TALES

FROM

“BLACKWOOD”

Contents of this Volume

[The Surveyor’s Tale.] By Professor Aytoun.

[The Forrest-Race Romance.]

[Di Vasari: A Tale of Florence.] By the late
Charles Edwards, Esq.

[Sigismund Fatello.]

[The Boxes.]

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS

EDINBURGH AND LONDON

TALES FROM “BLACKWOOD.”

——◆——

THE SURVEYOR’S TALE.

BY PROFESSOR AYTOUN.

[MAGA. April 1846.]

Good resolutions are, like glass, manufactured for the purpose of being broken. Immediately after my marriage, I registered in the books of my conscience a very considerable vow against any future interference with the railway system. The Biggleswade speculation had turned out so well that I thought it unsafe to pursue my fortune any further. The incipient gambler, I am told, always gains, through the assistance of a nameless personage who shuffles the cards a great deal oftener than many materialists suppose. Nevertheless, there is always a day of retribution.

I wish I had adhered to my original orthodox determination. During the whole period of the honeymoon, I remained blameless as to shares. Uncle Scripio relinquished the suggestion of “dodges” in despair. He was, as usual, brimful of projects, making money by the thousand, and bearing or bulling, as the case might be, with genuine American enthusiasm. I believe he thought me a fool for remaining so easily contented, and very soon manifested no further symptom of his consciousness of my existence than by transmitting me regularly a copy of the Railway Gazette, with some mysterious pencil-markings at the list of prices, which I presume he intended for my guidance in the case of an alteration of sentiment. For some time I never looked at them. When a man is newly married, he has a great many other things to think of. Mary had a decided genius for furniture, and used to pester me perpetually with damask curtains, carved-wood chairs, gilt lamps, and a whole wilderness of household paraphernalia, about which, in common courtesy, I was compelled to affect an interest. Now, to a man like myself, who never had any fancy for upholstery, this sort of thing is very tiresome. My wife might have furnished the drawing-room after the pattern of the Cham of Tartary’s for anything I cared, provided she had left me in due ignorance of the proceeding; but I was not allowed to escape so comfortably. I looked over carpet-patterns and fancy papers innumerable, mused upon all manner of bell-pulls, and gave judgment between conflicting rugs, until the task became such a nuisance that I was fain to take refuge in the sacred sanctuary of my club. Young women should be particularly careful against boring an accommodating spouse. Of all places in the world, a club is the surest focus of speculation. You meet gentlemen there who hold stock in every line in the kingdom—directors, committee-men, and even crack engineers. I defy you to continue an altogether uninterested auditor of the fascinating intelligence of Mammon. In less than a week my vow was broken, and a new liaison commenced with the treacherous Delilah of scrip. As nine-tenths of my readers have been playing the same identical game towards the close of last year, it would be idle to recount to them the various vicissitudes of the market. It is a sore subject with most of us—a regular undeniable case of “infandum regina.” The only comfort is, that our fingers were simultaneously burned.

Amongst other transactions, I had been induced by my old friend Cutts, now in practice as an independent engineer, to apply for a large allocation of shares in the Slopperton Valley, a very spirited undertaking, for which the Saxon (as we used to call him) was engaged to invent the gradients. This occurred about the commencement of the great Potato Revolution—an event which I apprehend will be long remembered by the squirearchy and shareholders of these kingdoms. The money-market was beginning to exhibit certain symptoms of tightness; premiums were melting perceptibly away, and new schemes were in diminished favour. Under these circumstances, the Provisional Committee of the Slopperton Valley Company were beneficent enough to gratify my wishes to the full, and accorded to me the large privilege of three hundred original shares. Two months earlier this would have been equivalent to a fortune—as it was, I must own that my gratitude was hardly commensurate to the high generosity of the donors. I am not sure that I did not accompany the receipt of my letter of allocation with certain expletives by no means creditable to the character of the projectors—at all events, I began to look with a milder eye upon the atrocities of Pennsylvanian repudiation. However, as the crash was by no means certain, my sanguine temperament overcame me, and in a fit of temporary derangement I paid the deposit.

In the ensuing week the panic became general. Capel-court was deserted by its herd—Liverpool in a fearful state of commercial coma—Glasgow trembling throughout its Gorbals—and Edinburgh paralytically shaking. The grand leading doctrine of political economy once more was recognised as a truth: the supply exorbitantly exceeded the demand, and there were no buyers. The daily share-list became a far more pathetic document in my eyes than the Sorrows of Werter. The circular of my brokers, Messrs Tine and Transfer, contained a tragedy more woful than any of the conceptions of Shakespeare—the agonies of blighted love are a joke compared with those of baffled avarice; and of all kinds of consumption, that of the purse is the most severe. One circumstance, however, struck me as somewhat curious. Neither in share-list nor circular could I find any mention made of the Slopperton Valley. It seemed to have risen like an exhalation, and to have departed in similar silence. This boded ill for the existence of the £750 I had so idiotically invested, the recuperation whereof, in whole or in part, became the subject of my nightly meditations; and as correspondence in such matters is usually unsatisfactory, I determined to start personally in search of my suspended deposit.

I did not know a single individual of the Slopperton Provisional Committee, but I was well enough acquainted with Cutts, whose present residence was in a midland county of England, where the work of railway construction was going actively forward. As I drove into the town where the Saxon had established his headquarters, I saw with feelings of peculiar disgust immense gangs of cut-throat-looking fellows—“the navvies of the nations,” as Alfred Tennyson calls them—busy at their embankments, absorbing capital at an alarming ratio, and utterly indifferent to the state of the unfortunate shareholders then writhing under the pressure of calls. Philanthropy is a very easy thing when our own circumstances are prosperous, but a turn of the wheel of fortune gives a different complexion to our views. If I had been called upon two months earlier to pronounce an oration upon the vast benefits of general employment and high wages, I should have launched out con amore. Now, the spectacle which I beheld suggested no other idea than that of an enormous cheese fast hastening to decomposition and decay beneath the nibbling of myriads of mites.

I found Cutts in his apartment of the hotel in the unmolested enjoyment of a cigar. He seemed fatter, and a little more red in the gills, than when I saw him last, otherwise there was no perceptible difference.

“Hallo, old fellow!” cried the Saxon, pitching away a pile of estimates; “what the mischief has brought you up here? Waiter—a bottle of sherry! You wouldn’t prefer something hot at this hour of the morning, would you?”

“Certainly not.”

“Ay—you’re a married man now. How’s old Morgan? Lord! what fun we had at Shrewsbury when I helped you to your wife!”

“So far as I recollect, Mr Cutts, you nearly finished that business. But I want to have a serious talk with you about other matters. What has become of that confounded Slopperton Valley, for which you were engineer?”

“Slopperton Valley! Haven’t you heard about it? The whole concern was wound up about three weeks ago. Take a glass of wine.”

“Wound up? Why, this is most extraordinary. I never received any circular!”

“I thought as much,” said Cutts, very coolly. “That’s precisely what I said to old Hasherton, the chairman, the day after the secretary bolted. I told him he should send round notice to the fellows at a distance, warning them not to cash up; but it seems that the list of subscribers had gone amissing, and so the thing was left to rectify itself.”

“Bolted! You don’t mean Mr Glanders, of the respectable firm of Glanders and Co.?”

“Of course I do. I wonder you have not heard of it. That comes of living in a confounded country where there are neither breeches nor newspapers—help yourself—and no direct railway communication. Glanders bolted as a matter of course, and I can tell you that I thought myself very lucky in getting hold of as much of the deposits as cleared my preliminary expenses.”

“Cutts—are you serious?”

“Perfectly. But what’s the use of making a row about it? You look as grim as if there was verjuice in the sherry. You ought to thank your stars that the thing was put a stop to so soon.”

“Why—didn’t you recommend me to apply for shares?”

“Of course I did, and I wonder you don’t feel grateful for the advice. Everybody thought they would have come out at a high premium. I would not have taken six pounds for them in the month of September; but this infernal potato business has brought on the panic, and nobody will table a shilling for any kind of new stock. It was a lucky thing for us that we got a kind of hint to draw in our horns in time.”

“And pray, since the concern is wound up, as you say, how much of our deposit-money will be returned?”

“You don’t mean to say,” said Cutts, with singularly elaborate articulation—“You don’t mean to say that you were such an inconceivable ass as to pay up your letter of allotment? Well, I never heard of such a piece of deliberate infatuation! Why, man, a blacksmith with half an eye must have seen that the game was utterly up a week before the calls were due. I don’t think there is a single man out of Scotland who would have made such a fool of himself; indeed, so far as I know, nobody cashed up except a dozen old women who knew nothing about the matter, and ten landed proprietors, who expected compensation, and deserved to be done accordingly. You need not look as though you meditated razors. The Biggleswade profits will pay for this more than thirty times over.”

“I’ll tell you what, Cutts,” said I in a paroxysm, “this is a most nefarious transaction, and I’m hanged if I don’t take the law with every one connected with it. I’ll make an example of that fellow Hasherton, and the whole body of the committee.”

“Just as you like,” replied the imperturbable Cutts. “You’re a lawyer, and the best judge of those sort of things. I may, however, as well inform you that Hasherton went into the Gazette last week, and that you won’t find another member of the committee at this moment within the four seas of Great Britain.”

“And pray, may I ask how you came to be connected with so discreditable a project? Do you know that it is enough to blast your own reputation for ever?”

“I know nothing of the kind,” said the Saxon, commencing another cigar. “I look to the matter of employment, and have nothing to do with the character of my clients, beyond ascertaining their means of liquidating my account. The committee required the assistance of a first-rate engineer, and I flatter myself they could hardly have made a more unexceptionable selection. But what’s the use of looking sulky about it? You can’t help yourself; and, after all, what’s the amount of your loss? A parcel of pound-notes that would have lain rotting in the bank had you not put them into circulation! Cheer up, Fred, you’ve made at least one individual very happy. Glanders is going it in New York. I shouldn’t be surprised if half your deposit-money is already invested in mint-juleps, gin-slings, and sherry-cobblers.”

“It is very easy for you to talk, Mr Cutts,” said I, with considerable acrimony. “Your account, at all events, appears to have been paid. Doubtless you looked sharply after that. I cannot help putting my own construction upon the conduct of a gentleman who makes a direct profit out of the misfortunes of his friends.”

“You affect me deeply,” said Cutts, applying himself diligently to the decanter; “but you don’t drink. Do you know you put me a good deal in mind of Macready? Did you ever hear him in Lear,

‘How sharper than a serpent’s thanks it is
To have a toothless child?’

You’re remarkably unjust, Fred, as you will acknowledge in your cooler moments. I am hurt by your ingratitude—I am,” and the sympathising engineer buried his face in the folds of a Bandana handkerchief.

I knew, by old experience, that it was of no use to get into a rage with Cutts. After all, I had no tenable ground of complaint against him; for the payment of the deposit-money was my own deliberate act, and it was no fault of his that the shares were not issued at a premium. I therefore contrived to swallow, as I best could, my indignation, though it was no easy matter. Seven hundred and fifty pounds is a serious sum, and would have gone a long way towards the furnishing of a respectable domicile.

I believe that Cutts, though he never allowed himself to exhibit a symptom of ordinary regret, was internally annoyed at the confounded scrape in which I was landed by following his advice. At all events he soon ceased comporting himself after the manner of the comforters of Job, and finally undertook to look after my interest in case any fragment of the deposits could be rescued from the hands of the Philistines. I have since had a letter from him with the information that he has recovered a hundred pounds—a friendly exertion which shall be duly acknowledged so soon as I receive a remittance, which, however, has not yet come to hand.

By the time we had finished the sherry, I was restored, if not to good-humour, at least to a state of passive resignation. The Saxon gave strict orders that he was to be denied to everybody, and made some incoherent proposals about “making a forenoon of it,” which, however, I peremptorily declined.

“It’s a very hard thing,” said Cutts, “but I see it’s an invariable rule that matrimony and good-fellowship can never go together. You’re not half the brick you used to be, Fred; but I suppose it can’t be helped. There’s a degree of slow-coachiness about you which I take to be peculiarly distressing, and if you don’t take care it will become a confirmed habit.”

