CHAPTER XLI.

Sir Philip Hastings returned to his own house earlier than had been expected, bringing with him the physician he had gone to seek, and whom--contrary to the ordinary course of events--he had found at once. They both went up to Lady Hastings's room where the physician, according to the usual practice of medical men in consultation, approved of all that his predecessor had done, yet ordered some insignificant changes in the medicines in order to prove that he had not come there for nothing. He took the same view of the case that Mr. Short had taken, declaring that there was no immediate danger; but at the same time he inquired particularly how that lady rested in the night, whether she started in her sleep, was long watchful, and whether she breathed freely during slumber.

The maid's account was not very distinct in regard to several of these points; but she acknowledged that it was her young lady who usually sat up with Lady Hastings till three or four o'clock in the morning.

Sir Philip immediately directed Emily to be summoned, but the maid informed him she had gone out about an hour and a half before, and had not then returned.

When the physician took his leave and departed, Sir Philip summoned the butler to his presence, and inquired, with an eager yet gloomy tone, if he knew where Mistress Emily had gone.

"I really do not, Sir Philip," replied the man. "She went out with Mr. Dixwell, but they parted a little way down the road, and my young lady went on as if she were going to farmer Wallop's or Jenny Best's."

At the latter name Sir Philip started as if a serpent had stung him, and he waved to the man to quit the room. As soon as he was alone he commenced pacing up and down in more agitation than he usually displayed, and once or twice words broke from him which gave some indications of what was passing in his mind.

"Too clear, too clear," he said, and then after a pause exclaimed, holding up his hands; "so young, and so deceitful! Marlow must be told of this, and then must act as he thinks fit--it were better she were dead--far better! What is the cold, dull corruption of the grave, the mere rotting of the flesh, and the mouldering of the bones, to this corruption of the spirit, this foul dissolution of the whole moral nature?"

He then began to pace up and down more vehemently than before, fixing his eyes upon the ground, and seeming to think profoundly, with a quivering lip and knitted brow. "Hard, hard task for a father," he said--"God of heaven that I should ever dream of such a thing!--yet it might be a duty. What can Marlow be doing during this long unexplained absence? France--can he have discovered all this and quitted her, seeking, in charity, to make the breach as little painful as possible? Perhaps, after all," he continued, after a few moments' thought, "the man may have been mistaken when he told me that he believed that this young scoundrel was lying ill of a fall at this woman's cottage; yet at the best it was bad enough to quit a sick mother's bed-side for long hours, when I too was absent. Can she have done it to show her spleen at this foolish opposition to her marriage?"

There is no character so difficult to deal with--there is none which is such a constant hell to its possessor--as that of a moody man. Sir Philip had been moody, as I have endeavored to show, from his very earliest years; but all the evils of that sort of disposition had increased upon him rapidly during the latter part of his life. Unaware, like all the rest of mankind, of the faults of his own character, he had rather encouraged than struggled against its many great defects. Because he was stern and harsh, he fancied himself just, and forgot that it is not enough for justice to judge rightly of that which is placed clearly and truly before it, and did not remember, or at all events apply the principle, that an accurate search for truth, and an unprejudiced suspension of opinion till truth has been obtained, are necessary steps to justice. Suspicion--always a part and parcel of the character of the moody man--had of late years obtained a strong hold upon him, and unfortunately it had so happened that event after event had occurred to turn his suspicion against his own guiltless child. The very lights and shades of her character, which he could in no degree comprehend, from his own nature being destitute of all such impulsiveness, had not only puzzled him, but laid the foundation of doubts. Then the little incident which I have related in a preceding part of this work, regarding the Italian singing-master--Emily's resolute but unexplained determination to take no more lessons from that man, had set his moody mind to ponder and to doubt still more. The too successful schemes and suggestions of Mrs. Hazleton had given point and vigor to his suspicions, and the betrayal of his private conversation to the government had seemed a climax to the whole, so that he almost believed his fair sweet child a fiend concealed beneath the form of an angel.

