexhaustible, incapable of yielding to bad fortune, it must either vanquish or be crushed. It has little of what is called wit, but exalted passions are with it a substitute for that light which is derived from the refinement and abundance of ideas. A Spaniard, who passes the day without speaking, who has seen nothing, and cares not for seeing anything, who has read nothing, studied nothing, compared nothing, will yet discover, in the greatness of his resolutions, the necessary resources at the moment of adversity.

It was Don Rodrigo’s birthday, and Blanca was giving her father a tertulia, or little entertainment, in this delightful solitude. The Duke invited Aben-Hamet to seat himself amidst the young ladies, who were amused at the turban and robe of the stranger. Some velvet cushions were brought, and Aben-Hamet reclined himself on these cushions in the Moorish fashion. He was questioned respecting his country, and his adventures; he replied to these enquiries with spirit and vivacity. He spoke the purest Castilian; one could have taken him for a Spaniard, if he had not almost constantly said thou instead of you. This word had something so sweet about it in his mouth, that Blanca could not help feeling a secret annoyance when he addressed it to one of her companions.

A numerous retinue of servants appeared, and were the bearers of chocolate, of fruit cakes, and little sweet cakes from Malaga, white as snow, porous and light as sponges. After the refresco, Blanca was entreated to execute one of those national dances, in which she excelled the most accomplished Gitanas. She was obliged to accede to the wishes of her friends. Aben-Hamet was silent, but his supplicating looks spoke as eloquently as his mouth would have done. Blanca chose a zambra, an expressive dance which the Spaniards have borrowed from the Moors.

One of the young ladies began to play upon the guitar the air of this foreign dance. The daughter of Don Rodrigo took off her veil, and fastened a pair of ebony castanets round her white hands. Her black hair falls in ringlets on her alabaster neck; her mouth and her eyes smile in concert; her colour is animated by the action of her heart. All at once she makes the noisy ebony re-echo, beats time three times, commences the song of the zambra, and, mingling her voice with the sounds of the guitar, darts off like lightning.

What variety in her steps! What elegance in her attitudes! Now she raises her arms with vivacity, then she lets them fall with languor. Sometimes she springs forward as if intoxicated with pleasure, and then retires as if overwhelmed with sorrow. She turns her head, seems to call to her some invisible person, modestly holds out her rosy cheek to receive the kiss of a newly married husband, flies back ashamed, returns delighted and consoled, marches with a noble and almost warlike step, afterwards skims afresh the verdant mead. The harmony between her dancing, her singing, and the music of the guitar was perfect. The voice of Blanca, slightly husky, had that species of accent which stirs the passions to the very bottom of the soul. The Spanish music, composed of sighs, of lively movements, of melancholy repetitions, of airs suddenly stopped, presents a singular mixture of gaiety and melancholy. This music and this dancing settled the destiny of the last Abencerrage irrecoverably; they would have been sufficient to trouble a heart less susceptible than his.

In the evening they returned to Granada by the valley of the Darro. Don Rodrigo was so delighted with the noble and polished manners of Aben-Hamet, that he would not let him depart without receiving his promise to come frequently and amuse Blanca with the wonderful stories of the East. The Moor, at the height of his wishes, accepted the invitation of the Duke of Santa Fé; and, beginning with the following day, he was regular in his visits to the palace where she breathed whom he loved more than the light of day.

Blanca found her heart very soon engaged in a deep passion, from the very impossibility she had fancied that ever she should feel that passion. That any one should love an infidel, a Moor, an unknown stranger, appeared to her so extraordinary, that she took no precaution against the malady which began to insinuate itself into her veins. But no sooner did she become sensible of its inroads, than she accepted this malady like a true Spaniard. The dangers and troubles, which she foresaw, neither made her draw back when on the brink of the precipice, nor deliberate long with her heart. She said to herself: “Let Aben-Hamet become a Christian, let him love me, and I will follow him to the extremity of the earth.”

On his part, the Abencerrage also felt the full power of an irresistible passion: he no longer lived but for Blanca; he no longer occupied himself with the plans which had brought him to Granada. It was easy for him to obtain the information which he came expressly in pursuit of: but every other interest, except that of his love, had vanished from his eyes. He even dreaded the knowledge which might produce a change in his mode of existence. He asked for nothing; he wished not to know anything. He said to himself: “Let Blanca become a Mahometan, let her love me, and I will serve her to my last sigh.”

Thus determined in their resolutions, Aben-Hamet and Blanca only waited for a favourable moment to discover their mutual sentiments to each other. It was then the best time of the year. “You have not yet seen the Alhambra,” said the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé to the Abencerrage. “If I can guess, by some words which have dropped from you, your family is originally from Granada. You will perhaps be pleased to visit the palace of your ancient kings? I will myself, this evening, be your guide thither.”

Aben-Hamet swore, by the prophet, that no excursion could ever be more agreeable to him.

When the hour appointed for this pilgrimage to the Alhambra arrived, the daughter of Don Rodrigo mounted a white hackney, accustomed to climb the rocks like a deer. Aben-Hamet accompanied the brilliant Spaniard on an Andalusian horse, equipped in the Turkish manner. In the rapid course of the young Moor, his purple robe swelled out behind him, his crooked sabre echoed on the elevated saddle, and the wind shook the plume with which his turban was surmounted. The common people, charmed by his graceful carriage, said as they saw him pass: “It is an infidel prince whom Donna Blanca is going to convert.”

They first went up a long street which still bore the name of an illustrious Moorish family. This street bordered on the exterior inclosure of the Alhambra. They then crossed a wood of young elm-trees, arrived at a fountain, and shortly found themselves in front of the interior inclosure of the palace of Boabdil. In a wall flanked with towers and surmounted by battlements, was a gate called the Gate of Judgement. They passed through this first gate, and proceeded along a narrow road which led them in a serpentine course between high walls and half-ruined hovels. This road brought them to the square of the Algibes, close to which Charles V. was then erecting a palace. From thence, turning northward, they halted in a deserted court, at the foot of an unornamented wall, out of repair from the effects of time. Aben-Hamet, springing lightly to the ground, presented his hand to Blanca, and assisted her in alighting from her mule. The servants knocked at a deserted door, the threshold of which was concealed by the grass; the door opened, and all at once disclosed to view the secret recesses of the Alhambra.

All the charms of, and regrets for, his country, mingled with the glamour of love, seized the heart of Aben-Hamet. Silent and immovable, his wondering looks dived into this habitation of the genii. He fancied himself transported to the entrance of one of those palaces the account of which one reads in the Arabian tales. Light galleries, canals of white marble bordered with lemon and orange-trees in full bloom, fountains, and solitary courts, presented themselves in all directions to the eyes of Aben-Hamet; and through the lengthened vaults of the porticoes he perceived other labyrinths and fresh enchantments. The azure of the most beautiful sky appeared between the columns, which supported a chain of Gothic arches. The walls were covered with arabesques, which seemed to the eye like imitations of those stuffs of the East, which, in the ennui of the harem, are embroidered by the caprice of a female slave. An air of voluptuousness, of religion, and of war, seemed to breathe in this magic edifice; it was a species of lovers’ cloister, a mysterious retreat, where the Moorish sovereigns tasted all the pleasures, and forgot all the duties of life.

After some minutes of surprise and silence, the two lovers entered into this residence of fallen greatness and past felicities. They first made the round of the hall of Mexuar, in the midst of the perfume of flowers and the freshness of waters. They then penetrated into the Court of Lions. The agitation of Aben-Hamet increased at every step. “Didst thou not fill my soul with delight,” said he to Blanca, “with what pain should I find myself obliged to ask of thee, a Spaniard, the history of this palace! Ah! these places are made to serve as a retreat for happiness, and I!...”

Aben-Hamet perceived the name of Boabdil enchased in the mosaics: “ O my king!” exclaimed he, “what is become of thee? where shall I find thee in thy deserted Alhambra?” And tears of fidelity, of loyalty, and of honour suffused the eyes of the young Moor. “Your old masters,” said Blanca, “or rather the kings of your fathers, were ungrateful.”—” What matter!” returned the Abencerrage, “they were unfortunate!”

As he pronounced these words, Blanca conducted him into an apartment which seemed to be the very sanctuary of the temple of love. The elegance of this asylum could not be surpassed; the entire ceiling, painted blue and gold, and composed of arabesques of filagree work, allowed the light to appear as if through a tissue of flowers. A fountain spouted in the midst of the building, the waters of which, falling again in a shower of dew, were received in an alabaster shell. “Aben-Hamet,” said the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé “look well at this fountain; it received the disfigured heads of the Abencerrages. You can still see, on the marble, the stain of the blood of the unhappy men who were sacrificed to Boabdil’s suspicions. It is thus that, in your country, men who seduce credulous women are treated.”

Aben-Hamet had ceased to listen to Blanca; he had prostrated himself, and kissed respectfully the mark of the blood of his ancestors. Then rising he exclaimed: “O Blanca! I swear, by the blood of these knights, to love thee with the constancy, the fidelity and the ardour of an Abencerrage!”

“You love me then?” returned Blanca, clasping her beautiful hands, and raising her eyes to heaven; “but do you forget that you are an infidel, a Moor, an enemy, and that I am a Christian and a Spaniard?”

“O holy prophet!” said Aben-Hamet, “be thou witness of my oaths!...” Blanca interrupted him. “And what reliance think you can I place on the oaths of a persecutor of my God? Do you know whether I love you? Who has given you the assurance to use such language to me?”

Aben-Hamet in consternation replied: “True, lady, I am only thy slave; thou hast not chosen me to be thy knight.”

“Moor,” said Blanca, “lay artifice aside. Thou hast seen, by my looks, that I loved thee; my passion for thee exceeds all bounds: be a Christian, and nothing shall prevent me from being thine. But, if the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé venture to speak to thee thus frankly, thou mayest judge, from that very circumstance, that she will know how to conquer herself, and that no enemy of the Christians shall ever possess any claim on her.”

Aben-Hamet, in a transport of passion, seized the hands of Blanca, and placed them first on his turban, and then on his heart: “Allah is powerful,” he cried, “and Aben-Hamet is happy! O Mahomet, let this Christian acknowledge thy law, and nothing can....”—” Thou art a blasphemer,” said Blanca, “let us depart hence.”

Leaning on the arm of the Moor, she proceeded to the fountain of the Twelve Lions, which gives its name to one of the courts of the Alhambra. “Stranger,” said the artless Spanish maiden, “when I look at thy robe, thy turban, and thy arms, and think of our loves, I fancy I see the shade of the handsome Abencerrage walking in this forsaken retreat with the unfortunate Alfayma. Explain to me the Arabic inscription which is engraved on the marble of this fountain.”

Aben-Hamet read these words:

The beautiful princess who walks, covered with pearls, in her garden, adds to the beauty of it so prodigiously....[4] The rest of the inscription was effaced.