“Seven hundred and fifty pounds—what! all my pretty chickens and their——”

“Don’t swear! it’s a highly immoral practice. At all events you’ll dine with me to-day at six. You shall have as much claret as you can conscientiously desire, and, for company, I have got the queerest fellow here you ever set eyes on. You used to pull the long bow with considerable effect, but this chap beats you hollow.”

“Who is he?”

“How should I know? He calls himself Leopold Young Mandeville—is a surveyor by trade, and has been working abroad at some outlandish line or another for the last two years. He is a very fair hand at the compasses, and so I have got him here by way of assistant. You may think him rather dull at first, but wait till he has finished a pint, and I’m shot if he don’t astonish you. Now, if you will have nothing more, we may as well go out, and take a ride by way of appetiser.”

At six o’clock I received the high honour of an introduction to Mr Young Mandeville. As I really consider this gentleman one of the most remarkable personages of the era in which we live, I may perhaps be excused if I assume the privilege of an acquaintance, and introduce him also to the reader. The years of Mr Mandeville could hardly have exceeded thirty. His stature was considerably above the average of mankind, and would have been greater save for the geometrical curvature of his lower extremities, which gave him all the appearance of a walking parenthesis. His hair was black and streaky; his complexion atrabilious; his voice slightly raucous, like that of a tragedian contending with a cold. The eye was a very fine one—that is, the right eye—for the other optic was evidently internally damaged, and shone with an opalescent lustre. There was a kind of native dignity about the man which impressed me favourably, notwithstanding the reserved manner in which he exchanged the preliminary courtesies.

Cutts did the honours of the table with his usual alacrity. The dinner was a capital one, and the wine not only abundant but unexceptionable. At first, however, the conversation flowed but languidly. My spirits had not yet recovered from the appalling intelligence of the morning; nor could I help reflecting, with a certain uneasiness, upon the reception I was sure to meet with from certain brethren in the Outer House, to whom, in a moment of rash confidence, I had intrusted the tale of my dilemma. I abhor roasting in my own person, and yet I knew I should have enough of it. Mandeville ate on steadily, like one labouring under the conviction that he thereby performed a good and meritorious action, and scorning to mix up extraneous matter with the main object of his exertions. The Saxon awaited his time, and steadily circulated the champagne.

We all got more loquacious after the cloth was removed. A good dinner reconciles one amazingly to the unhappy chances of our lot; and, before the first bottle was emptied, I had tacitly forgiven every one of the Provisional Committee of the Slopperton Railway Company, with the exception of the villanous Glanders, who, for anything I knew, might, at that moment, be transatlantically regaling himself at my particular expense. His guilt was of course inexpiable. Mandeville, having eat like an ogre, began to drink like a dromedary. Both the dark and the opalescent eye sparkled with unusual fire, and with a sigh of philosophic fervour he unbuttoned the extremities of his waistcoat.

“Help yourselves, my boys,” said the jovial Cutts; “there’s lots of time before us between this and the broiled bones. By Jove, I’m excessively thirsty! I say, Mandeville, were you ever in Scotland? I hear great things of the claret there.”

“I never had that honour,” replied Mr Young Mandeville, “which I particularly regret, for I have a high—may I say the highest?—respect for that intelligent country, and indeed claim a remote connection with it. I admire the importance which Scotsmen invariably attach to pure blood and ancient descent. It is a proof, Mr Cutts, that with them the principles of chivalry are not extinct, and that the honours which should be paid to birth alone, are not indiscriminately lavished upon the mere acquisition of wealth.”

“Which means, I suppose, that a lot of rubbishy ancestors is better than a fortune in the funds. Well—every man according to his own idea. I am particularly glad to say, that I understand no nonsense of the kind. There’s Fred, however, will keep you in countenance. He says—but I’ll be hanged if I believe it—that he is descended from some old king or another, who lived before the invention of breeches.”

“Cutts—don’t be a fool!”

“Oh, by Jove, it’s quite true!” said the irreverent Saxon; “you used to tell me about it every night when you were half-seas over at Shrewsbury. It was capital fun to hear you, about the mixing of the ninth tumbler.”

“Excuse me, sir,” said Mr Mandeville, with an appearance of intense interest—“do you indeed reckon kindred with the royal family of Scotland? I have a particular reason personal to myself in the inquiry.”

“Why, if you really want to know about it,” said I, looking, I suppose, especially foolish, for Cutts was evidently trotting me out, and I more than half suspected his companion—“I do claim—but it’s a ridiculous thing to talk of—a lineal descent from a daughter of William the Lion.”

“You delight me!” said Mr Mandeville. “The connection is highly respectable—I have myself some of that blood in my veins, though perhaps of a little older date than yours; for one of my ancestors, Ulric of Mandeville, married a daughter of Fergus the First. I am very glad indeed to make the acquaintance of a relative after the lapse of so many centuries.”

I returned a polite bow to the salutation of my new-found cousin, and wished him at the bottom of the Euxine.

“Will you pardon me, Mr Cutts, if I ask my kinsman a question or two upon family affairs? The older cadets of the royal blood have seldom an opportunity of meeting.”

“Fire away,” said the Saxon, “but be done with it as soon as you can.”

“Reduced as we are,” continued Mr Mandeville, addressing himself to me, “in numbers as well as circumstances, it appears highly advisable that we should maintain some intercourse with each other for the preservation of our common rights. These, as we well know, had their origin before the institution of Parliaments, and therefore are by no means fettered or impugned by any of the popular enactments of a later age. Now, as you are a lawyer, I should like to have your opinion on a point of some consequence. Did you ever happen to meet our cousin, Count Ferguson of the Roman Empire?”

“Never heard of him in my life,” said I.

“Any relation of the fellow who couldn’t get into the lodging-house?” asked Cutts.

“I do not think so, Mr Cutts,” replied Mandeville, mildly. “I had the pleasure of making the Count’s acquaintance at Vienna. He is, I apprehend, the only heir-male extant to the Scottish crown, being descended from Prince Fergus and a daughter of Queen Boadicea. Now, you and I, though younger cadets, and somewhat nearer in succession, merely represent females, and have therefore little interest beyond a remote contingency. But I understand it is the fact that the ancient destination to the Scottish crown is restricted to heirs-male solely; and therefore I wish to know, whether, as the Stuarts have failed, the Count is not entitled to claim in right of his undoubted descent?”

I was petrified at the audacity of the man. Either he was the most consummately impudent scoundrel I ever had the fortune to meet, or a complete monomaniac! I looked him steadily in the face. The fine black eye was bent upon me with an expression of deep interest, and something uncommonly like a tear was quivering in the lash. Palpable monomania!

“It seems a very doubtful question,” said I. “Before answering it, I should like to see the Count’s papers, and take a look at our older records.”

“That means, you want to be fee’d,” said Cutts. “I’ll tell you what, my lads, I’ll stand this sort of nonsense no longer. Confound your Fergusons and Boadiceas! One would think, to hear you talk, that you were not a couple of as ordinary individuals as ever stepped upon shoe-leather, but princes of the blood-royal in disguise. Help yourselves, I say, and give us something else.”

“I fear, Mr Cutts,” said Mandeville, in a deep and choky voice, “that you have had too little experience of the vicissitudes of the world to appreciate our situation. You spoke of a prince. Know, sir, that you see before you one who has known that dignity, but who never shall know it more! O Amalia, Amalia!—dear wife of my bosom—where art thou now! Pardon me, kinsman—your hand—I do not often betray this weakness, but my heart is full, and I needs must give way to its emotion.” So saying, the unfortunate Mandeville bowed down his head and wept; at least, so I concluded, from a succession of severe eructations.

I did not know what to make of him. Of all the hallucinations I ever had witnessed, this was the most strange and unaccountable. Cutts, with great coolness, manufactured a stiff tumbler of brandy and water, which he placed at the elbow of the ex-potentate, and exhorted him to make a clean breast of it.

“What’s the use of snivelling about the past?” said he. “It’s a confounded loss of time. Come, Mandeville, toss off your liquor like a Trojan, and tell us all about it, if you have anything like a rational story to tell. We’ll give you credit for the finer feelings, and all that sort of nonsense—only look sharp.”

Upon this hint the Surveyor spoke, applying himself at intervals to the reeking potable beside him. I shall give his story in his own words, without any commentary.

“I feel, gentlemen, that I owe to you, and more especially to my new-found kinsman, some explanation of circumstances, the mere recollection of which can agitate me so cruelly. You seemed surprised when I told you of the rank which I once occupied, and no doubt you think it is a strange contrast to the situation in which you now behold me. Alas, gentlemen! the history of Europe, during the last half-century, can furnish you with many parallel cases. Louis Philippe has, ere now, like myself, earned his bread by mathematical exertion—Young Gustavson—Henry of Bourbon, are exiles! the sceptre has fallen from the hands of the chivalrous house of Murat! Minor principalities are changed or absorbed, unnoticed amidst the war and clash of the great world around them! Thrones are eclipsed like stars, and vanish from the political horizon.

“Do not misunderstand me, gentlemen—I claim no such hereditary honours. I am the last representative of an ancient and glorious race, who cut their way to distinction with their swords on the field of battle. Roger de Mandeville, bearer of the ducal standard at the red fight of Hastings, was the first of my name who set foot upon English ground. Since then, there is not an era in the history of our country which does not bear witness to some achievement of the stalwart Mandevilles. The Crusades—Cressy—Poitiers—and—pardon me, kinsman—Flodden, were the theatres of our renown.

“I dare not trust myself to speak of the broad lands and castles which we once possessed. These have long since passed away from us. A Birmingham artisan, whose churl ancestor would have deemed it an honour to run beside the stirrup of my forefathers, now dwells in the hall of the Mandeville. The spear is broken, and the banner mouldered. Nothing remains, save in the chancel of the roofless church a recumbent marble effigy, with folded hands, of that stout Sir Godfrey of Mandeville who stormed the breach of Ascalon!

“I was heir to nothing but the name. Of my early struggles I need not tell you. A proud and indomitable heart yet beat within this bosom; and though some of the ancient nobility of England, who knew and lamented my position, were not backward in their offers, I could not bring myself in any one instance to accept of eleemosynary assistance. Even the colours which were spontaneously offered to me by the great Captain of the age, were rejected, though not ungratefully. Had there been war, Britain should have found me foremost in her ranks as a volunteer, but I could not wear the livery of a soldier so long as the blade seemed undissolubly soldered to the sheath. I spurned at the empty frivolity of the mess-room, and despised every other bivouac save that upon the field of battle.

“In brief, gentlemen, I preferred the field of science, which was still open to me, and became an engineer. Mr Cutts, whose great acquirements and brilliant genius have raised him to such eminence in the profession”—here Cutts made a grateful salaam—“can bear testimony to the humble share of talent I have laid at the national disposal; and if you, my kinsman, are connected with any of the incipient enterprises in the north, I should be proud of an opportunity of showing you that the genius of a Mandeville can be applied as well to the arts of peace as to the stormy exercises of war. But even Mr Cutts does not know how strangely my labours have been interrupted. What an episode was mine! A year of exaltation to high and princely rank—a year of love and battle—and then a return to this cold and heavy occupation! Had that interval lasted longer, gentlemen, believe me, that ere now I should have carried the victorious banners of Wallachia to the gates of Constantinople, plucked the abject and besotted Sultan from his throne, and again established in more than its pristine renown the independent Empire of the East!”

“Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah! Well said, Mandeville!” shouted Cutts. “I like to see the fellow who never sticks at trifles.”

“No reality, sirs, could have prevented me; but I fear my preface is too long. About two years ago I was requested by the projectors of the great railway between Paris and Constantinople to superintend the survey of that portion which stretches eastward from Vienna. I accepted the appointment with pleasure, for I longed to see foreign countries, and the field abroad appeared to me a much nobler one than that at home. I had personal letters of introduction to the Emperor, who treated me with marked distinction; for some collateral branches of my family had done the Austrian good service in the wars of Wallenstein, and the heroic charge of the Pappenheimers under Herbert Mandeville at Lutzen was still freshly and gratefully remembered. It was in Vienna that I made the acquaintance of our mutual kinsman, Count Ferguson, whose claims to hereditary dignity, I trust, you will reflect on at your leisure.