It was in vain that he asked himself, What could be her motives? He had an answer ready, that her motives had always been a mystery to him, even in her lightest acts. "There are some people," he thought, "who act without motives--in whom the devil himself seems to have implanted an impulse to do evil without any cause or object, for the mere pleasure of doing wrong."

On the present occasion he had accidentally heard from the farmer, who was the next neighbor of Jenny Best, that he was quite certain Sir John Hastings, as he called him, was lying ill from a fall at that good woman's cottage. His horse had been found at a great distance on a wild common, with the bridle broken, and every appearance of having fallen over in rearing. Blood and other marks of an accident had been discovered on the road. Mr. Short, the surgeon, was seen to pay several visits every day to the old woman's house, and yet maintained the most profound secrecy in regard to his patient. The farmer argued that the surgeon would not be so attentive unless that patient was a person of some importance, and it was clear he was not one of Jenny Best's own family, for every member of it had been well and active after the surgeon's visits had been commenced.

All these considerations, together with the absence of John Ayliffe from his residence, had led the good farmer to a right conclusion, and he had stated the fact broadly to Sir Philip Hastings.

Sir Philip, on his part, had made no particular inquiries, for the very name of John Ayliffe was hateful to him; but when he heard that his daughter had gone forth alone to that very cottage, and had remained there for a considerable time in the same place with the man whom he abhorred, and remembered that the tale which had been boldly put forth of her having visited him in secret, the very blood, as it flowed through his heart, seemed turned into fire, and his brain reeled with anguish and indignation.

Presently the hall door was heard to open, and there was a light step in the passage. Sir Philip darted forth from his room, and met his daughter coming in with a sad and anxious face, and as he thought with traces of tears upon her eyelids.

"Where have you been?" asked her father in a stern low tone.

"I have been to Jenny Best's down the lane, my father," replied Emily, startled by his look and manner, but still speaking the plain truth, as she always did. "Is my mother worse?"

Without a word of reply Sir Philip turned away into his room again and closed the door.

Alarmed by her father's demeanor, Emily hurried up at once to Lady Hastings's room, but found her certainly more cheerful and apparently better.

The assurance given by the physician that there was no immediate danger, nor any very unfavorable symptom, had been in a certain degree a relief to Lady Hastings herself; for, although she had undoubtedly been acting a part when in the morning she had declared herself dying, yet, as very often happens with those who deceive, she had so far partially deceived herself as to believe that she was in reality very ill. She was surprised at Emily's sudden appearance and alarmed look, but her daughter did not think it right to tell her the strange demeanor of Sir Philip, but sitting down as calmly as she could by her mother's side, talked to her for several minutes on indifferent subjects. It was evident to Emily that, although her father's tone was so harsh, her mother viewed her more kindly than in the morning, and the information which had been given her by the surgeon accounted for the change. The conduct of Sir Philip, however, seemed not to be explained, and Emily could hardly prevent herself from falling into one of those reveries which have often been mentioned before. She struggled against the tendency, however, for some time, till at length she was relieved by the announcement that Mistress Hazleton was below, but when Lady Hastings gave her maid directions to bring her friend up, Emily could refrain no longer from uttering at least one word of warning.

"Give me two minutes more, dear mamma," she said, in a low voice. "I have something very particular to say to you--let Mrs. Hazleton wait but for two minutes."

"Well," said Lady Hastings, languidly; and then turning to the maid she added, "Tell dear Mrs. Hazleton that I will receive her in five minutes, and when I ring my bell, bring her up."

As soon as the maid had retired Emily sank upon her knees by her mother's bed-side, and kissed her hand, saying, "I have one great favor to ask, dear mother, and I beseech you to grant it."