“It is for thee that this inscription was made,” said Aben-Hamet. “Beloved Sultana, these palaces have never been so beautiful in their youth, as they now are in their ruins. Listen to the murmur of the fountains, the waters of which have been turned from their course by the moss: look at the gardens, which we see through these half-ruined arcades; contemplate the star of day, which is setting beyond all these porticoes; how sweet it is to wander with thee in these abodes! Thy words embalm these retreats like the roses of Hymen. With what delight do I discover, in thy speech, some of the accents of the language of my fathers! The mere rustling of thy dress on these marbles makes me thrill. The air is only perfumed because it has touched thy tresses. Beautiful art thou as the genius of my country in the midst of these ruins! But can Aben-Hamet hope to fix thy heart? What is he, when compared to thee! He has roamed over the mountains with his father; he knows the plants of the desert.... Alas! there is not one of them that can heal the wound which thou hast given him!... He carries arms, but he is not a knight.

“I said to myself formerly: ‛The water of the sea, which sleeps under shelter in the hollow of the rock, is tranquil and silent, while quite near the open sea is noisy and agitated: Aben-Hamet! such will be thy life, silent, peaceful and unheard of, in an unknown corner of the earth, while the court of the Sultan is overturned by storms!’ I said so to myself, young Christian, and thou hast proved to me that the tempest may also disturb the drop of water in the hollow of the rock.”

Blanca listened with delight to a language which was so new to her, and the oriental turn of which seemed so much in harmony with this fairy abode, which she rambled over with her lover. Love penetrated her heart in all directions: she felt her knees sink under her, and was obliged to lean more heavily on the arm of her companion. Aben-Hamet supported the sweet burden, and repeated as he walked along: “Ah! why am I not an illustrious Abencerrage!”

“Thou wouldst please me less,” said Blanca, “for I should be more unhappy; remain in obscurity and live for me. A brave knight often forgets love for glory.”

“Thou wouldst not have that danger to apprehend,” replied Aben-Hamet with quickness.

“And how wouldst thou love me then, if thou wert an Abencerrage?” demanded the descendant of Ximena.

“I would love thee more than glory, and less than honour!” was the answer of the Moor.

The sun had sunk beneath the horizon during the promenade of the two lovers; they had traversed the whole of the Alhambra. What recollections were presented by it to the mind of Aben-Hamet! Here the Sultana received, by means of air-holes, the smoke of the perfumes which were burnt under her; there, in that secluded retreat, she adorned herself with the glorious attire of the East. And it was Blanca, it was a beloved woman, who related all these details to the handsome youth whom she idolized.

The rising moon diffused her doubtful light in the forsaken sanctuaries and in the deserted courts of the Alhambra; her silver rays outlined, upon the green turf of the gardens, and upon the walls of the apartments, the lace-work of an aerial architecture, the arches of the cloisters, the flitting shadows of the spouting waters, and those of the shrubs agitated by the zephyr. The nightingale sang in a cypress which pierced the domes of a ruined mosque, and the echoes repeated her plaintive strains. By the light of the moon, Aben-Hamet wrote the name of Blanca on the marble of the Hall of the Two Sisters; he traced it in Arabic characters, in order that the traveller might find an additional mystery for the exercise of his conjectures in this palace of mysteries.

“Moor,” said Blanca, “these amusements are cruel; let us quit this spot. The destiny of my life is fixed for ever. Bear well in mind those words: ‛Mussulman, I am thy mistress without hope; Christian, I am thy fortunate wife.’”

Aben-Hamet answered: “Christian, I am thy despairing slave; Mussulman, I am thy proud husband.”

And these noble lovers departed from this dangerous palace.

The passion of Blanca increased every day, and that of Aben-Hamet became equally violent. He was so transported at the idea of being loved for his own sake, and of owing the sentiments which he had inspired to no foreign cause, that he did not disclose the secret of his birth to the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé: he pictured to himself a delicate pleasure in giving her the information that he bore an illustrious name, on the very day when she consented to give him her hand. But he was suddenly recalled to Tunis. His mother had been attacked by an incurable disease, and wished to embrace and bless her son before her death. Aben-Hamet presented himself at the palace of Blanca. “Sultana,” said he to her, “my mother is at the point of death. She has sent for me to close her eyes. Wilt thou continue to love me?”

“Thou leavest me then,” replied Blanca, turning pale; “shall I never see thee more?”

“Come with me,” said Aben-Hamet; “I wish to exact an oath of thee, and to give thee one in return, which death alone can break. Follow me.”

They go out; they reach a cemetery which was formerly that of the Moors. Here and there were still to be seen little funeral columns round which the sculptor had formerly figured a turban; but which the Christians had subsequently replaced by a cross. Aben-Hamet led Blanca to the foot of these columns.

“Blanca,” said he, “this is the place where my ancestors repose; I swear by their ashes to love thee until the day when the angel of judgement shall summon me to the tribunal of Allah. I promise thee never to engage my heart to another woman, and to take thee for my wife, as soon as thou shalt know the divine light of the prophet. Every year, at this period, I will return to Granada, to see if thou hast kept thy faith to me, and if thou wilt renounce thy errors.”

“And I,” said Blanca, in tears, “will expect thee every year; I will preserve, until my latest sigh, the faith which I have sworn to thee; and I will receive thee for my husband, when the God of the Christians, more powerful than thy mistress, shall have melted thy infidel heart.”

Aben-Hamet departs, the winds carry him to the African shores. His mother had just expired. He weeps for her; he embraces her coffin. The months roll by; sometimes wandering amid the ruins of Carthage, sometimes seated on the tomb of St. Louis, the banished Abencerrage longs for the day which is to carry him back to Granada. That day at last arrives: Aben-Hamet embarks, and the vessel directs her course to Malaga. With what transport, with what joy mixed with apprehension, did he descry the first promontories of Spain! Is Blanca awaiting him on these shores? Does she still remember the poor Arab, who has never ceased to adore her under the palm-tree of the desert?

The daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé was not unfaithful to her vows. She had requested her father to convey her to Malaga. From the mountain-tops which bordered the uninhabited coast, she followed with her eyes the distant vessels and the flying sails. During the tempest, she contemplated with alarm the sea, as it was raised into fury by the winds. Then it was that she loved to lose herself in the clouds, to expose herself in dangerous passages, to feel herself washed by the same waves, or carried along by the same hurricane which threatened the days of Aben-Hamet. As she saw the plaintive seamew skim the waves with her large crooked wings, and fly towards the shores of Africa, she charged her with all the love-messages and extravagant wishes which proceed from a heart devoured by passion.

One day, while wandering on the beach, she discovered a long vessel, whose elevated prow, bent mast, and triangular sail announced the elegant genius of the Moors. Blanca ran to the port, into which she soon saw the Barbary vessel enter, making the sea foam under her rapid course. A Moor, most superbly dressed, was standing on the prow. Behind him, two black slaves held by the bridle an Arabian horse, whose smoking nostrils and dishevelled mane indicated both his natural ardour, and the terror with which the noise of the waves affected him. The bark arrives, lowers her sails, touches the pier, and lays to her side; the Moor springs upon the shore, which re-echoes with the sound of his arms. The slaves disembark the leopard-spotted courser, which neighs and leaps with joy at once more finding himself on land. Other slaves lower, with great care, a basket in which lay a gazelle amid palm-tree leaves; her delicate limbs were fastened and doubled under her, for fear of their being broken by the movement of the vessel; she wore a collar of aloe berries, and upon the gold plate, which served to connect the two ends of the collar, were engraved in Arabic a name and a talisman.

Blanca recognized Aben-Hamet; fearful of betraying herself in the presence of the crowd, she retired, and sent Dorothea, one of her attendants, to inform the Abencerrage, that she was waiting for him at the palace of the Moors. Aben-Hamet was at that moment presenting to the governor his firman, written in blue characters on beautiful vellum, and rolled up in a silk case. Dorothea approached, and conducted the happy Abencerrage to the feet of Blanca. What transports, when they found that both had remained faithful! What happiness in seeing each other after having been so long separated! How many fresh vows of eternal affection!

The two black slaves bring the Numidian courser, which, in place of a saddle, had only a lion’s skin thrown over his back and fastened by a purple belt. Afterwards the gazelle was introduced. “Sultana,” said Aben-Hamet, “this is a deer of my country, almost as light-footed as thyself.” Blanca, with her own hands, untied the beautiful animal, which seemed to thank her, by looks of the sweetest expression. During the absence of the Abencerrage, the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé had been studying Arabic; she read, with tearful eyes, her own name engraved on the gazelle’s collar. The animal, on being restored to her liberty, could scarcely stand upon her feet, from their having been so long tied up; she laid herself down upon the ground, and leaned her head against the knees of her mistress. Blanca gave her some fresh dates, and caressed this doe of the desert, whose fine coat retained the perfume of the aloe wood and of the rose of Tunis.

The Abencerrage, the Duke of Santa Fé and his daughter departed together for Granada. The days of the happy lovers passed like those of the preceding year: the same walks, the same regret at the sight of his country, the same love, or rather love always increasing, and always mutual; but also the same attachment in the two lovers to the religion of their fathers. “Become a Christian,” said Blanca;—“Become a Mussulman,” said Aben-Hamet, and they separated once more, without giving way to the passion which attracted them to each other.

Aben-Hamet reappeared the third year, like those birds of passage, which love brings back to our climates in the spring. This time he found not Blanca on the shore; but a letter from that adored woman informed the faithful Arab of the departure of the Duke for Madrid, and the arrival of Don Carlos at Granada. The latter was accompanied by a French prisoner, friend of Blanca’s brother. The Moor’s heart sunk within him at the perusal of this letter. He set out from Malaga for Granada with the most melancholy forebodings; the mountains appeared to him frightfully solitary: and he several times turned round to look at the sea which he had just crossed.

Blanca, during her father’s absence, had been unable to quit a brother whom she loved, a brother who intended to divest himself of all his property in her favour, and whom she saw again after seven years’ absence. Don Carlos possessed all the courage and all the pride of his nation: terrible as the conquerors of the New World, in whose ranks he had first carried arms; religious like the Spanish knights who conquered the Moors, he cherished in his heart that hatred of the infidels which he inherited from the blood of the Cid.

Thomas de Lautrec, of the illustrious house of Foix, in which beauty in the females and bravery in the males were regarded as hereditary qualities, was the younger brother of the Countess de Foix, and of the brave and unfortunate Odet de Foix, Lord of Lautrec. At the age of eighteen, Thomas had been knighted by Bayard, in that retreat which cost the life of the knight without fear and without reproach. Some time after, Thomas was pierced with wounds and made prisoner at Pavia, while defending the chivalrous monarch, who then lost all, except his honour.

Don Carlos de Bivar, who was a witness of the gallantry of Lautrec, had caused care to be taken of the wounds of the young Frenchman, and there was speedily formed between them one of those heroic friendships, of which esteem and virtue are the foundations. Francis I. had returned to France, but Charles V. detained the other prisoners. Lautrec had had the honour to share his sovereign’s captivity, and to lie at his feet in prison. Having remained in Spain, after the departure of his king, he had been handed over on his parole to Don Carlos, who had just brought him to Granada.