“Do either of you, gentlemen, understand German?—No!—I regret the circumstance, because you can hardly follow me out distinctly when I come to speak of localities. But I shall endeavour to be as clear as possible. One evening I was in attendance upon his majesty—who frequently honoured me with these commands, for he took a vast interest in all matters of science—at the great theatre. All the wealth, beauty, and talent of Austria were there. I assure you, gentlemen, I never gazed upon a more brilliant spectacle. The mixture of the white and blue uniforms of the Austrian officers, with the national costumes of the nobility of Hungary, Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, and the Tyrol, gave the scene the appearance of a studied and gorgeous carnival. The glittering of diamonds along the whole tier of the boxes was literally painful to the eyes. Several of the Esterhazy family seemed absolutely sheathed in jewel armour, and I was literally compelled to request the Duchessa Lucchesini, who was seated next me, to lower her beautiful arm, as the splendour of the brilliants on her bracelet—I, of course, said the lustre of the arm itself—was so great as to obstruct my view of the stage. She smilingly complied. The last long-drawn note of the overture was over, the curtain had risen, and the prima donna Schenkelmann was just trilling forth that exquisite aria with which the opera of the Gasthaus begins, when the door of the box immediately adjoining the imperial one opened, and a party entered in the gay Wallachian costume. The first who took her place, in a sort of decorated chair in front, and who was familiarly greeted by his Majesty, was a young lady, as it seemed to me even then, of most surpassing beauty. Her dark raven hair was held back from a brow as white as alabaster by a circlet of gorgeous emeralds, whose pale mild light added to the pensive melancholy of her features. I have no heart to describe her further, although that image stands before me now, as clearly as when I first riveted these longing eyes upon her charms!—O Amalia!

“Her immediate companion was a tall stalwart nobleman, beneath whose cloak glittered a close-fitting tunic of ring-mail. His looks were haughty and unprepossessing; he cast a fierce glance at the box which contained the Esterhazys; bowed coldly in return to the recognition of the Emperor; and seated himself beside his beautiful companion. I thought—but it might be fancy—that she involuntarily shrank from his contact. The remainder of the box was occupied by Wallachian ladies and grandees.

“My curiosity was so whetted, that I hardly could wait until the Schenkelmann had concluded, before assailing my neighbour the Duchessa with questions.

“‘Is it possible?’ said she. ‘Have you been so long in Vienna, chevalier, and yet never seen the great attraction of the day—the Wallachian fawn, as that foolish Count Kronthaler calls her? I declare I begin to believe that you men of science are absolutely born blind!’

“‘Not so, beautiful Lucchesini! But remember that ever since my arrival I have been constantly gazing on a star.’

“‘You flatterer! But seriously, I thought every one knew the Margravine of Kalbs-Kuchen. She is the greatest heiress in Europe—has a magnificent independent principality, noble palaces, and such diamonds! That personage beside her is her relation, the Duke of Kalbs-Braten, the representative of a younger branch of the house. He is at deadly feud with the Esterhazys, and the Emperor is very apprehensive that it may disturb the tranquillity of Hungary. I am sure I am glad that my own poor little Duchy is at a distance. I wish he would not bow to me—I am sure he is a horrid man. Only think, my dear chevalier! He has already married two wives, and nobody knows what has become of them. Poor Clara von Gandersfeldt was the last—a sweet girl, but that could not save her. They say he wants to marry his cousin—I hope she won’t have him.’

“‘Does he indeed presume!’ said I, ‘that dark-browed ruffian, to aspire to such an angel?’

“‘I declare you make me quite jealous,’ said the Lucchesini; ‘but speak lower or he will overhear you. I assure you Duke Albrecht is a very dangerous enemy.’

“‘O that I might beard him!’ cried I, ‘in the midst of his assembled Hulans! I tell you, Duchessa, that ere now a Mandeville——’

“‘Potz tausend donner-wetter!’ said the Emperor, good-humouredly turning round; ‘what is that the Chevalier Mandeville is saying? Why, chevalier, you look as fierce as a roused lion. We must take care of you old English fire-eaters. By the way,’ added he very kindly, ‘our Chancellor will send you to-morrow the decoration of the first class of the Golden Bugle. No thanks. You deserve it. I only wish the order could have been conferred upon such a field as that of Lutzen. And now come forward, and let me present you to the Margravine of Kalbs-Kuchen, whose territories you must one of these days traverse. Margravine—this is the Chevalier Mandeville, of whom I have already told you.’

“She turned her head—our eyes met—a deep flush suffused her countenance, but it was instantly succeeded by a deadly paleness.

“‘Eh, wass henker!’ cried the Emperor, ‘what’s the meaning of this?—the Margravine is going to faint!’

“‘Oh no—no—your Majesty—’tis nothing—a likeness—a dream—a dizziness, I mean, has come over me! It is gone now. You shall be welcome, chevalier,’ continued she, with a sweet smile, ‘when you visit our poor dominions. Indeed, I have a hereditary claim upon you, which I am sure you will not disregard.’

“‘Hagel und blitzen!’ cried his imperial Majesty—‘What is this? I understood the chevalier was never in Germany before.’

“‘That may be, sire,’ repeated the Margravine with another blush. ‘But my great-grandmother was nevertheless a Mandeville, the daughter of that Field-marshal Herbert who fought so well at Lutzen. His picture, painted when he was a young cuirassier, still hangs in my palace, and, indeed, it was the extreme likeness of the chevalier to that portrait, which took me for a moment by surprise. Let me then welcome you, cousin; henceforward we are not strangers!’

“I bowed profoundly as I took the proffered hand of the Margravine. I held it for an instant in my own—yes!—by Cupid, there was a gentle pressure. I looked up and beheld the dark countenance of the Duke of Kalbs-Braten scowling at me from behind his cousin. I retorted the look with interest. From that moment we were mortal foes.

“‘Unser Ritter ist im klee gefallen—the chevalier has fallen among clover,’ said the Emperor with a smile—‘he has great luck—he finds cousins everywhere.’

“‘And in this instance,’ I replied, ‘I might venture to challenge the envy even of your Majesty.’

“‘Well said, chevalier! and now let us attend to the second act of the opera.’

“‘You are in a critical position, Chevalier de Mandeville,’ said the Lucchesini, to whose side I now returned. ‘You have made a powerful friend, but also a dangerous enemy. Beware of that Duke Albrecht—he is watching you closely.’

“‘It is not the nature of a Mandeville to fear anything except for the safety of those he loves. You, sweet Duchessa, I trust have nothing to apprehend?’

“‘Ah, perfide! Do not think to impose upon me longer. I know your heart has become a traitor already. Well—we shall not be less friends for that. I congratulate you on your new honours, only take care that too much good fortune does not turn that magnificent head.’

“I supped that evening with the Lucchesini. On my return home, I thought I observed a dark figure following my steps; but this might have been fancy, at all events I regained my hotel without any interruption. Next morning I found upon my table a little casket containing a magnificent emerald ring, along with a small slip of paper on which was written, ‘Amalia to her cousin—Silence and Fidelity.’ I placed the ring upon my finger, but I pressed the writing to my lips.

“On the ensuing week there was a great masquerade at the palace. I was out surveying the whole morning, and was occupied so late that I had barely half an hour to spare on my return for the necessary preparations.

“‘There is a young lady waiting for you upstairs, Herr Baron,’ said the waiter with a broad grin; ‘she says she has a message to deliver, and will give it to nobody else.’

“‘Blockhead!’ said I, ‘what made you show her in there? To a certainty she’ll be meddling with the theodolites!’

“I rushed upstairs, and found in my apartment one of the prettiest little creatures I ever saw, a perfect fairy of about sixteen, in a gipsy bonnet, who looked up and smiled as I entered.

“‘Are you the Chevalier Mandeville?’ asked she.

“‘Yes, my little dear, and pray who are you?’

“‘I am Fritchen, sir,’ she said with a curtsy.

“‘You don’t say so! Pray sit down, Fritchen.’

“‘Thank you, sir.’

“‘And pray now, Fritchen, what is it you want with me?’

“‘My mistress desired me to say to you, sir—but it’s a great secret—that she is to be at the masquerade to-night in a blue domino, and she begs you will place this White Rose in your hat, and she wishes to have a few words with you.’

“‘And who may your mistress be, my pretty one?’

“‘Silence and Fidelity!’

“‘Ha! is it possible? the Margravine!’

“‘Hush! don’t speak so loud—you don’t know who may be listening. Black Stanislaus has been watching me all day, and I hardly could contrive to get out.’

“‘Black Stanislaus had better beware of me!’

“‘Oh, but you don’t know him! He’s Duke Albrecht’s chief forester, and the Duke is in such a rage ever since he found my lady embroidering your name upon a handkerchief.’

“‘Did she, indeed?—my name?—O Amalia!’

“‘Yes—and she says you’re so like that big picture at Schloss-Swiggenstein that she fell in love with long ago—and she is sure you would come to love her if you only knew her—and she wishes, for your sake, that she was a plain lady and not a Princess—and she hates that Duke Albrecht so! But I wasn’t to tell you a word of this, so pray don’t repeat it again.’

“‘Silence and fidelity, my pretty Fritchen. Tell your royal mistress that I rest her humble slave and kinsman; that I will wear her rose, and defend it too, if needful, against the attacks of the universe! Tell her, too, that every moment seems an age until we meet again. I will not overload your memory, little Fritchen. Pray, wear this trifle for my sake, and——’

“‘O fie, sir! If the waiter heard you!’ and the little gipsy made her escape.

“I had selected for my costume that night, a dress in the old English fashion, taken from a portrait of the Admirable Crichton. In my hat I reverently placed the rose which Amalia had sent me, stepped into my fiacre, and drove to the palace.

“The masquerade was already at its height. I jostled my way through a prodigious crowd of scaramouches, pilgrims, shepherdesses, nymphs, and crusaders, until I reached the grand saloon, where I looked round me diligently for the blue domino! Alas! I counted no less than thirteen ladies in that particular costume.

“‘You seem dull to-night, Sir Englishman,’ said a soft voice at my elbow. ‘Does the indifference of your country or the disdainfulness of dark eyes oppress you?’

“I turned and beheld a blue domino. My heart thrilled strangely.

“‘Neither, sweet Mask; but say, is not Silence a token of Fidelity?’

“‘You speak in riddles,’ said the domino. ‘But come—they are beginning the waltz. Here is a little hand as yet unoccupied. Will you take it?’

“‘For ever?’

“‘Nay—I shall burden you with no such terrible conditions. Allons! Yonder Saracen and Nun have set us the example.’

“In a moment we were launched into the whirl of the dance. My whole frame quivered as I encircled the delicate waist with my arm. One hand was held in mine, the other rested lovingly upon my shoulder. I felt the sweet breath of the damask lips upon my face—the cup of my happiness was full.

“‘O that I may never wake and find this a dream! Dear lady, might I dare to hope that the services of a life, never more devotedly offered, might, in some degree, atone for the immeasurable distance between us? That the poor cavalier, whom you have honoured with your notice, may venture to indulge in a yet dearer anticipation?’

“I felt the hand of the Mask tremble in mine—

“‘The White Rose is a pretty flower,’ she whispered—‘can it not bloom elsewhere than in the north?’

“‘Amalia!’

“‘Leopold!—but hush—we are observed.’

“I looked up and saw a tall Bulgarian gazing at us. The mask of course prevented me from distinguishing his features, but by the red sparkle of his eye I instantly recognised Duke Albrecht.

“‘Forgive me, dearest Amalia, for one moment. I will rejoin you in the second apartment——’

“‘For the sake of the Virgin, Leopold—do not tempt him! you know not the power, the malignity of the man.’

“‘Were he ten times a duke, I’d beard him! Pardon me, lady. He has defied me already by his looks, and a Mandeville never yet shrunk from any encounter. Prince Metternich will protect you until my return.’