"Well, my child," answered Lady Hastings, thinking she was going to petition for a recall of her injunction against the marriage with Marlow, "I have but one object in life, my dear Emily, and that is your happiness. I am willing to make any sacrifice of personal feelings for that object. What is it you desire?"

"It is merely this," replied Emily, "that you would not put any trust or confidence whatever in Mrs. Hazleton. That you would doubt her representations, and confide nothing to her, for a short time at least."

Lady Hastings looked perfectly aghast. "What do yon mean, Emily?" she said. "What can you mean? Put no trust in Mrs. Hazleton, my oldest and dearest friend?"

"She is not your friend," replied Emily, earnestly, "nor my friend, nor my father's friend, but the enemy of every one in this house. I have long had doubts--Marlow changed those doubts into suspicions, and this day I have accidentally received proof positive of her cruel machinations against my father, yourself, and me. This justifies me in speaking as I now do, otherwise I should have remained silent still."

"But explain, explain, my child," said Lady Hastings. "What has she done? What are these proofs you talk of? I cannot comprehend at all unless you explain."

"There would be no time, even if I were not bound by a promise," replied Emily; "but all I ask is that you suspend all trust and confidence in Mrs. Hazleton for one short day--perhaps it may be sooner; but I promise you that at the end of that time, if not before, good Mr. Dixwell shall explain every thing to you, and place in your hands a paper which will render all Mrs. Hazleton's conduct for the last two years perfectly clear and distinct."

"But do tell me something, at least, Emily," urged her mother. "I hate to wait in suspense. You used to be very fond of Mrs. Hazleton and she of you. When did these suspicions of her first begin, and how?"

"Do you not remember a visit I made to her some time ago," replied Emily, "when I remained with her for several days? Then I first learned to doubt her. She then plotted and contrived to induce me to do what would have been the most repugnant to your feelings and my father's, as well as to my own. But moreover she came into my room one night walking in her sleep, and all her bitter hatred showed itself then."

"Good gracious! What did she say? What did she do?" exclaimed Lady Hastings, now thoroughly forgetting herself in the curiosity Emily's words excited.

Her daughter related all that had occurred on the occasion of Mrs. Hazleton's sleeping visit to her room, and repeated her words as nearly as she could recollect them.

"But why, my dearest child, did you not tell us all this before?" asked Lady Hastings.

"Because the words were spoken in sleep," answered Emily, "and excited at the time but a vague doubt. Sleep is full of delusions; and though I thought the dream must be a strange one which could prompt such feelings, yet still it might all be a troublous dream. It was not till afterwards, when I saw cause to believe that Mrs. Hazleton wished to influence me in a way which I thought wrong, that I began to suspect the words that had come unconsciously from the depths of her secret heart. Since then suspicion has increased every day, and now has ripened into certainty. I tell you, dear mother, that good Mr. Dixwell, whom you know and can trust, has the information as well as myself. But we are both bound to be silent as to the particulars for some hours more. I could not let Mrs. Hazleton be with you again, however--remembering, as I do, that seldom has she crossed this threshold or we crossed hers, without some evil befalling us--and not say as much as I have said, to give you the only hint in my power of facts which, if you knew them fully, you could judge of much better than myself. Believe me, dear mother, that as soon as I am permitted--and a very few hours will set me free--I will fly at once to tell you all, and leave you and my father to decide and act as your own good judgment shall direct."

"You had better tell me first, Emily," replied Lady Hastings; "a woman can always best understand the secrets of a woman's heart. I wish you had not made any promise of secrecy; but as you have, so it must be. Has Marlow had any share in this discovery?" she added, with some slight jealousy of his influence over her daughter's mind.

"Not in the least with that which I have made to-day," replied Emily; "but I need not at all conceal from you that he has long suspected Mrs. Hazleton of evil feelings and evil acts towards our whole family; and that he believes that he has discovered almost to a certainty that Mrs. Hazleton aided greatly in all the wrong and injury that has been done my father. The object of his going to France was solely to trace out the whole threads of the intrigue, and he went, not doubting in the least that he should succeed in restoring to my parents all that has been unjustly taken from them. That such a restoration must take place, I now know; but what he has learned or what he has done I cannot tell you, for I am not aware. I am sure, however, that if he brings all he hopes about, it will be his greatest joy to have aided to right you even in a small degree."