When Aben-Hamet presented himself at the palace of Don Rodrigo, and the door of the apartment in which was the Duke of Santa Fé’s daughter was opened, he experienced torments hitherto unknown to him. At the feet of Donna Blanca was seated a young man, who was looking at her in silence with a species of transport. This young man wore breeches made of buffalo’s skin, and a doublet of the same colour, fastened by a belt from which was suspended a sword with fleurs-de-lis. A silk mantle was thrown over his shoulders, and his head was covered with a narrow-brimmed hat, surmounted with feathers. A lace ruff, falling back on his bosom, allowed his neck to be seen. A pair of moustaches, black as ebony, gave a masculine and warlike air to a countenance naturally mild. To his large boots, which fell down and doubled over his feet, were attached golden spurs, the marks of knightly quality.

At some distance, another knight was standing, leaning on the iron cross of his long sword; he was dressed like his companion, but seemed rather older. His austere look, though at the same time ardent and passionate, inspired respect and awe. The red cross of Calatrava was embroidered on his doublet with this device: For it and for my king.

When Blanca perceived Aben-Hamet, she uttered an involuntary cry. “Knights,” said she immediately, “this is the infidel of whom I have said so much to you; take care he does not bear away the victory. The Abencerrages were just like him, and they were surpassed by none in loyalty, courage and gallantry.”

Don Carlos advanced to meet Aben-Hamet. “Señor Moor,” said he, “my father and sister have informed me of your name. They believe you are of a noble and brave race: you are yourself distinguished for your courtesy. My master Charles V. must soon commence war against Tunis, and we shall, I hope, meet each other in the field of honour.”

Aben-Hamet placed his hand upon his bosom, seated himself upon the ground without answering, and remained with his eyes fixed upon Blanca and upon Lautrec. The latter was admiring, with the curiosity peculiar to his countrymen, the handsome countenance of the Moor, his noble dress and his brilliant armour. Blanca displayed not the slightest embarrassment: her soul was completely exhibited in her eyes; the ingenuous Spaniard made no attempt to conceal the secret of her heart. After a silence of a few moments, Aben-Hamet rose, made his bow to the daughter of Don Rodrigo, and retired. Astonished at the behaviour of the Moor, and at the looks of Blanca, Lautrec left the apartment, with a suspicion which was speedily changed into certainty.

Don Carlos remained alone with his sister. “Blanca,” said he, “explain yourself. Whence this trouble which the sight of this stranger has occasioned you?”

“Brother,” answered Blanca, “I love Aben-Hamet, and, if he will become a Christian, my hand is his.”

“What!” exclaimed Don Carlos, “you love Aben-Hamet! the daughter of the Bivars love a Moor, an infidel, an enemy, whom we have driven from these palaces!”

“Don Carlos,” replied Blanca, “I love Aben-Hamet; Aben-Hamet loves me; for three years he has renounced me, sooner than renounce the religion of his forefathers. He possesses nobility, honour and knighthood: to my last breath I will adore him.”

Don Carlos was capable of estimating, in its fullest extent, the generous resolution of Aben-Hamet, although he lamented the infatuation of that infidel. “Unfortunate Blanca,” said he, “whither will this passion lead thee? I had hoped that my friend Lautrec would become my brother.”

“Thou deceivedst thyself,” said Blanca, “I cannot love that stranger. As to my feelings for Aben-Hamet, I am accountable to no one. Keep thy knightly vows, as I shall keep my vows of love. For thy comfort, be assured of this, that Blanca will never become the wife of an infidel.”

“Our family will then disappear from the earth!” said Don Carlos.

“It is thy business to revive it,” said Blanca. “Besides, of what consequence are sons whom thou wilt never see, and who will degenerate from thy virtues? Don Carlos, I feel that we are the last of our race; we are too much out of the common order to expect that our blood should flourish after us. The Cid was our ancestor: he will be our posterity;” so saying she quitted the apartment.

Don Carlos flew to the Abencerrage. “Moor,” said he, “renounce my sister, or meet me in single combat.”

“Art thou entrusted by thy sister,” said Aben-Hamet, “to reclaim the vows which she has made to me?”

“No,” replied Don Carlos, “she loves thee more than ever.”

“Ah! worthy brother of Blanca!” exclaimed Aben-Hamet, interrupting him, “I must derive all my happiness from thy noble blood! O fortunate Aben-Hamet! O happy day! I believed that Blanca was unfaithful for this French knight ...”

“That is thy misfortune!” angrily exclaimed Don Carlos in his turn, “Lautrec is my friend; but for thee, he would be my brother. You must give me satisfaction for the tears which you make my family shed.”

“I am contented to do so,” answered Aben-Hamet, “but although I am sprung from a family, which has probably combated thine, I am not a knight. I see no one here to confer upon me that order, which will allow thee to measure thy strength with mine, without degrading thy rank.”

Struck with the Moor’s observation, Don Carlos looked at him with a mixture of admiration and rage. Then all at once, “I myself will dub thee knight! thou art worthy of it.”

Aben-Hamet bent his knee to Don Carlos. The latter gave him the accolade, by striking him three times on the shoulder with the flat side of his sword; afterwards, he girded on him the same sword which the Abencerrage, perhaps, was about to plunge into his bosom. Such was ancient honour.

Both of them immediately sprang upon their coursers, got beyond the walls of Granada, and flew to the Fountain of the Pine. The duels between the Moors and Christians had for a long time given celebrity to this spring. It was there that Malek Alabes had fought with Ponce de Leon, and the Grand Master of Calatrava had killed the brave Abayados. The fragments of the armour of this Moorish knight were still seen suspended from the branches of the pine, and on the bark of the tree some letters of a funeral inscription were still legible. Don Carlos pointed out with his hand, to the Abencerrage, the tomb of Abayados. “Imitate,” said he to him, “that brave infidel, and receive baptism and death from my hand.”

“Death perhaps,” answered Aben-Hamet, “but Allah and the Prophet for ever!”

They immediately proceeded to take their ground, and rushed against each other with fury. They were only provided with swords: Aben-Hamet was much less skilful than Don Carlos in combat, but the excellence of his arms, which had been tempered at Damascus, and the fleetness of his Arabian steed, gave him an advantage over his enemy. He gave the reins to his courser in the Moorish manner, and with his large sharp stirrup cut the right leg of Don Carlos’s horse under the knee. The wounded animal fell to the ground, and Don Carlos, dismounted by this fortunate blow, marched against Aben-Hamet, bearing his sword aloft. Aben-Hamet sprang to the ground, and met Don Carlos with intrepidity; he warded off the first blows of the Spaniard, who broke his sword against the Damascus blade; twice disappointed by fortune, Don Carlos shed tears of rage, and called out to his enemy: “Strike, Moor, strike; Don Carlos, although disarmed, defies thee, thee and all thy infidel race.”

“Thou mightest have slain me,” replied the Abencerrage, “but I never thought of giving thee the slightest wound. I only wished to prove to thee that I was worthy of being thy brother, and to prevent thee from despising me.”

At that instant, they perceived a cloud of dust: it was Lautrec and Blanca, who were spurring on two mares of Fez, fleeter than the wind. On arriving at the Fountain of the Pine, they saw the combat suspended.

“I am vanquished,” said Don Carlos, “this knight has given me my life. Lautrec, you will perhaps be more fortunate than I?”

“My wounds,” replied Lautrec, in a noble and dignified tone of voice, “allow me to decline the combat with this courteous knight. I have no wish,” added he, with a blush, “to learn the subject of your quarrel, or to penetrate a secret which would probably be a deathblow to myself; my absence will speedily cause peace to be restored between you, at least unless it be Blanca’s orders that I should remain at her feet.”

“Sir knight,” said Blanca, “you must remain with my brother: you must look upon me as your sister. The hearts of all present are suffering deeply; you will learn from us to bear the ills of life.”

Blanca wished to constrain the three knights to shake each other’s hands; all three refused to do so. “I hate Aben-Hamet,” exclaimed Don Carlos. “I envy him,” said Lautrec. “And I,” said the Abencerrage, “I esteem Don Carlos, and I pity Lautrec; but I can love neither of them.”

“Let us continue to see each other,” said Blanca, “and sooner or later friendship will follow esteem. Let the fatal event which has brought us here be for ever unknown at Granada.”

From that moment Aben-Hamet became a thousand times dearer to the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé: love delights in valour. Nothing was now wanting to the Abencerrage, since he had shown himself brave, and Don Carlos owed his life to him. Aben-Hamet, by the advice of Blanca, abstained from appearing at the palace for several days, to allow the wrath of Don Carlos time to cool. A mixture of mild and bitter feelings filled the soul of the Abencerrage; if, on the one hand, the certainty of being loved with so much fidelity and ardour was to him an inexhaustible source of delight; on the other, the certainty of never being happy without renouncing the religion of his fathers weighed heavily on the courage of Aben-Hamet. Years had already elapsed without bringing any relief to his sufferings: should he see the rest of his life pass away in the same manner?

He was plunged into an abyss of the most serious and tender reflections, when one evening he heard the bell ringing for that Christian prayer which announces the close of the day. It struck him that he would enter into the temple of the God of Blanca, and ask further counsel of the Master of Nature.

He set out; he arrived at the door of an ancient mosque, which had been converted into a church by the faithful. With a heart pierced by sorrow and feelings of devotion, he penetrated into the temple which was formerly that of his God and of his country. Prayers were just ended: there was no longer any one in the church. A holy obscurity prevailed amid the multitude of columns, which resembled the trunks of trees of a regularly planted forest. The light architecture of the Arabs was here married to the Gothic architecture, and, without losing anything of its elegance, it had assumed a gravity better adapted to meditation. A few lamps scarcely gave light to the hollows of the vaults; but, by the brightness of several lighted tapers, the altar of the sanctuary was still conspicuous: it glittered with gold and precious stones. The Spaniards glory in stripping themselves of their riches, in order to decorate with them the objects of their worship; and the image of the living God, placed in the midst of lace veils, of crowns of pearls, and bunches of rubies, receives the adoration of a half-naked people.

Not a seat was to be seen in the whole extent of this vast area: a marble pavement, which covered coffins, served the great as well as the little, to prostrate themselves before the Lord. Aben-Hamet walked slowly up the deserted naves, which re-echoed with the solitary noise of his footsteps. His mind was divided between the recollections which this ancient edifice of the Moorish religion recalled to his memory, and the feelings to which the religion of the Christians gave birth in his heart. He distinguished at the foot of a column a motionless figure, which he at first mistook for a statue on a tomb. On approaching it, he distinguished a young knight on his knees, with his forehead reverently bent, and his arms crossed upon his bosom. This knight made not the slightest movement at the noise of Aben-Hamet’s steps; no mental wandering, no external sign of life disturbed his deep prayer; his sword was laid on the ground before him, and his plumed hat was placed by his side on the marble: he had the appearance of being fixed in that attitude from the effect of some enchantment. Aben-Hamet recognized Lautrec. “Ah!” said the Abencerrage to himself, “this young and handsome Frenchman is asking some signal favour of heaven; this warrior, so celebrated for his courage, is here laying his heart bare to the Sovereign of Heaven, as the humblest and the most obscure of men! Let me also pray to the God of knights and of glory.”

Aben-Hamet was about to prostrate himself upon the marble, when he perceived, by the glimmering of a lamp, some Arabic characters and a verse of the Koran, which appeared upon a half-ruined tablet. His heart again felt the pangs of remorse; and he made haste to quit a building in which he had entertained the idea of becoming a traitor to his religion and his country.