“The good-natured statesman, who was sauntering past unmasked, instantly offered his arm to the agitated Margravine. They retired. I strode up to the Bulgarian, who remained as motionless as a statue.

“‘Give you good-evening, cavalier. What is your purpose to-night?’

“‘To chastise insolence and punish presumption! What is yours?’

“‘To rescue innocence and beauty from the persecution of overweening power!’

“‘Indeed! anything else?’

“‘Yes, to avenge the fate of those who trusted, and yet died before their time. How was it with Clara of Gandersfeldt? Fell she not by thy hand?’

“‘Englishman—thou liest!’

“‘Bulgarian—thou art a villain!’

“The duke gnashed his teeth. For a moment his hand clutched at the hilt of his poniard, but he suddenly withdrew it.

“‘I had thought to have dealt otherwise with thee,’ he said, ‘but thou hast dared to come between the lion and his bride. Englishman—hast thou courage to make good thy injurious words with aught else but the tongue?’

“‘I am the last of the race of Mandeville!’

“‘Enough. I might well have left the chastising of thee to a meaner hand, and yet—for that thou art a bold fellow—I will meet thee. Dost thou know the eastern gate?’

“‘Well.’

“‘A mile beyond it there is a clump of trees and a fair meadow-land. The moon will be up in three hours; light enough for men who are determined on their work. Dost thou understand me—three hours hence on horseback, with the sword, alone?’

“‘Can I trust thee, Bulgarian?—no treachery?’

“‘I am a Wallachian and a duke!’

“‘Enough said. I shall be there;’ and we parted.

“I flew back to Amalia. She was terribly agitated. In vain did I attempt to calm her with assurances that all was well. She insisted upon knowing the whole particulars of my interview with her dreaded cousin of Kalbs-Braten, and at last I told her without reserve.

“‘You must not go, Leopold,’ she cried, ‘indeed you must not. You do not know this Albrecht. Hard of heart and determined of purpose, there are no means which he will not use in order to compass his revenge. Believe not that he will meet you alone: were it so, I should have little dread. But Black Stanislaus will be there, and strong Slavata, and Martinitz with all his Hulans! They will murder you, my Leopold! shed your young blood like water; or, if they dare not do that for fear of the Austrian vengeance, they will hurry you across the frontier to some dreary fortress, where you will pine in chains, and grow prematurely grey, far—far from your poor Amalia! Oh, were I to lose you, Leopold, now, I should die of sorrow! Be persuaded by me. My guards are few, but they are faithful. Avoid this meeting. Let us set out this night—nay, this very hour. Once within my dominions, we may set at defiance Duke Albrecht and all the black banditti of Kalbs-Braten. I have many friends and feudatories. The Hetman, Chopinski, is devoted to me. Count Rudolf of Haggenhausen is my sworn friend. No man ever yet saw the back of Conrad of the Thirty Mountains. We shall rear up the old ancestral banner of my house; give the Red Falcon to the winds of heaven; besiege, if need be, my perfidious kinsman in his stronghold—and, in the face of heaven, my Leopold, will I acknowledge the heir of Mandeville as the partner of my life and of my power!’

“‘Dearest, best Amalia! your words thrill through me like a trumpet—but alas, it may not be! I dare not follow your counsel. Shall it be said that I have broken my word—shrunk like a craven from a meeting with this Albrecht;—a meeting, too, which I myself provoked? Think it not, lady. Poor Mandeville has nothing save his honour; but upon that, at least, no taint of suspicion shall rest. Farewell, beautiful Amalia! Believe me, we shall meet again; if not, think of me sometimes as one who loved you well, and who died with your name upon his lips.’

“‘O Leopold!’

“I tore myself away. Two hours afterwards I had passed the eastern gate of Vienna, and was riding towards the place of rendezvous. The moon was up, but a fresh breeze ever and anon swept the curtains of the clouds across her disc, and obscured the distant prospect. The cool air played gratefully on my cheek after the excitement and fever of the evening; I listened with even a sensation of pleasure to the distant rippling of the river. For the future I had little care, my whole attention was concentrated upon the past. I felt no anxiety as to the result of the encounter; nor was this in any degree surprising, since, from my earliest youth, I had accustomed myself to the use of the sword, and was reputed a thorough master of the weapon. Neither could I believe that Duke Albrecht was capable, after having given his solemn pledge to the contrary, of anything like deliberate treachery.

“I was about half-way to the clump of trees, which he of Kalbs-Braten had indicated, when a heavy bank of clouds arose, and left me in total darkness. Up to this time I had seen no one since I passed the sentry; but now I thought I could discern the tramping of horses upon the turf. Almost mechanically I loosened my cloak, and brought round the hilt of my weapon so as to be prepared. When the moon reappeared, I saw on either side of me a horseman, in long black cloaks and slouched hats, which effectually concealed the features of the wearers. They did not speak nor offer any violence, but continued to ride alongside, accommodating their pace to mine. The horses they bestrode were large and powerful animals. There was something in the moody silence and even rigid bearing of these persons, which inspired me with a feeling rather of awe than suspicion. It might be that they were retainers of the duke; but then, if any ambuscade or foul play was intended, why give such palpable warning of it? I resolved to accost them.

“‘Ye ride late, sirs.’

“‘We do,’ said the one to the right. ‘We are bent on a far errand.’

“‘Indeed! may I ask its nature?’

“‘To hear the bat flutter and the owlet scream. Wilt also listen to the music?’

“‘I understand you not, sirs. What mean you?’

“‘We are the guardians of the Red Earth. The guilty tremble at our approach; but the innocent need not fear!’

“‘Two of the night patrole!’ thought I. ‘Very mysterious gentlemen, indeed; but I have heard that the Austrian police have orders to be reserved in their communications. I must get rid of them, however. Good-evening, sirs.’

“I was about to spur my horse, when a cloak was suddenly thrown over my head as if by some invisible hand; I was dragged forcibly from my saddle, my arms pinioned, and my sword wrested from me. All this was the work of a moment, and rendered my resistance useless.

“‘Villains!’ cried I, ‘unhand me—what mean you?’

“‘Peace, cavalier!’ said a deep low voice at my ear; ‘speak not—struggle not, or it may be worse for you; you are in the hands of the Secret Tribunal!’”

During the course of his narrative, Mr Mandeville, as I have already hinted, by no means discontinued his attentions to the brandy-and-water, but went on making tumbler after tumbler, with a fervour that was truly edifying. Assuming that the main facts of his history were true, though in the eye of geography and politics they appeared a little doubtful, it was still highly interesting to remark the varied chronology of his style. A century disappeared with each tumbler. He concentrated in himself, as it appeared to me, the excellencies of the best writers of romance, and withal had hitherto maintained the semblance of strict originality. He had now, however, worked his way considerably up the tide of time. We had emerged from the period of fire-arms, and Mandeville was at this stage medieval.

Some suspicion of this had dawned even upon the mind of Cutts, who, though not very familiar with romance, had once stumbled upon a translation of Spindler’s novels, and was, therefore, tolerably up to the proceedings of the Vehme Gericht.

“Confound it, Mandeville!” interrupted he, “we shall be kept here the whole night, if you don’t get on faster. Both Fred and I know all about the ruined tower, the subterranean chamber—which, by the way, must have looked deucedly like a tunnel—the cord and steel, and all the rest of it. Skip the trial, man. It’s a very old song now, and bring us as fast as you can to the castle and the marriage. I hope the Margravine took Fritchen with her. That little monkey was worth the whole bundle of them put together!”

The Margrave made another tumbler. His eye had become rather glassy, and his articulation slightly impaired. He was gradually drawing towards the chivalrous period of the Crusades.

“Two days had passed away since that terrible ride began, and yet there was neither halt nor intermission. Blindfold, pinioned, and bound into the saddle, I sate almost mechanically and without volition, amidst the ranks of the furious Hulans, whose wild huzzas and imprecations rung incessantly in my ears. No rest, no stay. On we sped like a hurricane across the valley and the plain!

“At last I heard a deep sullen roar, as if some great river was discharging its collected waters over the edge of an enormous precipice. We drew nearer and nearer. I felt the spray upon my face. These, then, were the giant rapids of the Danube.

“The order to halt was given.

“‘We are over the frontier now!’ cried the loud harsh voice of Duke Albrecht; ‘Stanislaus and Slavata—unbind that English dog from his steed, and pitch him over the cliff. Let the waters of the Danube bear him past the castle of his lady. It were pity to deny my delicate cousin the luxury of a coronach over the swollen corpse of her minion!’

“‘Coward!’ I exclaimed; ‘coward as well as traitor! If thou hast the slightest spark of manhood in thee, cause these thy fellows to unbind my hands, give me back my father’s sword, stand face to face against me on the greensward, and, benumbed and frozen as I am, thou shalt yet feel the arm of the Mandeville!’

“Loud laughed he of Kalbs-Braten. ‘Does the hunter, when the wolf is in the pit, leap down to try conclusions with him? Fool! what care I for honour or thy boasted laws of chivalry? We of Wallachia are men of another mood. We smite our foeman where we find him, asleep or awake—at the wine-cup or in the battle—with the sword by his side, or arrayed in the silken garb of peace! Drag him from his steed, fellows! Let us see how lightly this adventurous English diver will leap the cataracts of the Danube!’

“Resistance was in vain. I had already given myself up for lost. Even at that moment the image of my Amalia rose before me in all its beauty—her name was on my lips; I called upon her as my guardian angel.

“Suddenly I heard the loud clear note of a trumpet—it was answered by another, and then rang out the clanging of a thousand atabals.

“‘Ha! by Saint John of Nepomuck,’ cried the Duke, ‘the Croats are upon us—There flies the banner of Chopinski! there rides Conrad of the Thirty Mountains on the black steed that I have marked for my second charger! Hulans! to your ranks. Martinitz, bring up the rear-guard, and place them on the right flank. Slavata, thou art a fellow of some sense——’

“‘Ay, you can remember that now,’ grumbled Slavata.

“‘Take thirty men and lead them up that hollow—you will secure a passage somewhere over the morass—and then fall upon Chopinski in the rear. Let two men stay to guard the prisoner. Now, forward, gentlemen; and if you know not where to charge, follow the white plume of Kalbs-Braten!’

“I heard the cavalry advance. Maddened by the loss of my freedom at such a moment, I burst my bonds by an almost supernatural exertion, and tore the bandage from my eyes. To snatch a battle-axe from the hand of the nearest Hulan, and to dash him to the ground, was the work of a moment—a second blow, and the other fell. I leaped upon his horse, shouted the ancient war-cry of my house, ‘Saint George for Mandeville!’ and dashed onwards towards the serried array of the Croats, which occupied a little eminence beyond.

“‘For whom art thou, cavalier?’ cried Chopinski, as I galloped up.

“‘For Amalia and Kalbs-Kuchen!’ I replied.

“‘Welcome—a thousand times welcome, brave stranger, in the hour of battle! But ha!—what is this?—that white rose—that lordly mien—can it be? Yes! it is the affianced bridegroom of the Margravine!’

“With a wild cry of delight the Croats gathered around me. ‘Long live our gracious Margravine!’ they shouted—‘long live the noble Mandeville!’

“‘By my faith, Sir Knight,’ said the Count Rudolf of Haggenhausen, an old warrior whose seamed countenance was the record of many a fight—‘By my faith, I deemed not we could carry back such glorious tidings to our lady—nor, by Saint Wladimir, so goodly a pledge!’

“‘May I never put lance in rest again,’ cried Conrad of the Thirty Mountains, ‘but the Margravine hath a good eye—there be thews and sinews there! But we must take order with yon infidel scum. How say you, sirs—shall this cavalier have the ordering of the battle? I, for one, will gladly fight beneath his banner——’

“‘And so say I,’ said Chopinski, ‘but he must not go thus. Yonder, on my sumpter-mule, is a suit of Milan armour, which a king might wear upon the day he went forth to do battle for his crown. Bring it forth, knaves, and let the Mandeville be clad as becomes the affianced of our mistress.’