"I do believe he is a very excellent and amiable young man," said Lady Hastings thoughtfully.

She seemed as if she were on the point of saying something farther on the subject of Marlow's merits; but then checked herself, and added, "But now indeed, Emily, I think I ought to send for Mrs. Hazleton."

"But you promise me, dear mother," urged Emily eagerly, "that you will put no faith in any thing she tells you, and will not confide in her in any way till you have heard the whole?"

"That I certainly will take care to avoid, my dear," replied Lady Hastings. "After what you have told me, it would be madness to put any confidence in her--especially when a few short hours will reveal all. You are sure, Emily, that it will not be longer!"

"Perfectly certain, my dear mother," answered her daughter. "I would not have promised to refrain from speaking, had I not been certain that the time for such painful concealment must be very short."

"Well, then, my dear child, ring the bell," said Lady Hastings. "I will be very guarded merely on your assurances, for I am sure that you are always candid and sincere whatever your poor father may think."

Emily rung the bell, and retired to her own room, repeating mournfully to herself, "whatever my poor father may think!--Well, well," she added, "the time will soon come when he will be undeceived, and do his child justice. Alas, that it should ever have been otherwise!"

She found relief in tears; and while she wept in solitude Lady Hastings prepared to receive Mrs. Hazleton with cold dignity. She had fully resolved when Emily left her to be as silent as possible in regard to every thing that had occurred that day, not to allude directly or indirectly to the warning which had been given her, and to leave Mrs. Hazleton to attribute her unwonted reserve to caprice or any thing else she pleased. But the resolutions of Lady Hastings were very fragile commodities when she fell into the hands of artful people who knew her character, and one was then approaching not easily frustrated in her designs.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1850, by G. P. R. James, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New-York.

Continued from page 41.

NEWSPAPER POETS: CHARLES WELDON.

Some of the best poetry in America makes its appearance in the newspapers, without pretension, and often without the names of its authors. It is enough for them to write, and publish, whoever will may take the fame. This indifference to public opinion does not arise from any want of autorial vanity perhaps, but in most cases from that modesty which an acquaintance with and self-measurement by the best standards never fails to produce in sincere lovers of art.

Recently a series of noticeable poems has from time to time appeared in the _Tribune_, without any name or clue to their authorship except the enigmatical initials O. O. They are by Mr. Charles Weldon; he is still a young man, and the poems below, we have been told, are the first that he wrote. Their niceties of rhythm in many cases would reflect credit on the recognized masters of the poetic art. In this respect they are remarkable; but perhaps their greatest charm is a certain kind of subtle but masculine thought. They embody what most men feel, but lack words to express; strange facts of impression and consciousness, half-formed philosophies, and those glimpses of truth which are revealed to the mind in certain moods, as stray rays of the moon on a cloudy night. In this respect they resemble the best pieces of Emerson, who seems to be a favorite with Mr. Weldon. In others they remind us of the simplicity of "In Memoriam." By this we intend a compliment rather than a charge of imitation. Mr. Weldon's thoughts are too peculiar to come from any one but himself, and too original to be cast in other moulds. We shall watch his progress with interest, and are mistaken if he does not do something worthy to be long remembered.

Mysterious interpreter, Dear Aid that God has given to me! Instruct me, for I meanly err; Inform me, for I dimly see.

I know thee not: How can I know?-- I sought thee long, and lately found, Wearing the sable weeds of wo, A figure cast upon the ground.

_Thou_ wert that figure. Face to face We have not stood: I dare not see Thy features. We did once embrace, And all my being went to thee.