The cemetery which surrounded this ancient mosque was a species of garden, planted with orange, cypress and palm-trees, and watered by two fountains; a cloister went all round it. Aben-Hamet, in passing under one of the porticoes, perceived a female about to enter the church. Although she was wrapped up in a veil, the Abencerrage recognized the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé; he stopped her, and said to her: “Dost thou come to seek Lautrec in this temple?”

“Dismiss this vulgar jealousy,” replied Blanca, “if I no longer loved thee, I would tell thee so: I would scorn to deceive thee. I come here to pray for thee. Thou alone art now the object of my wishes. I forget my own soul for thine. Thou shouldst not have intoxicated me with the poison of thy love, or thou shouldst have consented to serve the God whom I serve. Thou disturbest my whole family; my brother hates thee, my father is overwhelmed with vexation, because I refuse to marry. Dost thou not see how much my health suffers? Behold this enchanted asylum of death: here I shall soon be laid, if thou dost not hasten to receive my vows at the foot of the Christian altar. The struggles which I endure are gradually undermining my existence; the passion, with which thou hast inspired me, will not always support this feeble frame. Remember, oh Moor, to speak to thee in thy own language, that the flame which lights the torch is also the fire which consumes it.”

Blanca entered the church, and left Aben-Hamet confounded with her last words.

The struggle is ended; the Abencerrage is vanquished; he is about to renounce the errors of his faith; he has struggled long enough; the dread of seeing Blanca perish triumphs over every other feeling in the breast of Aben-Hamet. “After all,” said he to himself, “perhaps the God of the Christians is the true God? This God is always the deity of noble souls, since he is the God of Blanca, of Don Carlos, and of Lautrec.”

Full of this idea, Aben-Hamet waited with impatience for the following day, to inform Blanca of his resolution, and to convert a life of sorrow and of tears into one of joy and happiness; he was unable, however, to repair to the palace of the Duke of Santa Fé until the evening. He learned that Blanca was gone with her brother to the Generalife, where Lautrec was giving an entertainment. Agitated by fresh suspicions, Aben-Hamet flies upon the traces of Blanca. Lautrec blushed at seeing the Abencerrage appear so suddenly; as to Don Carlos, he received the Moor with cool politeness, through which esteem was perceptible.

Lautrec had caused a collation to be served up of the finest fruits of Spain and of Africa, in one of the apartments of the Generalife, styled the Hall of the Knights. All round this hall were suspended the portraits of the princes and knights, who had conquered the Moors,—of Pelayo, the Cid, Gonzalvo de Cordova; and the sword of the last king of Granada was hung under these portraits. Aben-Hamet did not allow the internal pain which he felt to appear, and only said, like the lion, on looking at these portraits, “We know not how to paint.”

The generous Lautrec, who saw the eyes of the Abencerrage turned involuntarily towards the sword of Boabdil, said to him, “Knight of the Moors, had I anticipated the honour of your presence at this fête, I would not have received you here. One loses a sword every day, and I have seen the bravest of monarchs deliver up his to his fortunate enemy.”

“Ah!” exclaimed the Moor, hiding his face with a corner of his robe, “one might lose it like Francis I., but like Boabdil!...”

Night came on, lights were brought, and the conversation took another turn. Don Carlos was requested to relate the discovery of Mexico. He spoke of that unknown world with the pompous eloquence which is natural to the Spanish nation. He related the misfortunes of Montezuma, the manners of the Americans, the prodigies of Spanish valour, and even the cruelties of his countrymen, which did not, in his eyes, seem to deserve either praise or blame.

These narratives delighted Aben-Hamet, whose passion for marvellous tales betrayed his Arabian blood. When it came to his turn, he gave a picture of the Ottoman empire, newly established on the ruins of Constantinople, bestowing a tribute of passing regret to the first empire of Mahomet; the happy days when the Commander of the Faithful saw shining around him Zobeide, Flower of Beauty, Jalib al Koolloob, Fetnah and the generous Ganem, Love’s Slave. As to Lautrec, he painted the gallant court of Francis I., the arts reviving from the midst of barbarism, the honour, the loyalty, the chivalry of the olden time, joined to the politeness of civilized ages, the Gothic turrets ornamented with the Grecian orders, and the French ladies setting off their rich dresses with Athenian elegance.

After this conversation, Lautrec, wishing to amuse the divinity of the entertainment, took his guitar, and sang this romance[5] which he had composed to one of the mountain airs of his country:

Oft to my birthplace mem’ry’s glance
Will turn, and my rapt soul entrance!
Sister, how sweet the minutes rolled
In France!
My country! thee more dear I hold
Than gold.
Rememb’rest thou how to her breast
Our mother both her children prest,
And how her bright white looks would glister?
How blest!
While we with lips of love, sweet sister!
Kiss’d her.
Rememb’rest thou that castle dear,
By which the swift stream flowed; and near,
That Moorish tow’r, with age so worn,
From where
The trumpet sounded when the morn
Was born?
Rememb’rest thou that tranquil lake
Which the swift swallow skimmed to slake
His thirst; where zephyr the sweet rose
Would shake;
And Sol’s last rays at evening’s close
Repose?
Oh! who my Helen back will yield,
My native hill, my oak-crowned field?
Their mem’ry keeps my heart-wounds old
Unhealed;
My country! thee more dear I’ll hold
Than gold.

As he finished the last couplet, Lautrec, with his glove, brushed away the tear which the recollection of the gentle land of France extorted from him. The regret of the handsome prisoner was warmly participated by Aben-Hamet, who deplored as well as Lautrec the loss of his country. When requested to take the guitar in his turn, he excused himself, by saying that he only knew one romance, which would not be at all agreeable to Christian ears.

” If it is a song of the infidels smarting under our victories,” said Don Carlos scornfully, “you may sing it; tears are allowed to the vanquished.”

“Yes,” said Blanca, “and that is the reason why our ancestors, while they were under the Moorish yoke, have left us so many complaints.”

Aben-Hamet then sang this ballad, which he had learned from a poet of the tribe of the Abencerrages.[6]

As Royal John
Rode out one day,
Granada’s town
Before him lay,
With sudden start,
“Fair town,” said he,
“My hand and heart
I give to thee.
“Thee will I wive,
And to thee will
Cordova give,
And proud Seville.
Robes rich and fair,
And jewels fine,
Shall all declare
My love is thine.”
Granada cried,
“Great Leon’s king!
I’m the Moor’s bride,
I wear his ring.
So keep thy own;
The gems I wear
Are a gorgeous zone
And children dear.”
Thou promis’d’st thus,
But kept’st not well,
O woe for us!
Granada fell.
A Christian base,
Abencerrage,
Rules thy birthplace;
’Twas in Fate’s page.
To that tomb ne’er,
The pool so near,
Shall camel bear
Medina’s seer.
A Christian base,
Abencerrage,
Rules thy birthplace;
’Twas in Fate’s page.
Alhambra’s tow’rs!
Palace of God!
Town of fair flow’rs
And fountains broad!
A Christian base,
Abencerrage,
Rules thy birthplace;
’Twas in Fate’s page.

The plaintive artlessness of this lament affected even the proud Don Carlos, notwithstanding the imprecations it pronounced against the Christians. He would have wished to be excused from singing himself, but, out of courtesy to Lautrec, he felt obliged to yield to his entreaties. Aben-Hamet handed the guitar to Blanca’s brother, who celebrated the exploits of the Cid, his illustrious ancestor.[7]

Bright in his mail, with love and valour fired,
The Cid, about to part for Afric’s war,
Stretched at Ximena’s feet, as love inspired,
Thus sung his parting to the sweet guitar:
“My love hath said: Go forth and meet the Moor,
Return victorious from the well-fought field;
Yes! I shall then believe thou canst adore,
If, at my wish, thy love to honour yield!
“Then give to me my helmet and my spear!
In bloody fight the Cid his love shall prove,
Amidst the din of war the Moor shall hear
His battle-cry, ‛My honour and my love!’
“O gallant Moor, vaunt not thy tuneful strain,
My song shall be a nobler theme than thine,
Ere long it will become the folly of Spain,
As one where love with honour doth combine.
“Oft in my native valleys shall be heard
In the old Christians’ mouth Rodrigo’s name,
Who nobly to inglorious life preferred
His God, his king, his honour, and his flame.”

Don Carlos appeared so proud in singing these words, in a masculine and sonorous voice, that he might have been taken for the Cid himself. Lautrec shared the warlike enthusiasm of his friend; but the Abencerrage had turned pale at the name of the Cid.

“This knight,” said he, “whom the Christians denominate the Flower of Battles, bears with us the name of the Cruel. Had his generosity but equalled his valour!...”

“His generosity,” said Don Carlos, interrupting Aben-Hamet, warmly, “was even greater than his courage, and none but a Moor would calumniate the hero to whom my family owes its birth.”

“What sayest thou?” exclaimed Aben-Hamet, springing up from the seat on which he lay half reclined: “dost thou reckon the Cid among thy ancestors?”

“His blood flows in my veins,” replied Don Carlos, “and I recognize my possession of that noble blood by the hatred with which my heart burns against the foes of my God.”

“It follows then,” said Aben-Hamet, looking at Blanca, “that you belong to the family of the Bivars who, after the conquest of Granada, invaded the possessions of the unfortunate Abencerrages, and put to death an ancient knight of that name, who attempted to defend the tomb of his forefathers.”

“Moor!” exclaimed Don Carlos, inflamed with rage, “know that I do not suffer myself to be interrogated. If I now possess the spoils of the Abencerrages, my ancestors acquired them at the price of their blood, and to their sword only do they owe them.”

“Only one word more,” said Aben-Hamet, with constantly increasing emotion; “we knew not in our exile that the Bivars had the title of Santa Fé, and it was this which was the cause of my error.”

“It was on the same Bivar,” answered Don Carlos, “who conquered the Abencerrages, that this title was conferred by Ferdinand the Catholic.”

The head of Aben-Hamet declined upon his bosom; he remained standing in the midst of Don Carlos, Lautrec and Blanca, who looked at him with astonishment. Two floods of tears gushed from his eyes upon the poniard which was fastened to his girdle. “Pardon me,” he said, “men ought not, I know, to shed tears; from this time mine will no longer flow externally, although I have many more to shed: listen to me.

“Blanca! my love for thee equals the ardour of the burning winds of Arabia. I was conquered: I could no longer live without thee. Yesterday the sight of this French knight at his prayers, and thy words in the cemetery of the temple, had made me resolve to know thy God, and to pledge thee my faith.”

A movement of joy from Blanca, and of surprise from Don Carlos, interrupted Aben-Hamet; Lautrec covered his face with both hands. The Moor divined his thoughts, and shaking his head with an agonizing smile said, “Knight, lose not all hope; as to thee, Blanca, weep for ever over the last of the Abencerrages.”

Blanca, Don Carlos and Lautrec all three lifted up their hands to heaven, and exclaimed, “The last of the Abencerrages!”

There was a moment of silence; fear, hope, hatred, love, astonishment and jealousy agitated their different hearts: Blanca shortly fell upon her knees: “Gracious God!” she said, “thou hast justified my choice; I could only love the descendant of heroes!”

“Sister!” said the irritated Don Carlos, “you forget that you are here in the presence of Lautrec.”