“‘Brave Chopinski,’ I said, ‘and you, kind sirs and nobles—pardon me if I cannot thank you now in a manner befitting to the greatness of your deserts. But there is a good time, I trust, in store. Suffer me now to arm myself, and then we shall try the boasted prowess of yonder giant of Kalbs-Braten!’

“In a few moments I was sheathed in steel, and, mounted on a splendid charger, took my station at the head of the troops. Again their applause was redoubled.

“‘Lord Conrad,’ said I to the warrior of the Thirty Mountains, ‘swart Slavata has gone up yonder with a plump of lances, intending to cross the morass, and assail us on the rear. Be it thine to hold him in check.’

“‘By my father’s head!’ cried Conrad, ‘I ask no better service! That villain Slavata oweth me a life, for he slew my sister’s son at disadvantage, and this day will I have it or die. Fear not for the rear, noble Mandeville—I will protect it while spear remains or armour holds together!’

“‘I doubt it not, valiant Conrad! Brave Chopinski—noble Haggenhausen—let us now charge together! ’Tis not beneath my banner you fight. The Blue Boar of Mandeville never yet fluttered in the Wallachian breeze, but we may give it to the winds ere long! Sacred to Amalia, and not to me, be the victory! Advance the Red Falcon of Kalbs-Kuchen—let it strike terror into the hearts of the enemy—and forward as it pounces upon its prey!’

“With visors down and lances in rest we rushed upon the advancing Hulans, who received our charge with great intrepidity. Martinitz was my immediate opponent. The shock of our meeting was so great that both the horses recoiled upon their hams, and, but for the dexterity of the riders, must have rolled over upon the ground. The lances were shivered up to the very gauntlets. We glared on each other for an instant with eyes which seemed to flash fire through the bars of our visors—each made a demivolte——”

“I say, Cutts,” whispered I, “it occurs to me that I have heard something uncommonly like this before. Our friend is losing his originality, and poaching unceremoniously upon Ivanhoe. You had better stop him at once.”

“I presume then, Mandeville, you did for that fellow Martinitz?” said Cutts.

“The gigantic Hulan was hurled from his saddle like a stone from a sling. I saw him roll thrice over, grasping his hands full of sand at every turn.”

“That must have been very satisfactory. And what became of the duke?”

“Often did I strive to force my way through the press to the spot where Kalbs-Braten fought. I will not belie him—he bore himself that day like a man. And yet he had better protection than either helm or shield; for around him fought his foster-father, Tiefenbach of the Yews, with his seven bold sons, all striving to shelter their prince’s body with their own. No sooner had I struck down one of them than the old man cried—‘Another for Kalbs-Braten!’ and a second giant stepped across the prostrate body of his brother!”

“The Fair Maid of Perth, for a rump and a dozen!” was my remark.

“Meanwhile, Conrad of the Thirty Mountains had reached the spot where Slavata with his cavalry was attempting the passage of the morass. Some of the Hulans were entangled there from the soft nature of the ground, the horses having sunk in the mire almost up to their saddle-girths. Others, among whom was their leader, had successfully struggled through.

“Conrad and Slavata met. They were both powerful men, and well matched. As if by common consent, the soldiers on either side held back to witness the encounter of their chiefs.

“Slavata spoke first. ‘I know thee well,’ he said: ‘thou art the marauding baron of the Thirty Mountains, whose head is worth its weight of gold at the castle-gate of Kalbs-Braten. I swore when we last met that we should not part again so lightly, and now I will keep my oath!’

“‘And I know thee, too,’ said Conrad; ‘thou art the marauding villain Slavata, whose body I intend to hang upon my topmost turret, to blacken in the sun and feed the ravens and the kites!’

“‘Threatened men live long,’ replied Slavata with a hollow laugh; ‘thy sister’s son, the Geissenheimer, said as much before, but for all that I passed this good sword three times through his bosom!’

“‘Villain!’ cried Conrad, striking at him, ‘this to thy heart!’

“‘And this to thine, proud boaster!’ cried Slavata, parrying and returning the blow.

“They closed. Conrad seized hold of Slavata by the sword-belt. The other——”

“He’s off to Old Mortality now,” said I to Cutts. “For heaven’s sake stop him, or we shall have a second edition of the Bothwell and Burley business.”

“Come, Mandeville, clear away the battle—there’s a good fellow. There can be no doubt that you skewered that rascally duke in a very satisfactory manner. I shall ring for the broiled bones, and I beg you will finish your story before they make their appearance. Will you mix another tumbler now, or wait till afterwards? Very well—please yourself—there’s the hot water for you.”

“They led me into the state apartment,” said Mandeville, with a kind of sob. “Amalia stood upon the dais, surrounded by the fairest and the noblest of the land. The amethyst light, which streamed through the stained windows, gorgeous with armorial bearings, fell around her like a glory. In one hand she held a ducal cap of maintenance—with the other she pointed to the picture of my great ancestor—the very image, as she told me, of myself. I rushed forward with a cry of joy, and threw myself prostrate at her feet!

“‘Nay, not so, my Leopold!’ she said. ‘Dear one, thou art come at last! Take the reward of all thy toils, all thy dangers, all thy love! Come, adored Mandeville—accept the prize of silence and fidelity!’ And she added, ‘and never upon brows more worthy could a wreath of chivalry be placed.’

“She placed the coronet upon my head, and then, gently raising me, exclaimed—

“‘Wallachians! behold your Prince!’”

Mr Mandeville did not get beyond that sentence. I could stand him no longer, and burst into an outrageous roar of laughter, in which Cutts most heartily joined, till the tears ran plenteously down his cheeks. The Margrave of Wallachia looked quite bewildered. He attempted to rise from his chair, but the effort was too much for him, and he dropped suddenly on the floor.

“Well,” said I, after we had fairly exhausted ourselves, “there’s the spoiling in that fellow of as good a novelist as ever coopered out three volumes. He would be an invaluable acquaintance for either Marryat or James. ’Tis a thousand pities his talents should be lost to the public.”

“There’s no nonsense about him,” replied Cutts; “he buckles to his work like a man. Doesn’t it strike you, Freddy, that his style is a great deal more satisfactory than that of some other people I could name, who talk about their pedigree and ancestors, and have not even the excuse of a good cock-and-bull story to tell? Give me the man that carves out nobility for himself, like Mandeville, and believes it too, which is the very next best thing to reality. Now, let’s have up the broiled bones, and send the Margrave of Wallachia to his bed.”

THE FORREST-RACE ROMANCE.

(EXTRACTED FROM PAPERS DATED 1773.)

[MAGA. February 1833.]

I passed my examination with some credit, and was appointed assistant-surgeon to my ship, then lying at Portsmouth. As she was expected, however, to sail every tide to join the fleet off Cherbourg,[A] I was not sent down at once, but received instructions to be on board the Gull tender, at Sheerness, in eight days. In the mean time, with my appointment, and twenty guineas in my pocket, a light heart and a tolerable figure, I went down into Surrey, to Bromley Hall, the seat of an excellent friend, from whom I had long had an invitation. I found the house fall of visitants, chiefly young people about my own age, all making merry, and had little difficulty in being admitted of their crew. I never saw so many happy, fair and handsome faces together, as were there assembled for the next week—but by far the loveliest of the fair faces was that of a young lady from the west, called Fane; and none, perhaps, was happier than my own, when beside her. She delighted in botany; and although I at that time knew little more of the science than would have enabled me to make a tolerable guess at the dried drug in a medicine-chest, yet the temptation was so great that I could not resist the opportunity of becoming her more constant companion, by undertaking the office of her tutor. My inadequacy must have been soon betrayed; nevertheless, we continued to pursue our studies, with as regular attendance as ever on my part, and as implicit attention on hers, till mutually we arrived at the tacit understanding that, provided we looked at the flower together, it mattered little whether I assigned it a right or a wrong place in our rare classification. We soon exchanged the garden for the fields and green lanes; and often before the others had risen to their daily vocations of riding or sailing, we would contrive a ramble in search of some unknown species of an unheard-of genus, to the romantic borders of Holmsdale, which lay within a half mile of Bromley, with the apology of the children for our guides, who rarely failed to find inducement enough in the rabbit-warren or rookery to leave us alone in our search through the glades and avenues of the old holm oak and the furze. It cannot be expected that, with these occasions constantly falling out, an ardent youth of nineteen, as I then was, should long conceal feelings fostered by such appliances of time and circumstance; nor need it be wondered at that, before even the week had elapsed, I had avowed my passion, and had not been altogether unsuccessful in eliciting a confession of its return. My exultation on that evening must have been very apparent, for next morning, as I came down stairs, having lain much later than usual, my host Mr Blundell met me, and took my arm as he bade me good morning, then led me into the library, and, “Harry, my fine fellow,” said he, in his good-natured way, “you must get the M.D. to your name, and make something handsome of your own, before you begin to run away with the hearts of our girls here in the country.”

“’Pon my soul, sir,” stammered I, while I felt myself blushing to the eyes, “I—I—we were only pulling flowers, sir.”

“Ah! my dear boy,” he sighed and went on, “take care that, while you pull the flowers, you do not plant thorns for both hereafter.” I had expected nothing short of thorns for my roses; but he surprised me a little when he proceeded: “Ellen is my ward: she is a good girl, and will be a rich girl; and you know very well I would not be acting as a guardian worthy such a trust, if I encouraged the addresses of one whose fortune is still to make, and whose attachments, Harry, have still to undergo the changes of the most fickle time in his life. Come, tell me candidly, now, how far has this business gone?”

Here was a pretty reckoning to be run up under a hedge. I was silent and sheepish for a while; but told him honestly all about it, so soon as I could speak without choking on every second word.

“Surely,” said he, when I had done, “you must have been aware of the great impropriety of trying to engage this young lady’s affections without my sanction—I am her guardian, you know.”

“I declare, my dear sir, I never knew that you were her guardian,” I exclaimed; “I never knew she had any fortune to guard.”

He smiled, and asked, “Were you ever in love before, Harry?”

“Never, sir, upon my honour—except once—but that was nothing.”

“Nothing to this, I suppose,” he replied; “and this, I daresay, will be nothing to the next. Tut, man! I was a young fellow once myself, and remember many a time when I would have given my eyes to have walked to church with one pretty girl, and my head, I suppose, if I could, to have walked home with another. I was just your age then—what age are you now, Harry?”

“Nineteen past, sir” (it was not a week since my birthday).

“Ay, ay, I was just about nineteen myself then—but no matter. You would see the propriety, my dear boy, of going up to London in the mean time, were it not that Ellen is obliged to leave us to-day; it is no arrangement of mine, I can assure you. If I thought it necessary to get either of you out of the other’s way, I certainly would pack you off, and keep Ellen with me; but the fact is, I am only joint trustee in this business: her other guardians insist on having her away to the house of one of them, to whose nomination I have been over-persuaded to consent. He is needy, and the allowance may be an object; but I would rather pay the money out of my own pocket twice told, than let her go down among them. However, it cannot be helped: she must leave us. Poor thing! with such a fortune and so many connections—keeping myself out of the question, without whose sanction, thank Heaven, they cannot marry her—there never was a more friendless dependent.”

“And has Miss Fane no brother, no father alive?” inquired I.

“Mother, sister, and brother, all the family are dead,” replied Mr Blundell, “excepting her father, who, I am sorry to say, is still alive to everything but a proper sense of his own respectability and his child’s happiness. His last instructions were dated London, but what he is doing there, or where, or how he lives, I cannot tell.”

He had now forgotten my misdemeanours in his own confidential regrets, and I had forgotten my confusion in eagerness to know something more of one who, I felt, for all the careful old gentleman’s prudent veto, was not yet quite out of my reach; although the mention of her fortune, while it made the prize (why should I be ashamed to confess it?) much more seriously valuable, had inspired me with a fear of failure proportionate to the enhanced advantages of success.

“What a pity, sir,” I said, going cunningly to work, “that testators do not attend more to the interests of their legatees in the appointment of equally careful guardians, if they think one not enough.”

“Ah, it was the doing of the law, not of her grandfather, else Fane would never have had the control of a penny of it; but had it not been for me, he would have had it all. I fought her battle stoutly though, and kept matters square enough till I was induced to consent to the admission of this other worthy, as a sort of balance-wheel to keep our ill-sorted motions from bringing everything to a stand.”

“And pray, sir,” I went on, elated with my success, “who may this vexatious umpire be?” I fairly overshot the mark.

“That’s no affair of yours, Harry, just now. Go on with your profession, get half-a-dozen years over your head, and a decent independence at least in your pocket, and then I shall be very happy indeed to put the son of an old friend in the way of a good match; but never, Harry, never let your wife have to say that she made a man of you, while you have head and hands and health to make a man of yourself.”

“Dear sir, you are quite right; and believe me, I would never dream of acting otherwise—only—had I not better see about Miss Fane’s hortus siccus, as you say she goes to-day?”

“I have saved you that trouble, Harry: she is gone before you were out of bed.”

I am afraid I proved but dull company during the few hours of my stay at Bromley Hall after this disappointment. I took my leave that evening, and, to tell the truth, came up to London in a fuming passion, for I could get no satisfaction whatever, notwithstanding my numerous inquiries; I could not even ascertain the boarding-school at which she had been in town. All I knew amounted to this, that I was in love, and likely to continue so; but with whom exactly, I could not tell, farther than that she was a lovely girl, an heiress, and the ward of my careful friend Mr Blundell, in conjunction with her father—a character, I feared, not too respectable—and some one else of much the same stamp, with whom she now was about to be placed, not less against her own and Mr Blundell’s will than mine. But I had little time to indulge in regrets or speculations; I found the Gull with her mainsail set at moorings in the Medway, and hurrying on board forgot everything for a while in the bustle of getting the little schooner under weigh. As we stretched out of the Nore, however, with a steady breeze and smooth water, in the summer evening, when the difficulties of crooked pilotage and frequent alterations in our course had been exchanged for the quiet relaxation of fair wind and open sea-room; and when the boat had begun to take her work into her own hand, like a strong and willing labourer, laying herself to the water, and sending the crew from her sloped deck to lounge about the companion, and lean into the sunset over her high weather-rail, with folded arms and half-shut eyes; then, as I looked across the glittering expanse, where the level sun danced upon every wave between us and the hazy shore, I insensibly began to people the filmy and golden-grained air with my old familiar images again; and long after the failing radiance had spent itself in the eastern gloom, and long after the waters had ceased to roll in even the reflected splendour of the upper sky, I continued sowing their dim and restless floor with waving visions of green fields, and flowery plats, and airy coppices, till the bright enchantress of them all seemed to be won back to my side, and I wandered with her again through the long day of sunshine, forgetful alike of sea, and ship, and sorrow, and the fast-falling shadows of night.

The chill breeze sent me below at last, and, wearied with a day of unusual fatigue, I turned into my berth; but was long kept awake by an angry altercation between the commander and his mate, who were drinking together in the main cabin. What they disputed about I could not understand, but I heard enough to convince me that the command had been intrusted to a person of no very amiable temper; in fact, I had hardly ever met a more disagreeable man than our petty captain, or one on whose countenance habitual violence and intoxication had contracted a more repulsive look.

In the morning we were off Dungeness, with a steady south-easterly breeze, that gave us a favourable run to Portsmouth that evening. Here we joined three others on the same destination, and, standing out again, made so much of it during the night, that when I came on deck next morning I found ourselves and consorts beating up with a light wind abreast of Cherbourg, the coast about which was just beginning to be distinguishable. There had been a good deal of disputing the day previous on board the Gull; and the captain’s tyrannical conduct had put every one on board in a state of angry excitement. For my own part, I avoided coming in contact with him, except at meals, when I could not help it, and then I had only to dread the want of social humanity which I never failed to meet; but it was far otherwise with the crew; he knocked them about with whatever came to hand without mercy, and openly kept up his mastery by exciting himself to a pitch of sufficient violence with quantities of brandy.

We could not yet distinguish any of the fleet; for the wind had come round to the south, and was still getting lighter; but at last we plainly heard the noise of a heavy cannonade. It was the first time in my life that I had heard a shot fired in anger; and as every deep explosion came through the air, my heart beat faster and faster, and, natural fear mingling with natural impatience, I stood engrossed in pleasingly fearful feelings, till I was roused by the voice of the mate, crying that there was a ship to windward. As our fleet lay between us and the shore, we had no fear of its proving an enemy, and farther than as an object of casual speculation, the sail attracted little notice, till at length, as we stood up Channel, with the ship, which seemed a large merchantman, going full before the wind, that had now freshened, under a heavy press of sail, about a mile to windward on our bow, the mate gave it as his opinion that we ought to speak him, and learn how the fleet lay. Now, about a quarter of an hour before this, one of the men having grumbled at a cuff, the Captain had taken me regularly to witness the mutiny; and, going to his arms’ chest, had stuck a pair of pistols in the breast of his jacket, with which he had paraded the deck for a few minutes, in tenfold truculence, and had then gone below again, where he now sat over his articles of war and brandy-bottle. The cabin light was partly open to admit air; and he made his inquiries, and gave his orders, without coming on deck. “What colours does the fellow show, sir?”

“He is canvass to the mast-head, sir, and I cannot see his flag; but I think I know the cut of his royals: he’s a merchant victualler, if I don’t mistake, belonging to the leeward division, standing across to Portsmouth—for stores, I suppose.”

“I don’t care what you suppose, sir—what is his name?”

“The Prince Frederick.”

“Ah—eh!—old Manson’s craft?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What course do you lie, sir?”

“Hard upon the wind: if he hold on, we will cross his wake close astern.”

“Well, do now as I desire you, sir. Let the boat away as many points as will run you under his bows—and hold on your course till I give you farther orders.” Then, in an under-growl to himself, “Ah, ha, he thought he had swamped me about that d——d business of his Son’s and the Phœnix; but I’ll show the old costermongering rogue that I can cross his bows, both on shore and at sea”—here he raised his voice again—“and, hilloa, sir! order him, as soon as he comes within hail, to run under my stern, and round to leeward, till your commander questions him on his Majesty’s service. And clear away that gun in the bows there, for, by ——, if he does not put his helm up, I’ll fire into him, as I would into a huxter’s stall!”

We accordingly fell away to leeward, and the vessels rapidly neared each other. The stranger had studding-sails set from the very top-gallant royals to the chain-plates; and a more splendid sight my eyes never beheld than he presented, spooming down, swift and steady through the fresh, green, sparkling seas that sheeted off round either bow in a continuous jet, glassy, unbroken, and in colour like the purest amethyst, till it foamed away down the broadside in white boiling eddies of froth. We were now within hail: the mate took the trumpet, and shouted his orders as he had received them: there was no answer. The stranger still held on his course, right before the wind.

“He won’t alter his course, sir,” said the mate to the captain. “What is to be done?”

“Hold on, as I ordered you, sir; bring up under his lee; and if he don’t slacken sail, fire your gun into him, and be d——d! Ah, is it luffing you are, you mutinous lubber? must I overhaul you?” And he laid hold of a handspike, and came up the companion, his eyes glaring, his teeth set, and a torrent of curses hissing through them, hot and horrible. He kicked the mate into the scuppers, and laid hold of the tiller, round which he lashed its lanyard with a second turn, before he had given more than one look at the stranger; and while knotting the lashings, reiterated his orders with double vehemence about the gun. If ever the devil had possession of any man, he was in him then. It all occurred in less time than a minute; but so inexperienced at sea was I, that I apprehended a fight more than anything else; although, as the tiller was lashed, I saw it was next to impossible for the vessels to escape running foul. The seamen were all in consternation, crowding from the bows, and clamouring advice, entreaties, and denunciations, without the slightest effect, on their captain. He held a pistol in his hand, and swore he would shoot the first mutineer who should dare to interfere. But, at the second look he took at the tower of canvass now stooping down upon us, within half a stone’s throw, he dropped the tiller, staggered back, and clapt both his hands over his eyes. When he withdrew them to grasp the tafferel, against which he had stumbled, one might have thought that he had been smearing his face with white paint, so deadly pale was he grown all on the sudden; but his eyes were fixed and glazed, his mouth wide open, his lips livid, and shaking like jelly, his hair on end, his limbs in a loose palsy, his knees going against and over one another. It was a moment of dreadful confusion. I was thrown down by the rushing about of the crew; and, as I looked up from among the trampling crowd, through whose feet I rolled like a log, I saw, all at once, between me and the blue sky, over our quarter, the jib-boom of the ship pushed through the serene air with a smooth and equable motion, but swift and irresistible in the whole wing of the wind. It caught us by the lifts of the mainsail, and we were gently pushed over for an almost imperceptible moment; then came a sharp crash, and the main-topmast toppled down, tearing and smashing everything in its descent, and making the started planks fly from stern to stern, as it drove right through the deck into the cabin. At the same moment the ship’s jib-boom sprung high into the air, and from among her pile of sails that were now bellying out almost overhead, there leaped down, like an eagle from his cloud, the whole broad-winged fore-top-gallant-mast, royals and all, with a swoop upon our deck. All the men round the tiller were struck down; some with broken limbs, and all dreadfully bruised, but none was killed save their miserable commander; he was killed where he stood still paralysed against the tafferel. I saw him struck by the jagged stump of the broken mast, as it fell; he dropped shrieking over the low bulwark, and sank with his face downwards. I saw no more, for the bows of the ship here caught us astern with a crushing shock, that drove the schooner right under water, up to the main hatchway, and I was floated off in the sea. The first thing I can remember after that catastrophe, was the roaring as if of a thousand cataracts about my ears, and a consciousness that I was hauled through the water like a fish in a net. This was indeed the case: I had been entangled in the loose wreck of rigging that fell on board the Gull; and when the ship, after grazing her stern, drew these masts and sails after her, by the numerous ropes that still remained unbroken, I was carried along, and would certainly have perished, had not the lightness of the wreck, and the rapidity with which it was dragged, kept me on the surface; yet even there I was never nearer anything than suffocation, from the overwhelming tumult of the broken water which was now sheeting over my head and shoulders, and falling in foam upon my feet like the very jets round the ship’s cutwater. I saw that I must perish if I did not get out of the rush; and having with infinite labour disentangled myself from the rope round my middle, by which I was held, made a desperate exertion, and succeeded in drawing myself forward, and climbing up the connecting rigging at the bows, till I got my head out of the spray. So soon as I was out of immediate peril I relaxed my exertions for a few minutes to take breath; and although I frequently cried for help, I could not make myself heard, for my voice, as well as my strength, was almost exhausted, and once or twice I was on the point of giving up the struggle, and dropping into my deep death-bed, through pure inability of longer hanging on. At last, finding my cries fruitless, and feeling that, without some extraordinary exertion, I must face the abhorred change without further preparation, I collected all the energies of my remaining strength, and with an effort that left me as weak as an infant, drew myself up by the sheer force of my arms, and grasped the fore-chains; then slowly clambered to the dead-eyes, gained the rail of the bulwark, doubled over it like a sack, and fell on deck insensible. When my senses began to collect, and before I had yet opened my eyes, I remember congratulating myself in my own mind on my escape, and dimly contrasting the oozy bed of the sea with the warm berth in which I either was, or was about to be placed. But it was cold—cold. I opened my eyes; I was lying in a dripping coil like a bundle of wet sea-weed, the deck flooded all round with the water still running from my clothes and hair. I dried the blinding spray from my eyes, and, raising myself upon my elbow, looked about. There was not a soul there but myself!