“Don Carlos,” said Aben-Hamet, “suspend thy wrath: it is my business to restore thee to repose.” Then, addressing himself to Blanca, who had again taken her seat:

“Houri of heaven, Genie of love and of beauty, Aben-Hamet will be thy slave to his latest breath; but hear the full extent of his misfortune. The old man who was immolated by thy ancestor, while defending his home, was the father of my father; learn also a secret which I concealed from thee, or rather which thou madest me forget. When I came for the first time to visit this sorrowful country, my first object was to find out some descendant of the Bivars whom I might call to account for the blood which his fathers had shed.”

“Well then,” said Blanca, in a voice of grief, but sustained by the accent of a great soul, “what is thy resolution?”

“The only one which is worthy of thee,” answered Aben-Hamet: “to restore thee thy vows, to satisfy by my eternal absence, and by my death, what we both of us owe to the enmity of our Gods, of our countries, and of our families. Should my image ever be blotted out from thy heart; if time, which destroys everything, should erase from thy memory the recollection of Abencerrage ... this French knight ... Thou owest this sacrifice to thy brother.”

Lautrec started up impetuously, and threw himself into the arms of the Moor. “Aben-Hamet,” he cried, “think not to outdo me in generosity; I am a Frenchman; I was knighted by Bayard; I have shed my blood for my king; I will be like my sponsor and my prince, without fear and without reproach. Shouldst thou remain with us, I will entreat Don Carlos to bestow upon thee the hand of his sister; if thou quittest Granada, never shall thy mistress be troubled with a whisper of my love. Thou shalt not carry with thee into thy exile the fatal idea that Lautrec was insensible to thy virtues, and sought to take advantage of thy misfortune.”

And the young knight pressed the Moor to his bosom with the warmth and vivacity of a Frenchman.

“Knights,” said Don Carlos in his turn, “I expected nothing less from the illustrious races to which ye belong. Aben-Hamet, by what mark can I recognize you for the last Abencerrage?”

“By my conduct,” replied Aben-Hamet.

“I admire it,” said the Spaniard; “but, before I explain myself, shew me some proof of your birth.”

Aben-Hamet took from his bosom the hereditary ring of the Abencerrages, which he wore suspended from a golden chain.

At sight of this, Don Carlos stretched out his hand to the unfortunate Aben-Hamet. “Sir knight,” said he, “I regard you as a man of honour, and the real descendant of kings. You honour me by your plans connected with my family; I accept the combat which you came privately to seek. If I am conquered, all my property, which formerly belonged to your family, shall be faithfully restored to you. If you have renounced your intention to fight, accept in turn the offer which I make to you: become a Christian, and receive the hand of my sister, which Lautrec has solicited for you.”

The temptation was great; but it was not beyond the strength of Aben-Hamet. If all-powerful love pleaded strongly in the heart of the Abencerrage; on the other hand, he could not think but with terror of uniting the blood of the persecutors with that of the persecuted. He fancied he saw the shade of his ancestor rising from the tomb, and reproaching him with this sacrilegious alliance. With a heart torn by grief, Aben-Hamet exclaimed: “Ah! why do I here meet with souls so sublime, characters so generous, to make me feel more bitterly the value of what I lose! Let Blanca pronounce; let her say what I must do, in order to render myself more worthy of her love!”

“Return to the desert!” was the exclamation of Blanca, who immediately sunk to the earth in a swoon.

Aben-Hamet prostrated himself, adored Blanca even more than Heaven, and departed without uttering a word. The same night he set out for Malaga, and took his passage on board a vessel which was to touch at Oran. Near that city he found the caravan encamped which leaves Morocco every three years, crosses Africa, repairs to Egypt, and rejoins the caravan of Mecca in Yemen. Aben-Hamet joined it as one of the pilgrims.

Blanca’s life was at first considered to be in danger, but she recovered. Faithful to the promise which he had given to the Abencerrage, Lautrec departed, and never did a word of his love or his sorrow trouble the melancholy of the daughter of the Duke of Santa Fé. Every year Blanca made a journey to Malaga, to wander on the mountains, at the period when her lover was accustomed to return from Africa; she seated herself upon the rocks, contemplated the sea, and the vessels in the distance, and afterwards returned to Granada: she passed the rest of her life amid the ruins of the Alhambra. She complained not; she wept not; she never spoke of Aben-Hamet; a stranger to her would have thought her happy. She was the only survivor of her family. Her father died of grief, and Don Carlos was killed in a duel, in which Lautrec acted as his second. What was the fate of Aben-Hamet no one ever knew.

In leaving Tunis, by the gate which leads to the ruins of Carthage, the traveller finds a cemetery; under a palm-tree, in a corner of this cemetery, a tomb was pointed out to me, which was called the tomb of the last of the Abencerrages. There is nothing remarkable about it; the sepulchral stone is perfectly smooth; only, after a Moorish fashion, a slight hole has been excavated in the middle of it by the chisel. The rain-water which collects in the bottom of this funeral cup, serves, in a burning climate, to quench the thirst of the birds of the air.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Published posthumously. “Stendhal” died in 1842.

[2] The towers of a palace at Granada.

[3] An expression which the Mussulmans have constantly in their mouths, and apply to almost every event in their lives.

[4] This inscription, as well as several others, is still existing. It is needless to say that I wrote this description of the Alhambra on the spot.

[5] The public is already acquainted with this romance. I composed the words for an air of the mountains of Auvergne, remarkable for its sweetness and simplicity.

[6] In crossing the mountainous country between Algeciras and Cadiz, I halted at a venta situated in the midst of a wood. I found there only a little boy of fourteen or fifteen, and a little girl of nearly the same age, brother and sister, who were sitting by the fireside and twisting mats. They sang a romance, the words of which I did not understand, but the air was simple and naïve. The weather was dreadfully stormy, and I remained two hours at the venta. My juvenile hosts repeated so frequently the couplets of their romance, that it was easy for me to get the air by heart. To this air I composed the romance of the Abencerrage. Perhaps Aben-Hamet was mentioned in the romance of my two little Spaniards. I may add that the dialogue of Granada and the king of Leon is imitated from a Spanish romance.

[7] All the world knows the air of the Follies of Spain. This air had no words, at least none which expressed its grave, religious and chivalrous character. This character I have endeavoured to give in the romance of the Cid. This romance, having got into the hands of the public without my consent, some celebrated masters did me the honour to set it to music. But, as I had expressly composed it for the air of the Follies of Spain, one of the couplets becomes complete nonsense, unless, reference is had to my original intention.

My song shall be a nobler theme than thine, Ere long it will become the folly of Spain, etc.

In short, these three romances have little other merit than their adaptation to three old airs of undoubted nationality: besides this, they bring on the dénouement of the story.

THE PRISONERS OF THE CAUCASUS
COUNT XAVIER DE MAISTRE

The Caucasian mountains have long been enclosed by the Russian empire without belonging to it. Their fierce inhabitants, cut off by language and by difference of interests, form a large number of petty tribes which have little political intercourse one with another, but which are all animated by the same love of independence and of plunder.

One of the most numerous and most formidable is that of the Tchetchens, who inhabit the great and the little Kabarda, provinces whose lofty valleys extend as far as the summits of the Caucasus. The men of this tribe are handsome, brave, and intelligent, but they are robbers and cruel, and in a continual state of war with the troops of “the line.”[8]

In the midst of these dangerous hordes, and in the very centre of this immense chain of mountains, Russia has established a line of communication with her possessions in Asia. Redoubts, placed at intervals, protect the road as far as Georgia, but no traveller would dare to venture alone across the space separating them. Twice a week a convoy of infantry, with cannon and a considerable party of Cossacks, escorts travellers and government dispatches. One of these redoubts, situated at the outlet of the mountains, has become a village with a fair-sized population. Its position has caused it to receive the name of Vladikavkaz:[9] it is used as the residence of the commandant of the troops who perform the troublesome duty which has just been mentioned.

Major Kaskambo, of the Vologda regiment, a Russian nobleman, belonging to a family of Greek origin, was to go and take up the command of the station at Lars, in the gorges of the Caucasus. Impatient to reach his post, and brave to rashness, he had the imprudence to undertake this journey with the escort of some fifty Cossacks whom he commanded, and the still greater imprudence to talk of his plan and boast about it before it was carried out.

The Tchetchens who live near the frontiers, and are called “peaceful Tchetchens,” are subject to Russia, and have in consequence free access to Mozdok; but most of them keep up friendly relations with the mountaineers and are very often partners in their robberies. These last, apprised of Kaskambo’s journey and of the very day of his departure, proceeded in great numbers to the road by which he was to travel, and prepared an ambush for him. About twenty versts from Mozdok, at the turn of a little hill covered with brushwood, he was attacked by seven hundred mounted men. Retreat was impossible: the Cossacks dismounted and sustained the attack with great firmness, hoping to be relieved by the troops of a redoubt which was not far distant.

The inhabitants of the Caucasus, although individually very brave, are incapable of a concerted attack, and consequently are not very dangerous to a troop that presents a firm front; but they are well armed and take excellent aim. Their large numbers, on this occasion, made the fight too unequal. After a fairly long fusillade, more than half of the Cossacks were killed or disabled; the rest had made for themselves, with their dead horses, a circular rampart, from behind which they fired their last cartridges. The Tchetchens, who are always accompanied in their expeditions by Russian deserters, whom they use if need arises as interpreters, made them shout to the Cossacks: “Surrender the major to us, or you will be killed to the last man.” Kaskambo, foreseeing the certain loss of his men, resolved to surrender himself to save the lives of those who were left: he entrusted his sword to the Cossacks and advanced alone towards the Tchetchens, who ceased firing immediately, their aim being only to take him alive in order to obtain a ransom. He had scarcely given himself up to his enemies, when he saw appearing in the distance the relief that was being sent to him: it was too late: the brigands rapidly withdrew.

His “denshchik” [10] had stayed behind with the mule that carried the major’s baggage. Hidden in a ravine, he was awaiting the issue of the fight, when the Cossacks found him and told him of his master’s misfortune. The worthy servant at once determined to share his fate, and set out in the direction whither the Tchetchens had retreated, leading his mule with him, and following the track of the horses. When he began to lose it in the darkness, he met a straggler of the enemy, who conducted him to the Tchetchens’ rendezvous.

One can imagine the feelings of the prisoner when he saw his denshchik come of his own accord to share his bad fortune. The Tchetchens at once divided amongst themselves the booty thus brought to them. They left to the major only a guitar which was with his baggage, and which they restored to him in mockery. Ivan (this was the denshchik’s name)[11] seized upon it and refused to throw it away, as his master advised him. “Why should we lose heart?” he said, “‘the God of the Russians is great’;[12] it is to the interest of the brigands to preserve you. They will do you no harm.”

After a halt of some hours the horde were going to continue their march, when one of their men, who had just joined them, announced that the Russians were still advancing, and that probably the troops from the other redoubts would unite to pursue them. The chiefs held a council; it was a question of concealing their retreat, not only in order to keep their prisoner, but also to turn the enemy aside from their villages, and thus avoid reprisals. The horde dispersed by various roads. Ten men on foot were told off to conduct the prisoners, while about a hundred horsemen remained together, and marched in a different direction from that which Kaskambo was to take. They took away from the latter his nail-studded boots, which might have left a recognizable track on the ground, and forced him, as well as Ivan, to walk barefoot for a part of the morning.

Coming near a stream, the little escort followed its course, on the grass, for a distance of half a verst, and climbed down the banks where they were steepest, among thorny bushes, being careful to avoid leaving any trace of their passage. The major was so weary, that, to bring him down to the stream, they had to hold him up with belts. His feet were bleeding; they decided to give him back his boots so that he might be able to finish what remained of the journey.

When they reached the first village, Kaskambo, still more ill with vexation than with fatigue, seemed to his guards so weak and exhausted, that they feared for his life, and treated him more humanely. They allowed him a short rest, and gave him a horse for the march; but to turn aside the Russians from the search they might prosecute, and to make it impossible for the prisoner himself to apprise his friends of the place where he was hidden, they carried him from village to village, and from one valley to another, taking the precaution of blindfolding him several times. They thus passed a large river, which he supposed to be the Sudja. They took great care of him during these journeys, allowing him sufficient food and such rest as he needed. But, when they had reached the distant village where he was to be kept definitely, the Tchetchens suddenly changed their conduct towards him, and subjected him to all kinds of ill treatment. They fettered his hands and feet, and put round his neck a chain, to the end of which a log of oak was fastened. The denshchik was less harshly treated, his fetters were lighter, and permitted of his rendering some services to his master.

Situated thus, at every fresh outrage he endured, a man who spoke Russian would come to see him and advise him to write to his friends to obtain his ransom, which had been fixed at ten thousand roubles. The unhappy prisoner was unable to pay such a large sum, and had no hope except in the protection of the government, which had redeemed, some years before, a colonel who had fallen like himself into the hands of the brigands. The interpreter promised to provide him with paper and to see that his letter reached its destination; but after obtaining his consent he did not reappear for several days, and during this time the major was made to suffer increased miseries. They deprived him of food, they took away from him the mat on which he had lain, and the pad of a Cossack saddle which had served him for a pillow; and, when at last the mediator returned, he announced, in confidence, that if the sum demanded was refused at the line, or if payment of it was delayed, the Tchetchens had decided to make away with him, in order to spare themselves the expense and anxiety which he caused them. The object of their cruel behaviour was to compel him to write more urgently. At last he was supplied with paper and a reed cut in the Tartar fashion; they took off the chains which bound his hands and neck, so that he might write freely; and when the letter was written it was translated to the chiefs, who undertook to see that it reached the commandant of the line.

From that time, he was treated less harshly, and was burdened with but a single chain, which bound his right hand and foot.

His host, or rather his gaoler, was an old man of sixty, of enormous stature, and with a savage appearance which his character did not belie. Two of his sons had been killed in an encounter with the Russians, which was the reason of his having been chosen, out of all the inhabitants of the village, to be the prisoner’s keeper.

The family of this man, whose name was Ibrahim, consisted of the widow of one of his sons, aged thirty-five, and a young child of seven or eight, called Mamet. The mother was as ill-natured as the old keeper, and more capricious. Kaskambo had much to suffer, but the caresses and friendship of little Mamet were in the time that followed a diversion, and even a real consolation in his misfortunes. This child conceived for him so great an affection, that the threats and ill treatment of his grandfather could not prevent him from coming and playing with the prisoner whenever he found an opportunity. He had given to the latter the name of “Kunakh,” which in the language of that country means a guest or a friend. He secretly shared with him what fruit he could obtain, and, during the forced abstinence which the major had been compelled to endure, little Mamet, touched with pity, skilfully took advantage of his relations’ momentary absence to bring him bread or potatoes cooked in the ashes.

Some months had elapsed since the sending of the letter, without any noteworthy event. During this interval, Ivan had been able to win the good will of the woman and the old man, or at least had succeeded in making himself necessary to them. He was versed in all the arts that can be employed in a commanding officer’s mess. He made “kisliya shchi” [13] to perfection, prepared pickled cucumbers, and had accustomed his hosts to the little comforts which he had introduced into their housekeeping.

To win greater confidence, he had placed himself with them on the footing of a buffoon, every day inventing some new jest to amuse them; Ibrahim especially loved to see him dance the Cossack dance. When any one of the villagers came to visit them, Ivan’s fetters were removed, and he was made to dance; which he always did with a good grace, each time adding some new absurd gambol. By behaving thus continually he had obtained for himself the freedom of the village, through which he was generally followed by a crowd of children attracted by his buffooneries; and, as he understood the Tartar language, he had soon learnt that of the country, which is a closely related dialect.

The major himself was often forced to sing Russian songs with his denshchik, and to play his guitar to amuse this fierce company. At first they had taken off the chains which fettered his right hand when this service was exacted from him; but, the woman having noticed that he would sometimes play, in spite of his fetters, for his own amusement, this favour was no longer allowed him, and the unfortunate musician more than once repented that he had let his talent become known. He did not know then that his guitar would one day assist him to regain his liberty.

To attain that longed-for liberty, the two prisoners formed a thousand plans, all very difficult to execute. At the time of their arrival in the village, the inhabitants used to send each night, by turns, a different man to augment the guard. Imperceptibly this precaution was relaxed. Often the sentinel did not come: the woman and the child slept in a neighbouring room, and old Ibrahim remained alone with them; but he kept the key of the chains carefully on his person, and woke up at the least sound. From day to day, the prisoner was treated more harshly. As the answer to his letters never came, the Tchetchens often visited his prison to insult him and threaten him with the most cruel treatment. They deprived him of his meals, and he had one day the vexation of seeing little Mamet pitilessly beaten for having brought him a few medlars.

One very remarkable circumstance in the painful position in which Kaskambo was placed, was the confidence which his persecutors had in him, and the respect with which he had inspired them. Whilst these barbarians subjected him to continual outrages, they would often come to consult him and to make him arbiter in their transactions and in their contests with one another. Amongst other disputes of which he was made the judge the following deserves mention on account of its peculiarity.

One of these men had entrusted a Russian note for five roubles to his friend, who was leaving for a neighbouring valley, asking him to deliver it to a certain person. The messenger lost his horse, which died on the way, and came to the conclusion that he had a right to keep the five roubles to repay him for the loss he had sustained. This reasoning, worthy of the Caucasus, was not at all relished by the owner of the money. On the traveller’s return, there was a great commotion in the village. These two men had gathered around them all their relations and friends, and the quarrel might have led to bloodshed if the old men of the band, after having vainly tried to pacify them, had not induced them to submit their case to the decision of the prisoner. The whole population of the village tumultuously took their way to him, the sooner to learn the issue of this farcical trial. Kaskambo was brought out of his prison and led on to the platform which constituted the roof of the house.

The greater number of the dwellings in the Caucasian valleys are partly hollowed out of the earth, and only rise three or four feet above the ground; the roof is horizontal, and is formed of a layer of beaten clay. The inhabitants, especially the women, come to rest on these terraces after sunset, and often pass the night there in the fine season.

When Kaskambo appeared on the roof there was a profound silence. It must doubtless have been extraordinary, to see, at this strange tribunal, furious litigants, armed with pistols and daggers, submitting their cause to a judge in chains, half dead with hunger and distress, who nevertheless passed judgement in the last resort, and whose decisions were always respected.

Despairing of making the accused listen to reason, the major made him come forward, and, in order to put the laughers at least on the side of justice, questioned him as follows. “If, instead of giving you five roubles to take to his creditor, your friend had only asked you to give him his greeting, your horse would be dead all the same, would it not?”

“Perhaps,” answered the defendant.

“And in that case,” continued the judge, “what would you have done with the greeting? Would you not have been obliged to keep it as payment and to be content with it? My sentence is, therefore, that you return the note, and that your friend gives you his greeting.”

When this decision was translated to the spectators, shouts of laughter proclaimed far and wide the wisdom of the new Solomon. The condemned man himself, after arguing for some time, was obliged to yield, and said, as he looked at the note: “I knew beforehand that I should lose if that dog of a Christian interfered.” This singular confidence shows the idea entertained by these people of European superiority, and the innate feeling for justice that exists among the fiercest of men.

Kaskambo had written three letters since his detention without receiving any answer: a year had passed. The wretched prisoner, without linen, and in want of all the comforts of life, found his health declining, and gave way to despair. Ivan himself had been ill for some time. The severe Ibrahim, to the major’s great surprise, had however freed the young man from his fetters during his sickness, and still left him at liberty. The major questioning him one day on this matter: “Master,” Ivan said to him, “I have been wanting for a long time to consult you about a plan which has come into my head. I think that I should do well to turn Mahometan.”

“You are certainly going mad!”

“No, I am not mad: this is the only way in which I can be useful to you. The priest has told me that if I were circumcised they could no longer keep me in chains; then I could do you service, procure you at least good food and linen, and at last, who knows? when I am free ... the God of the Russians is great! We shall see....”

“But God Himself will desert you, poor wretch, if you betray Him.”

Kaskambo, even while scolding his servant, could hardly refrain from laughing at his whimsical plan, but, when he went so far as to forbid it formally: “Master,” Ivan answered, “I can no longer obey you, and it would be useless for me to try to hide it from you; it is already done: I have been a Mahometan since the day when you thought I was ill and they took off my chains. I am called Hussein now. What is the harm? Can I not be a Christian again when I wish and when you are free! See, already! I no longer have chains, I can break yours on the first favourable opportunity, and I have a strong hope that it will present itself.”

As a matter of fact, they kept their word to him: he was no longer fettered, and from that time enjoyed greater freedom; but this very freedom was nearly fatal to him. The chief authors of the expedition against Kaskambo soon began to fear that the new Mussulman might desert. His long stay in their midst and his knowledge of their language put him in a position to know them all by name, and to give a description of them to the line if he returned there; which would have exposed them personally to the vengeance of the Russians; they highly disapproved of the priest’s misplaced zeal. On the other hand, the good Mussulmans, who had favoured him from the time of his conversion, noticed that, when he was saying his prayer on the roof of the house, according to custom, and as the mullah had expressly enjoined him, that he might gain the public good-will, he often, through habit and inadvertently, mixed up signs of the cross with the prostrations he made towards Mecca, to which it sometimes happened that he turned his back; this made them doubt the reality of his conversion.

A few months after his pretended apostasy he noticed a great change in his intercourse with the inhabitants, and could not mistake the manifest signs of their ill will. He was vainly seeking to discover its cause, when the young men with whom he chiefly associated came to propose that he should accompany them in an expedition which they intended to undertake. Their plan was to cross the Terek, to attack some merchants who would be going to Mozdok; Ivan agreed to their proposal without hesitation. He had long been desiring to procure himself arms; they promised him a share of the spoils. He thought that when they saw him return to his master’s side the people who suspected him of wishing to desert would no longer have the same reasons for distrusting him. However, the major having strongly opposed the plan, he seemed to be thinking of it no longer, when one morning Kaskambo, on awaking, saw the mat on which Ivan slept rolled up against the wall; he had gone during the night. His companions were to pass the Terek on the following night, and attack the merchants, of whose progress they knew from their spies.