I swallowed a strange pang that arose from my heart, and looked out for something to make a noise with; there was nothing to be had—the decks were free from everything but tar and tallow. I had never seen such dirty decks before, yet there was nothing loose lying about. I had not yet risen—I was afraid to rise—so I pulled off my shoe, and began to hammer on the deck with the heel of it; then to call and to whistle. There was no answer! I started up with another pang that made the water gush to my eyes, and ran astern without looking either to the right or left. I stretched myself half over the tafferel, and looked for the schooner. I saw her lying far away astern, a water-logged wreck, with the other tenders bearing up to her, and signals flying from all their masts. I tossed my arms and shouted, in the wild hope that I might still be taken on board some of them. Alas! I felt the unmanned ship speeding on her dark errand beyond the hope of being overtaken. All the frightful stories of the Flying Dutchman came back with unnatural vividness upon my memory. I remembered the unaccountable terror of the wretched captain of the Gull, his horrible fate, and the invisible agency by which it seemed accomplished. I thought myself in superhuman hands, and my heart sank, and my breath failed, and I swooned for fear, as I had already fallen senseless from fatigue. Let it be remembered that I was a very young man; although I feel that apology need hardly be made for a fear so dreadful, and, in such circumstances, so natural, that not even at this day would the wealth of worlds induce me to spend another hour in the same ignorance of my situation that then afflicted me. I lifted my head from the deck with a bewildering recollection of all that had passed, but as my eye rested on the tall and shining sails overhead, I could not think that a fabric so beautiful was made to bear any but a human crew. Be her navigators who they might, I knew that it was the same whether I faced them fore or aft; so I leaped up, and forced myself forward, that I might put an end to my horrible suspense at once. From few, if any, do I apprehend contempt on account of this avowal. The awe of preternatural agency is part of this life’s natural religion; and sanctioned as it is in the revealed religion that has been vouchsafed to us, let no man scorn me for acknowledging its influence, while his own soul must tell him that he is a being existing he knows not how, among he knows not whom. I am not ashamed to confess, that I walked the deck of that deserted vessel in excessive fear; from companion and hatchway I expected every moment to see some inconceivable horror ascend; and although I held in my breath, and kept myself drawn up in rigid determination not to flinch from anything that a Christian man should confront, yet, with all the preparation I could muster, I felt that the twirling of a straw upon that bare deck would have upset me. My senses, however, were not so totally overwhelmed in awe and wonder as to prevent my perceiving that there really was something unusual in the appearance of things on deck. There were four wide funnels, one under each of the main and fore shrouds—things I had never seen in any ship before. The ports were larger than usual, and had, which seemed very strange, their hinges below. The decks were smeared and slippery, as I have before observed, with tar and tallow. I looked up with a lightened heart to the yard-arms;—there were the grappling-irons swinging from them one and all! I ran into the main-cabin without one hesitating pause—I was rushing desperately to be satisfied, and I was satisfied. The cabin was stripped of its furniture; troughs were laid along each side; they ran into the main-hold, and terminated in sally-ports at either quarter; they were stuffed with reeds in sheaves bound together with matches, and steeped in composition. It was evident—I was in a fire-ship; it accounted for everything. I ran to the sally-port; there was the black track of the gunpowder, and the spot plainly marked where the match had been extinguished. The ship had missed taking fire, and stood out to sea. I ran out on deck—threw off my clothes to dry—got a remnant of a sail, and rubbed myself into life and warmth once more; then wrapping myself in a canvass cloak very fairly cut from the fore stay-sail, I lay down in the sunny scuppers, and without a single thought of navigating the vessel—it never entered my head, once I had got the horrible deceit of my fear removed—gave myself up to the enjoyment of my security and rest so heartily, that at last, like a wearied child, I dropped involuntarily asleep. I could not have slept more than an hour when I was awakened by the snapping of a royal studding-sail boom, for the breeze had been freshening ever since I came on board, and was now straining spars and canvass at a pitch that threatened to carry away everything. The new dangers of my situation rose in fearful array before me, as I considered with myself the probable consequences. I was driving right on shore at a rate that must smash the vessel to pieces the moment she would take the ground; and how to shorten sail or lie to, I could not tell. Everything was fast, and my single strength could not suffice to slacken away anything of consequence. The vessel could never be put upon another course with all her yards braced square. There was little or no chance of my falling in with any sail in the Channel in such dangerous times. The wind was getting round to the east again, and I saw plainly that if it settled there, and still carried me before it, I must drift to the Atlantic, and die of hunger, unless I could subsist on tallow and brimstone (since nothing more eatable had been left on board) till the final catastrophe of going on shore, that sooner or later must befall me. Even if I should fall in with a sail, how were they to know that I was in distress? and if they did, how was I to bring the ship to? or (unless it fell a dead calm) how was a boat to be sent on board me driving at such a rate? I went to the wheel to try what I could do; not much caring though I should lay her fairly on her beam-ends; for, if she should not founder outright, I thought even such a state would be better than the rapid ruin she was then threatening me with. I brought her up till I shook the wind out of her canvass. She reeled and staggered for a moment like a drunken being, then all at once her lighter sails were taken aback with a slap that beat away booms, and tore down yards and tackling with a succession of crashes, flappings, and snaps like gun-shots, which threw me into such confusion, that I let go the wheel, and ran for the cabin, in dread of having my brains beaten out by a falling spar, like the luckless captain of the Gull. I sat down in despair among the tubs of composition and piles of oakum steeped in turpentine, with which the place was crammed, and listened to the effects of my rashness still sounding overhead, and making themselves known even below by the mad plunges of the vessel, that pitched me at length into a corner, where I lay till she righted, and went off dead before the wind once more. The rigging when I came on deck presented a strange sight. All the great sails had filled again, but the lighter ones were flying in lumbering streamers from every yard-arm like ribbands from a tattered cap; while booms and blocks went swinging through the confusion, knocking against the standing spars, and adding at every stroke some new disaster to the ruinous uproar. I would have almost changed places with Phæton. I would as soon have laid my hand upon the fiery mane of a courser of the sun, with all the zodiac reeling underfoot, as have touched a spoke of that fatal wheel during the next hour. I went below again, and got between decks by the communication from the cabin, where I saw the arrangement of the combustibles, which put the nature of the vessel beyond all doubt. The troughs crossed each other between four barrels of composition, placed one under each of the above-mentioned funnels. Chambers were loaded opposite all the ports, to blow them open and give the flame vent. Powdered resin and sulphur were scattered plentifully in all directions, and a mixture of combustibles like soft dry paste filled the bottoms of all the troughs, on top of which the reeds were tied with matches innumerable. The breeze now began to take off, and continued to lull away during all the afternoon, having settled at length at about south-east, so that my fears of drifting past the Land’s-end were now almost at rest. I dressed myself in my dried clothes, but dared not kindle a fire;—every spot was ready to start into flame with the merest spark; even in the after-cabin the berths were stowed full of old turpentine and oil jars, and dusted with meal of resin. I walked the deck till evening, and with departing light of day distinguished St Michael’s Mount, rising in a grey and purple haze high into the ruddy horizon. The night fell chilly and thick, and I went into the cabin and tried to make up my mind for the worst. But I could not long bear to stay there, it was so lonely and dismal. There was a sort of company in the wind and the struggling sails on deck, but below, everything was deadly dark and silent. So, chilly as it was, I wrapped my cloak of canvass once more about me, and sat down on the forecastle, shivering with cold and apprehension, and gazing, till my eyes grew strained and dizzy, into the monotonous gloom ahead. I could not see any star, but I think it must have been about one o’clock, when the heavy washing of the seas about our bows was broken by the distant murmur of breakers. Had I heard my death-bell tolling, it could not more surely have impressed me with the certainty of my immediate fate; and yet the very growling of that merciless band, into whose strangling tumult I so soon expected to be cast, came upon my numbed senses with a rousing and invigorating influence; for the dull uncertainty of my former state had been altogether stupifying. I rose and took my post once more by the wheel, determined to use my experience to the best advantage in counteracting or seconding the wind as I saw necessary, so far as its very limited command would go.

The tumult of broken water now became louder and louder, but instead of advancing on my ear as before, out of the darkness ahead, it growled away down the night on our starboard beam in an oblique direction, which I could not account for, till, looking over the stern, I saw, by the dim glimmer of the ship’s wake, that we were making more lee than head way; that, in fact, the ship was driving broadside on, in a powerful tide-race along a reef of rocks, through some opening in which, or past which altogether, I did not despair of being yet carried by the current, as I heard no surf loud enough to tell of its running anywhere against them, except beyond one breach in their line, comparatively smooth. The coast was now distinguishable ahead, black, high, and precipitous. It advanced higher and higher up the sky, till it almost seemed to overhang our forecastle, and I now felt the ship swing round in the sweep of the current, and saw the breakers running white astern as we swept clear of them, right through the reef. There rose presently a rustling sound about the bows; then a heavy grating all along the keel, a dull prolonged concussion, and the tide broke on her as she stuck—fast in a sand-bank. It was pitch dark. The breakers were on all sides; but the ship lay in smooth water among them. It would have been madness to attempt swimming on shore; where, even if I should escape the violence of the current and surf, I must spend the long morning on the bleak hill, weighed down by wet clothes, and ignorant of my road. Under these considerations, particularly as there was no fear of the ship yielding to any sea likely to run there, during the calm state of the weather, I determined to remain on deck till day; and now, considering my safety almost certain, I mingled my supplications with thanksgivings, and, falling on my knees, blessed God with tears of gratitude and delight; then wrapping myself up once more behind the shelter of the bulwark, went to sleep. I started up from a dream of home, for I distinctly heard the stroke of oars alongside. I was on the point of calling out when some one close under the quarter said, in a low but (to my morbidly sensitive ear) a clear whisper, “By —— I believe they have deserted her! But look sharp, my lads, for you may find plenty of them still, skulking behind the bulwarks.” I heard this with an accompaniment of cocking fire-arms and unsheathing cutlasses; and with the horrifying suspicion that they were a gang of Cornwall wreckers, I crept in renewed and redoubled terror into the cabin. Just as I concealed myself behind the door, which opened on the quarter-deck from under a high poop, the boat’s crew sprung on deck with lanterns and levelled weapons. Two tall and rather fine-looking men led the party, and so soon as they saw that there was no fighting for them on deck, drew their company together round the main-mast, and proceeded, to my inexpressible relief, to take possession of the ship in the name of his Majesty George the Third, by virtue of certain letters of marque and reprisal, empowering them, Adam and Hiram Forrest, of Forrest-Race, Esquires, to set upon by force of arms, subdue, and take all ships, vessels, goods, wares, munitions of war, &c. &c. of, or belonging to, the French nation. Now was my time to discover myself (and I confess I had a thought or two about my claim to a share of the prize-money).—One step I made from my position, but the noise arrested me with its immediate consequence—half-a-dozen muskets levelled at the door. “Keep together, men! they are barricaded in the cabin!—go aft, Hiram, with four hands, and break open the door, while I secure the forecastle and hatchways,” cried the elder leader. His associate sprung towards my place of concealment at the head of four fellows, brandishing their naked cutlasses; and bursting open the door with a drive of his foot, rushed in—a pistol in one hand, a drawn sword in the other. I thought it most prudent to keep clear of the first rush of their irruption, and so had retreated quietly to the after-cabin, where I concealed myself in one of the berths close by the stern-port. They soon found the cabin equally deserted with the deck; and as they went stumbling about with their one lantern through the lumber of combustibles, filled it with exclamations of amazement.

“Why, here’s no crew that I can see but a regiment of paint-pots—that must have been a rat that we heard, sir,” said one.

“D——n me, Tom, I say, what sort of a devil’s drawing-room have we here?” muttered another, as he stood turning over a mop of oakum with his toe; “and what sort of a damnable smell is this?” snuffing at a box of composition.