The trustfulness of the Tchetchens ought to have aroused some suspicion in Ivan’s mind: it was not natural that men so wily and suspicious should admit a Russian, their prisoner, into an expedition directed against his compatriots. In fact it transpired from what followed that they had only asked him to accompany them with the intention of assassinating him. As his character of a new convert compelled them to use some caution, they had planned to keep him in sight during the march, and afterwards to rid themselves of him at the instant of attack, letting it be believed that he had been killed in the fight. Only a few members of the expedition were in the secret; but the event upset their calculations. At the moment when the band had laid their ambush to attack the merchants, they were themselves surprised by a regiment of Cossacks, who charged them so vigorously that they had great difficulty in recrossing the river. Their great peril made them forget the plot against Ivan, who followed them in their retreat.

As their disordered troop crossed the Terek, the waters of which are very rapid, a young Tchetchen’s horse broke down in the middle of the river and was immediately carried away by the waves. Ivan, who was following him, urged his horse into the current, at the risk of being carried off himself, and, seizing the young man just when he was disappearing beneath the water, succeeded in bringing him to the opposite shore. The Cossacks, who, favoured by the dawning day, recognized him by his uniform and “furazhka,”[14] aimed at him, shouting: “Deserter! catch the deserter!” His clothes were riddled with bullets. At last, after fighting desperately and firing all his cartridges, he returned to the village with the glory of having saved the life of one of his companions, and been of service to the whole troop.

If his conduct on this occasion did not win over to him the minds of all, it gained him at least one friend; the young man whom he had saved adopted him for his “kunakh” (a sacred title which the Caucasian mountaineers never violate), and swore to defend him against every one. But this intimacy was not sufficient to shelter him from the hatred of the principal inhabitants. The courage which he had just shown, and his attachment to his master, increased the fears with which he had inspired them. They could no longer regard him as a buffoon incapable of any enterprise, as they had done until then; and, when they considered the abortive expedition in which he had taken part, they wondered how Russian troops had happened to be at the right moment in a spot so far from their usual haunts, and suspected that he had had the means of warning them. Although this conjecture was without any real foundation, they watched him more closely. Old Ibrahim himself, fearing some plot for the escape of his prisoners, no longer allowed them to engage in continued conversation, and the honest denshchik was threatened, sometimes even beaten, when he tried to talk to his master.

In this situation, the two prisoners contrived a means of conversing without arousing their keeper’s suspicions. As they were in the habit of singing Russian songs together, the major would take his guitar when he had anything important to communicate to Ivan in Ibrahim’s presence, and sing while he questioned him: the latter answered in the same manner, and his master accompanied him with his guitar. As this arrangement was by no means a novelty, nobody ever noticed a trick which besides they took the precaution to practise only on rare occasions.

More than three months had passed since the unfortunate expedition which has been mentioned, when Ivan fancied that he noticed an unusual disturbance in the village. Some mules loaded with powder had arrived in the plain. The men were cleaning their arms and preparing their cartridges. He soon learnt that a great expedition was on foot. The whole nation was to unite to attack a neighbouring tribe who had put themselves under the protection of the Russians, and had allowed them to build a redoubt on their territory. It was a question of nothing less than exterminating the whole tribe, as well as the Russian battalion which was protecting the building of the fort.

A few days later, Ivan, leaving the hut one morning, found the village deserted. All the men able to bear arms had gone during the night. In the visit which he made to the village to seek news, he obtained fresh proofs of the evil intentions they had against him. The old men avoided talking to him. A little boy told him openly that his father wanted to kill him. Finally, when he was returning very thoughtfully to his master, he saw on the roof of a house a young woman who raised her veil, and, with an appearance of the greatest terror, made signs to him to escape, pointing out the road to Russia; it was the sister of the Tchetchen whom he had saved at the crossing of the Terek.

When he re-entered the house, he found the old man engaged in inspecting Kaskambo’s fetters. A newcomer was seated in the room: it was a man whom an intermittent fever had prevented from accompanying his comrades and who had been sent to Ibrahim to augment the prisoners’ guard till the inhabitants returned. Ivan noticed this precaution without evincing the least surprise. The absence of the men of the village presented a favourable opportunity for the execution of his plans; but the more active vigilance of their keeper, and above all the presence of the fever patient, made success very uncertain. However, his death would be inevitable if he awaited the return of the inhabitants; he foresaw that their expedition would be unsuccessful and that their rage would not spare him. No resource remained for him except either to desert his master or to deliver him immediately. The faithful servant would have died a thousand deaths rather than choose the former alternative.

Kaskambo, who was beginning to lose all hope, had fallen for some time into a kind of stupor, and maintained a profound silence. Ivan, more calm and cheerful than usual, surpassed himself in preparing the meal, and while he did it he sang Russian songs, which he interspersed with words of encouragement to his master.

“The time has come,” he said, adding to each sentence the meaningless refrain of a popular Russian song, “hey lully, hey lully, the time has come to end our misery or to perish. To-morrow, hey lully, we shall be on the way to a town, a pretty town, hey lully, which I will not name. Courage, master! don’t let yourself lose heart. The God of the Russians is great.”

Kaskambo, indifferent alike to life and death, not knowing his denshchik’s plan, contented himself with answering: “Do what you like, and be silent.” Towards evening the fever patient, whom they had entertained bountifully in order to detain him, and who, besides the good meal he had made, had amused himself for the rest of the day with eating “shashlyk,”[15] was seized with such a violent fit of fever, that he left the company and withdrew to his own home. They let him go without much difficulty, Ivan having entirely reassured the old man by his gaiety. The more to remove any kind of suspicion, he retired early to the back of the room and lay down on a bench against the wall, until Ibrahim should fall asleep; but the latter had resolved to stay awake all night. Instead of lying down on the mat by the fire, as he generally did, he sat down on a log opposite his prisoner, and sent away his daughter-in-law, who withdrew to the next room, where her child was, and shut the door after her.

From the dark corner where he had settled himself, Ivan looked attentively at the scene before him. In the light of the fire which flared up from time to time, an axe glittered in a recess of the wall. The old man, overcome by drowsiness, let his head fall at times on his breast. Ivan saw that the time had come, and stood up. The suspicious gaoler noticed it immediately. “What are you doing there?” he asked sharply. Ivan, instead of replying, drew near the fire, yawning like a man waking from a deep sleep. Ibrahim, who himself felt his eyelids growing heavy, ordered Kaskambo to play the guitar to keep him awake. The latter refused, but Ivan handed him the instrument, at the same time making the sign arranged. “Play, master,” he said, “I have something to say to you.” Kaskambo tuned the instrument, and, beginning to sing, they commenced the terrible duet which follows.

KASKAMBO.

“Hey lully, hey lully, what have you to say? Be careful. (At each question, and each answer, they sang together verses of the Russian song following:)

“I am anxious, I am sad,
What to do I cannot tell,
Him I wait whom I love well,
Lonely watch I for my lad.
Hey lully, hey lully,
’Tis sad without my dearie.”

IVAN.

“See that axe,—don’t look at it. Hey lully, hey lully, I’ll split this rascal’s head.

“Here I sit and spin apart,
Breaks the thread my hand within:
Ah! to-morrow I will spin,
Now I am too sad at heart.
Hey lully, hey lully,
Oh, where can be my dearie?”

KASKAMBO.

“A useless slaughter! hey lully, how could I fly with my fetters?

“As a calf its mother’s side,
As a shepherd seeks his flocks,
As a kid, beneath the rocks,
Seeks the grass in sweet spring-tide,
Hey lully, hey lully,
So seek I for my dearie.”

IVAN.

“The key of the fetters will be in the brigand’s pocket.

“When I hie at break of day,
With my pitcher, to the well,—
How it is I cannot tell!—
Still my feet seek out the way,
Hey lully, hey lully,
That leads me to my dearie.”

KASKAMBO.

“The woman will give the alarm, hey lully.

“Waiting, ah! what grief I prove,
He, ingrate, elsewhere is gay,
Maybe false he doth me play,
Happy with another love.
Hey lully, hey lully,
Can I have lost my dearie?”

IVAN.

“It will happen as it may: will you not die all the same, hey lully, of misery and starvation?

“Ah, if false he be indeed,
If he pass me by some day,
Let the village burn away,
And on me the fierce flames feed!
Hey lully, hey lully,
Why live without my dearie?”

The old man becoming attentive, they redoubled the hey lully, accompanied by a noisy arpeggio: “Play, master,” continued the denshchik, “play the Cossack dance; I am going to dance round the room so as to get near the axe; play boldly.”

KASKAMBO.

“Well, be it so; this hell will be ended.”

He turned away his head and began with all his might to play the required dance.

Ivan began the steps and grotesque attitudes of the Cossack dance, which the old man especially liked, leaping and gambolling, and uttering cries to distract his attention. When Kaskambo felt that the dancer was near the axe, his heart throbbed with anxiety: this means of their deliverance was in a little cupboard without a door, contrived within the wall, but at a height to which Ivan could hardly reach. To have it within his reach, he took advantage of a favourable moment, seized it suddenly and at once placed it on the ground in the shadow cast by Ibrahim’s body. When the latter looked at him, he was far from the place, and continuing his dance. This dangerous scene had lasted for some time, and Kaskambo, weary of playing, began to think that his denshchik’s courage was failing, or that he did not think it a favourable opportunity. He glanced at him at the instant when, having seized the axe, the intrepid dancer was steadily advancing to strike the brigand with it. The emotion felt by the major was so strong, that he stopped playing, and let his guitar fall on his knees. At the same moment, the old man had stooped, and made a step forward to push some brushwood into the fire: some dry leaves burst into flame, and cast a bright glow into the room. Ibrahim turned round to sit down.

If, at this juncture, Ivan had pursued his enterprise, a hand-to-hand fight would have been inevitable: the alarm would have been given, which above all it was needful to avoid; but his presence of mind saved him. When he noticed the major’s confusion, and saw Ibrahim rise, he placed the axe behind the very log which served as a seat to the latter, and recommenced his dance. “Play, confound it!” he said to his master; “what are you thinking of?” The major, realizing how unwise he had been, began to play again softly. The old gaoler had no suspicion, and sat down again; but he ordered them to finish the music and lie down. Ivan, quietly going and taking the guitar-case, came and placed it on the hearth; but, instead of taking the instrument which his master held out to him, he suddenly snatched the axe from behind Ibrahim, and dealt him such a frightful blow on the head, that the unhappy man did not even utter a sigh, but fell stark dead, his face in the fire; his long grey beard began to blaze; Ivan pulled him out by the feet and covered him with a mat.

They were listening, to find out if the woman had been awakened, when, surprised no doubt at the silence which reigned after so much noise, she opened the door of her room: “What are you doing in here?” she said, advancing towards the prisoners; “how is it that there is a smell of burnt feathers?” The fire had just been scattered and gave hardly any light. Ivan raised the axe to strike her; she had time to turn her head, and received the blow on her breast, uttering a frightful sigh; another blow, swifter than lightning, caught her as she fell, and stretched her dead at Kaskambo’s feet. Terrified by this second murder, which he had not expected, the major, seeing Ivan advance towards the child’s room, placed himself in the way to stop him. “Where are you going, wretched man?” he said; “would you be so barbarous as to sacrifice the child too, who has shown me such friendship? If you set me free at this price, neither your attachment nor your services shall save you when we reach the line.”

“At the line,” answered Ivan, “you can do as you like; but here we must make an end.”

Kaskambo, collecting all his strength, collared him as he attempted to force his passage. “Wretch,” he said, “if you dare to attempt his life, if you touch a single hair of his head, I swear here before God that I will give myself up into the hands of the Tchetchens, and your barbarity will be in vain.”

“Into the hands of the Tchetchens!” repeated the denshchik, raising his bloody axe above his master’s head; “they shall never recapture you alive; I will slay them, you and myself, before that happens. This child might ruin us by giving the alarm; in your present state, women would be enough to put you back in prison.”

“Stop! stop!” cried Kaskambo, from whose hands Ivan was trying to free himself. “Stop! monster, you shall murder me before committing this crime!”

But, impeded by his chains and weak as he was, he could not restrain the ferocious young man, who thrust him back, so that he fell violently to the ground, ready to faint from bewilderment and horror. While, all stained with the blood of the first victims, he was attempting to rise, “Ivan,” he cried, “I implore you, do not kill him! In the name of God, do not spill the blood of that innocent creature!”

He ran to the help of the child as soon as he had the strength; but when he reached the door of the room he knocked in the darkness against Ivan coming out.

“All is over, master; let us lose no time, and don’t make a noise. Don’t make a noise, I tell you,” he answered to his master’s despairing reproaches: “what’s done is done; it is impossible to draw back now. Until we are free, every man I meet is dead, or else he must kill me; and if any one comes in here before our departure, I don’t care whether it is a man, a woman, or a child, a friend or an enemy, I lay him there with the others.”

He lighted a splinter of larch and began to rummage in the brigand’s cartridge-box and pockets; the key of the fetters was not there: he sought for it as vainly in the woman’s clothes, in a chest, and wherever he fancied it could be hidden. Whilst he made this search, the major gave himself up without restraint to his grief. Ivan comforted him in his own way. “You would do better,” he said, “to weep for the key of the fetters which is lost. Why should you regret this race of brigands, who have tortured you for more than fifteen months? They wanted to put us to death, well! their turn has come before ours. Is it my fault? May hell swallow them all!”

However, as the key of the fetters was not to be found, so many slaughters would be in vain if they could not manage to break them. Ivan, with the corner of the axe, succeeded in loosening the ring on the hand, but that which fastened the chain to the feet resisted all his efforts; he was afraid of hurting his master, and dared not use all his strength. On the other hand, the night was advancing, and the danger became urgent; they decided to go. Ivan fastened the chain firmly to the major’s belt, so that it impeded him as little as possible, and made no noise. He placed in a wallet a quarter of mutton, the remains of the evening meal, added to it some other provisions, and armed himself with the dead man’s pistol and dagger. Kaskambo took possession of his “burka”;[16] they went out in silence, and, going round the house to avoid meeting any one, they took the path into the mountains, instead of going towards Mozdok and the ordinary road, easily foreseeing that they would be pursued in that direction. For the rest of the night they tramped along the mountains that lay on their right, and when day began to dawn they entered a beech wood which crowned the whole mountain, and sheltered them from the danger of being seen from a distance.

It was in the month of February; the ground, on these heights, and especially in the forest, was still covered with a hard snow which supported the travellers’ steps during the night and part of the morning; but towards midday, when it had been softened by the sun, they sank at every instant, which made their progress very slow. Thus they reached laboriously the side of a deep valley which they had to cross, in the depths of which the snow had disappeared; a beaten path followed the windings of the stream, and proclaimed that the place was frequented. On this account, and because of the fatigue which overwhelmed the major, the travellers decided to remain in that spot to wait for the night; they settled down between some isolated rocks which projected from the snow. Ivan cut down some pine-branches to make from them, on the snow, a thick bed, on which the major slept. While he rested, Ivan tried to find out where they were. The valley at the summit of which they were was surrounded by lofty mountains between which no outlet was visible: he saw that it was impossible to avoid the beaten track, and that they must of necessity follow the course of the stream in order to get out of the labyrinth. It was about eleven o’clock at night, and the snow was beginning to harden again, when they descended into the valley. But before beginning their journey they set fire to their shelter, as much to warm themselves as to prepare a little meal of shashlyk, of which they were in great need. A handful of snow was their drink, and a mouthful of brandy finished the feast. They crossed the valley, luckily without seeing anyone, and entered the pass where the path and the stream were confined between steep perpendicular mountains. They walked with all possible speed, knowing well the danger they ran of being met in this narrow passage, out of which they only emerged towards nine o’clock in the morning.

It was then only that the dark pass suddenly opened out, and that they saw, beyond the lower mountains which intersected in front of them, the immense horizon of Russia, like a distant sea. It would be difficult to form an idea of the joy felt by the major at this unexpected sight. “Russia! Russia!” was the only word he could pronounce. The travellers sat down to rest and to enjoy beforehand their approaching freedom. This anticipation of happiness was mingled in the major’s mind with the memory of the horrible catastrophe which he had just witnessed, and which his fetters and blood-stained clothes recalled to him vividly. With eyes fixed on the distant goal of his labours, he calculated the difficulties of the journey. The sight of the long and dangerous road which remained for him to travel with fettered feet and legs swollen with fatigue, soon obliterated even the trace of the momentary pleasure which the sight of his native land had given him. To the torments of imagination was added a burning thirst. Ivan went down to the stream which flowed some way off to bring some water to his master; he found there a bridge made of two trees and saw far off a dwelling. It was a kind of chalet, a summer house of the Tchetchens which happened to be empty. In the plight of the fugitives, this isolated house was a precious discovery. Ivan came to tear his master away from his reflections, in order to lead him into the refuge which he had just discovered, and after having settled him there he at once began to look for the store.

The inhabitants of the Caucasus, who, for the most part, are half nomads and often exposed to attacks from their neighbours, always have near their houses caves, in which they hide their provisions and goods. These stores, formed like narrow wells, are closed with a plank or large stone carefully covered with earth, and are always placed in spots where turf is wanting, for fear the colour of the grass should betray the deposit. In spite of these precautions, the Russian soldiers often discover them; they strike the earth with the ramrods of their guns in the beaten paths which are near dwellings, and the sound indicates the hollows which they seek. Ivan found one under a shed adjoining the house, in which he discovered earthenware pots, some ears of maize, a piece of rock-salt and several household utensils. He ran to fetch water for cooking purposes; the quarter of mutton and some potatoes which he had brought were placed on the fire. While the soup was preparing, Kaskambo roasted the ears of maize: finally, some hazelnuts also found in the store completed the meal. When he had finished, Ivan, with more time and means, succeeded in freeing his master from his chains; and the latter, calmer, and revived by a meal excellent under the circumstances, slept soundly, and it was deep night when he awoke. In spite of this favourable rest, when he wanted to continue his journey, his swollen legs were so stiff that he could not make the least movement without suffering unbearable pain. However, he had to go. Leaning on his servant, he set out mournfully, convinced that he would never reach the longed-for goal. The motion and the heat of walking appeased little by little the pain he was suffering. He walked all night, often stopping, and then immediately recommencing his march. Sometimes also, giving way to discouragement, he threw himself on the ground, and urged Ivan to leave him to his evil fate. His dauntless companion not only encouraged him by his talk and example, but almost used violence to raise and drag him along with him. They found in their journey a difficult and dangerous pass, which they could not avoid. To wait for day would have caused an irreparable loss of time; they decided to cross it at the risk of being dashed to pieces, but, before allowing his master to enter upon it, Ivan wished to reconnoitre and go over it alone. While he descended, Kaskambo stayed on the brink of the rock in a state of anxiety difficult to describe. The night was dark; he heard beneath his feet the dull murmur of a rapid stream which flowed through the valley; the sound of the stones loosened from the mountain under his companion’s tread, and falling into the water, made him aware of the immense depth of the precipice on the edge of which he had stopped. In this moment of anguish, which might perhaps be the last of his life, the memory of his mother returned to his mind; she had tenderly blessed him on his departure from the line; this thought restored his courage. A secret presentiment gave him the hope of seeing her again. “O God!” he cried, “grant that her blessing may not be in vain!” As he was ending this short but fervent prayer, Ivan reappeared. The pass when surveyed was not so difficult as they had thought at first. After climbing down several fathoms between the rocks, it was necessary, in order to reach the practicable side, to walk along a narrow sloping ledge of rock, covered with slippery snow, beneath which was a sheer precipice. Ivan with his axe cut in the snow holes which made the passage easier: they crossed themselves. “Come then,” said Kaskambo, “if I perish, at least let it not be for want of courage; it was only illness that took that from me. I will go on now as long as God gives me strength.” They emerged successfully from the dangerous pass and continued their journey. The paths began to be more continuous and well-beaten, and they no longer found any snow except in places looking north, and on low-lying ground where it had accumulated. They had the good fortune to meet nobody until daybreak, when the sight of two men appearing in the distance obliged them to lie down on the ground so that they might not be seen.

When the mountains are left behind in these provinces, woods are no longer to be found; the ground there is absolutely bare, and a single tree would be vainly sought, except on the banks of the large rivers, where still they are very scarce, a most extraordinary thing, considering the fertility of the soil. They had for some time been following the course of the Sudja, which they had to cross to reach Mozdok, seeking a place where the water, less rapid, would offer a safer passage, when they saw a man on horseback coming straight towards them. The country, completely open, offered neither trees nor bushes as a means of hiding. They lay flat down under the bank of the Sudja, on the edge of the water. The traveller passed within a few fathoms of their lair. They intended only to defend themselves if they were attacked. Ivan drew his dagger and gave the pistol to the major. Seeing then that the rider was only a child of twelve or thirteen, he hurled himself suddenly upon him, collared him, and threw him down on the grass. The youth would have resisted, but, seeing the major appear on the river-bank, pistol in hand, he fled at full speed. The horse had no saddle, and a halter passed through its mouth by way of bridle. The two fugitives at once made use of their capture to cross the river. This encounter was very fortunate for them, for they soon saw that it would have been impossible for them to pass it on foot, as they had purposed. Their mount, although burdened with the weight of two men, was almost carried away by the swiftness of the water. However, they arrived safe and sound at the opposite shore, which unfortunately was too steep for the horse to be able to land. They got off to lighten it. As Ivan pulled with all his might to enable it to mount upon the shore, the halter came unfastened and remained in his hands. The animal, swept away by the current, after many efforts to land, was swallowed up in the river, and drowned.

Deprived of this resource, but from this time less troubled as to the danger of pursuit, they made for a hillock, covered with loose rocks, which they saw in the distance, intending to hide themselves and rest there until night. From their reckoning of the distance they had already travelled, they judged that the dwellings of the peaceful Tchetchens ought not to be very far away; but nothing could be more unsafe than to give themselves up to these men, whose probable treachery might be their undoing.

However, considering the weak state of Kaskambo, it would be very difficult for him to reach the Terek unaided. Their provisions were exhausted: they passed the rest of the day in gloomy silence, not daring to reveal their anxieties to each other. Towards evening, the major saw his denshchik strike his brow with his fist, uttering a deep sigh. Astonished at this sudden despair, which his dauntless companion had in no way evinced until then, he asked him the reason of it.