“The devil’s own smell—brimstone, by ——!” cried a fourth, shaking a cloud of sulphur from his fingers; and one fellow rummaging through the troughs pulled up a bundle of reeds and tossed them out on the floor, exclaiming, “Nothing but rush-lights in these here lockers, Master Hiram—rush-lights and mouldings of white biscuit, as I take it—light diet that, I may say, sir, for a ship’s company.” Just then some lumber getting loose, rolled out of an upper berth among them, and three or four smart cuts were made at it before they saw what it was. I had taken them as a hint to lie quiet a little longer, when their leader started suddenly, and, after standing for a moment at the heel of the mizen-mast, gave a strong shudder, and ordered the men out of the cabin. “Off, off to the forecastle every man of you!—off, I say, and send Captain Forrest here.” The men withdrew, muttering exclamations of amazement as he drove them out on deck, whence he presently returned, accompanied by the other. He locked and bolted the door after him, and led his companion up to the mast, then throwing the light full on it, asked in a whisper, that thrilled through me where I lay, “Do you know that?” “What?” “That splinter of steel buried in the wood.” The elder Forrest, without one word of reply, snatched up the lantern and ran round the cabin, holding the light over his head, and gazing at everything with a strong expression of astonishment; then stuck the lantern down upon a barrel-head, slapped his hands against his thighs, and exclaimed, “Hah!—Now may I be damned if it is not the old Phœnix come back again!—but Hiram, I say, by Heaven I cannot understand this—she is not the same boat, and yet she is—I thought I knew her deck although it is strangely altered—but what is the matter with you?” for the younger one stood pale and trembling, and here grasped him convulsively by the arm.

“What ails you, Hiram? I say,—I hope you are not afraid?”

“Yes, by ——” (with a slow and solemn asseveration), “I am afraid, Adam Forrest!” the other answered, gasping; “I am afraid, for I saw him there as plainly as I see you, clinging round the mast as he did that night, when he held on till you shore through his wrist with your cutlass, and snapped it an inch deep in the solid wood below! and if I go in there” (pointing to the after-cabin without even raising his averted face),—“if I go in there, I will see the others!—Come on deck—I am sick.”

“Stay where you are—you must not expose yourself to the men,—tut, tut!—What! after all we have seen together, to let a trick of your fancy get the better of your manhood in this disgraceful way!—Why,” and he mused for a moment, “it is odd enough too, that she should come here without hands, and all to give us a second crop off her old timbers; but egad, I have it! I’ll lay my life Tom has been overhauling her in the Channel, and has sent the old bird adrift, well knowing to whose door the Race would bring her!—Ah! poor Tom! many an ugly job he has brought me through; however, they say that Gull thing that I got him the command of is a switching fast sailer, and if he has but a stanch crew, he may make a good thing of it yet—that is, if he can only keep from getting more than moderately drunk. But come along till we see what this after-cabin has got for us. We have our letters of marque now, and need not be ashamed to show our faces under that authority to man or devil!—Come,” and he dragged his reluctant associate almost close to the spot where I lay, in another and still more dreadful relapse of horror. The young man leaned against a timber, with his head sunk upon his breast, and shuddered violently.

“Adam,” said he at length, “we have never thriven in anything since the night we had that business in this abominable den of blood. You and I then were, or ought to have been, country gentlemen, and he was no more than a careless sailor at worst; but with all the money we got in Bordeaux for the fruits of our villany, we are three miserable adventurers to-day, if the damning cargo she carries has not sunk the Gull already—Mother of God defend me! there is young Manson!” I can no more account for it now, than I could help it then, but the truth is, I had risen at this mention of the Gull in a sort of reckless frenzy, for I had no control over either my words or actions, and started out on the floor before them, a very ghastly and hideous spectacle; for I was pale and haggard with fear and desperation, and my face was bloody from a scratch I had got in the dark. The eyes of the repentant sinner fastened on me as I rose, and his terror was full as horribly depicted on his countenance, as that of his already punished associate had been on his; he fell flat on his face, and even the hardened ruffian at his side leaped back with a shout of horror as I rose before him with my hands held up, and a storm of denunciation that I could not control bursting from my lips. What I said I did not even then know, but it soon betrayed my mortal nature, and Forrest, with a blow of his fist, struck me back whence I had risen, then drew a pistol and came close up to me to make sure. I prayed for mercy now as wildly as I had before denounced vengeance, and in the extremity of my terror shut my eyes and clung to the very boards. A flash first came through my closed eyelids, and then a rushing and flapping burst of flame like interminable lightning. The pistol had burned priming, but even that had been enough to set fire to an open can of turpentine that was upset from a locker above by the thrust he had made after me with the weapon. The liquid starting into fire and smoke over the exploding gunpowder, flowed down in a waving river of flame, and spreading on the resined floors, and catching the loose combustibles all round, raised such a chaos of fire, smoke, hissing, sputtering, and suffocation, that I had only power to feel myself unwounded, and with my coat over my head, to pitch myself bodily against the port below me. I literally sank through a little pool of flame, but I burst open the port as I had expected, and found myself the next moment in the sea. It was now low water, and the stream that I had feared would sweep me among the breakers was totally subsided; but I could see nothing clearly for the first minute, only a dazzling and flashing of light through the spray, that swept over my head from the broken water on the rocks. The first thing I saw distinctly was a trail of flame writhing like a tail round the stern of the ship, as if the great black hulk had been lashing herself into the furious fit, that in another minute burst out from every vent and funnel in spouting and roaring jets of fire, that blazed up into the rigging as high as the lower masts, and pierced the night for miles round, with a splendour strong as the light of the sun at noonday. I got upon the nearest of the rocks (by the fall of the water they now rose much nearer than they had before seemed to do), and rising out of reach of the surf, contemplated a spectacle the grandest and most appalling I ever witnessed. The ship had run aground upon the landward side of a tongue of sand, that stretched (like half the string of a bent bow) partly across a curve of the coast, thus intercepting whatever the current from the opposite side might sweep into the bay; and there settling on a rapidly shelving bank, had fallen over as the water left her, till her masts and rigging lay almost across the narrow channel between. On shore an overhanging precipice rose right opposite, and close under her lee—so close that her rigging sloped up to within a stone’s-throw of the jutting rock. Between the base of this rock and the water’s edge, there was a stripe of greensward, evidently artificial, forming a platform of perhaps thirty yards across, which widened away at one side into a lawn with haycocks and shrubbery, while there was a good deal of planting visible up the back of the ravine. An old-fashioned straggling house stood almost under the precipice, facing the platform on one side, and the lawn on the other. Its steep roof of grey slate, and slender chimneys, made a gaunt and spectral show in the ruddy glare, contrasted with the black mass of rock behind, and the boiling flashes of the surf tossed up almost to its fantastic porch in front. I looked at the ship—the fore-hatchway had torn up with a tremendous burst, and the massy planks and bars of wrought-iron were scattered on either side; but the black tarpaulin rose like a canopy over the body of flame that followed, and was dissipated into smoke and ashes, without ever coming down. And now the breeze tossing that blaze about through the rigging in rolling and heavy volume, like a great tongue, it roared at every wallowing flap, and licked up square-sails, stay-sails, and studding-sails, as though they had been so much tinder, while the port-chambers successively exploding, thundered and flashed down either broadside, then vomited out their voluminous, flaring streamers of fire, that curled and climbed up into the conflagration till consumed amid the general flame. All the water out of the ship’s shadow blazed to the blazing pile; but wherever her hull momentarily intercepted its light, the sea seemed to heave more heavily, and with a lurid glow like blood. The boat’s crew had now pushed off from the quarter; I saw all on board save the two miserable beings I had left in the flames of the cabin: but the men had scarce pulled the boat’s length from the vessel’s side, when a figure leaped up on the quarter rail from deck—he looked as if he had risen out of hell; for his head was singed bald, and his face and hands were all livid, swollen, and bloody, from the scorching. It was the elder Forrest. He was tossing his arms and howling. The men pulled back, the boat shot into the shadow of the ship, and in the sudden difference of light I lost them for an instant; but the great flame of the forecastle took a sweep to windward, and showed them again, close under the quarter. All their faces glowed like copper, as they turned them up to the crimsoned figure wavering above, for Forrest had now seized a rope, that dangled still unconsumed from the mizen-yard arm, and was swinging to and fro, as the scorching flame behind him swayed forward or collapsed; but their faces fell, and a cry of horror burst from them all as it gave way, and the wretch, after balancing a moment on his narrow footing, fell back into the fire;—there was a puff of smoke and ashes, a long heaving roll of the flame, a shriek that rung shrilly over everything, and the seamen, silent and horrified, pushed off again, and made for the shore. And now the whole rigging was in a light flame, and the dance of sparks to leeward, where it eddied round the chimneys and gables of the old house, looked like a great spangled mantle shaken out in the sky. Beneath, smoke was curling in white eddies from every door and window, and the fate of the doomed dwelling seemed fixed, to burn first, while anything remained in it that would burn, and then to be swept from its foundations by the final explosion, out of reach of which I had all this time been painfully making my way, sometimes clambering over the rocks high and dry, and sometimes swimming. I gained the dry land at last, about three hundred yards astern of the vessel, and rounding the shoulder of a hill, lay down among the grass in the sudden pitchy darkness behind it, till my eyes had a little recovered from the effects of the excessive light, and I was able to see my way into the country. I was between two steep hills; that behind me was lurid in the dim reflection of the sky, but a ruddier haze than ever the sunset had thrown over it, glowed across the track of air above, and bore a crown of fire to the top of the higher hill opposite, on which every stock and stone showed like iron at a forging heat. Through this red region I had to pass to reach the inland. Pursuing a horse-track that led over it, I gained the limits of darkness again, without once turning to look at the scene behind—I had beheld enough. Suddenly I heard the sound of hoofs in the valley beyond, and turning, beheld a riderless horse toss up his mane like a fiery crest over the illuminated mountain, then plunge into the darkness between. I laid hold of the reins as he rushed past me, determined to use the opportunity of escape; and having checked him with some difficulty, threw myself into the saddle and gave him head. He bore me down the open hill like the wind; but when I got among the precipices below, through which the road was intricately carried, I was reluctantly obliged to draw up a little for fear of accidents. I was unwilling to do this, as well from the desire of making my escape to as great a distance as possible from the explosion, as from the conviction, growing every moment stronger, that I heard some one on horseback in pursuit. Now, I had no doubt that the animal I rode had thrown another rider immediately before being caught by me; and I thought it most probable, that whoever was now pursuing, had been in company with him when his horse had first run off. Be that as it might, I had had enough of Forrest-Race and its inhabitants, to make me determined, if I must be overtaken, to conceal myself by the road-side, and let my pursuer look after the runaway at his leisure. However, I tried to make the most of my chances in the mean time, and pushed on as rapidly as prudence would allow; but in ten minutes more, I found I had no prospect of escape; I heard the clatter of the horse, and once or twice the cries of the rider behind, and was just preparing to dismount, and looking back to try what I could see, when there shot up a column of fire, a hundred feet and more over the top of the highest mountain, and hill and valley, road, rock, and river, leaped out into astonishing splendour before me. Every object, for three or four seconds, was apparent in steady and intense light. I saw the perilous road down which I had come, and wondered how my horse had kept his footing at all; but my wonder was considerably greater when, about half a furlong behind, I saw my pursuer, as plainly as I ever saw my own mother, to be a woman—dressed, at least, in a female habit, and light as Diana, while she sat her rearing and plunging hunter through the wild tumult of his terror. But, before I could take a second look, down stooped the night again in tenfold power of darkness, while there burst through the shaken sky such a concussion, as with its tremendous and stunning violence beat the poor animal I bestrode, and myself along with him, flat down upon the ground, among the rebounding echoes and black darkness. I escaped from the fall unhurt, and the horse stood still and trembling, till I remounted, for I now was no longer desirous of escaping my pursuer. I was hardly in the saddle again, when I heard a sweet voice at my side—“Now, Heaven have mercy on us,—this is a fearful night!—How could you leave me in this way, George?—Ah! you could not help it, poor fellow—but did I not see you thrown after the grey ran off?—Why do you not answer, George—are you hurt?”

“In the name of God, Ellen Fane, what do you do here?” I exclaimed, in a voice that I could hardly think my own. She screamed aloud, for it was indeed she, and checked her horse till he almost went on his haunches; I seized him by the bridle to keep him from backing over the precipice.

“Keep off—keep off,” she cried. “Oh, have mercy on me if you are a man or a Christian, for I am a helpless girl, and in danger of my life!—Oh, only help me to get to Truro, and I will pray for you—indeed I will—as long as this miserable existence lasts!”

I was agitated by contending emotions—innumerable—indescribable; but I made a struggle to compose myself, and implored her not to be alarmed. “And, oh, Ellen, Ellen!” I cried, “do you not yet know me?”