Henceforward never more apart We wander. All thy steps are mine. Thou hast my brain: thou hast my heart: Thou hast my soul. And I am thine.

...*...*...*...*

The Sun has his appointed place, He never rests, and never tires; And ever in serenest space Burn the celestial, upper fires.

They shine into the soul of man-- Good works of God, but not the best-- And he adores them as he can, Cherishing a supremer guest.

He does not know the alphabet Of angel-language, who aspires Against the sky his tube to set, And spell them into worlds, those fires.

...*...*...*...*

The Petrel, bird of storms, is found Five hundred leagues from any ground: He dwells upon the ocean-wave; He screams above the sailor's grave.

How many tens of centuries Ere mankind built their theories, Skimming the foamy tracks of whales, Did he outride the stoutest gales,

Upon three thousand miles of sea From land to land perpetually Rolling; and not a wave could stay, From day to night, from night to day,

Without an anthem? Where are gone The anthem, and the sea-bird's moan? Where is the splendor of the morn That rose on seas, ere man was born?

Where are the roses of the years, Ere Mother Eve knew mother's cares? Where is the clang of Tubal-Cain's First brass, and where are Jubal's strains?

Where is the rainbow Noah saw And heard a law, or thought a law? The rainbow fades, the beauty lives; The creature falls, the race survives.

...*...*...*...*

They tell us that the brain is mind, Or the mind enters through the brain, Even as light that is confined And colored by the window pane.

The act is fashioned by the head, And thus man does or cannot do; Through the red glass the light is red. Through the blue glass the light is blue.

They do not urge their world-machine To sounder progress, nor explain The difficulties that were seen And felt before--pray what _is_ brain?

All undiscoverable, how Can they resolve the Whence or Why Man grew to being in the Now, Or what is his Futurity.

...*...*...*...*

Down the world's steep, dread abysmal, Icy as Spitzbergen's coast, Through the night hours, long and dismal, Ghost is calling unto ghost; Crushed is every fairer promise, And the good is taken from us; Sorrow adds to former sorrow, And, with every new to-morrow, Some expected joy is lost.

But I will not shrink nor murmur. Though a spectre leads me on; Now I set my footsteps firmer, Face me now, thou skeleton! Trance me with thy fleshless eyeholes-- But I move to other viols Than the rattling of thy bones, As we tread the crazy stones, For I see the risen sun.

With my face behind my shadow Thrown before the risen sun, Life I follow o'er the meadow, And an angel thrusts me on. Every little flower below me Seems to see me, seems to know me; Every bird and cloud above me Seems (or do I dream?) to love me, While the Angel thrusts me on.

Where the turf is softest, greenest, Does that Angel thrust me on; Where the landscape lies serenest In the journey of the sun. I shall pass through golden portals With him, to the wise Immortals, And behold the saints and sages Who outshone their several ages, For an Angel thrust them on.

...*...*...*...*

The poem of the Universe Nor rhythm has, nor rhyme; Some god recites the wondrous song, A stanza at a time.

Great deeds he is foredoomed to do, With Freedom's flag unfurled, Who hears the echo of that song, As it goes down the world.

Great words he is compelled to speak, Who understands the song; He rises up like fifty men-- Fifty good men and strong.

A stanza for each century! Now, heed it, all who can, Who hears it, he, and only he, Is the elected man.

...*...*...*...*

The frost upon the window pane Makes crystal pictures in the night; The Earth, old mother, wears again Her garment of the shining white. We fly across the frozen snow With bounding blood that will not pause. Oh Heaven! we are far below-- Oh Earth! above thee, with thy laws.

The happy horses toss their bells; The sleigh goes on into the far And far away. (A whisper tells Of flight to where the angels are.) Glide forward. As a star that slips Through space, we know a large desire; And though our steeds are urged by whips, We haste as they were urged by fire.

Dash forward, Let us know no rest-- But on, and on, and ever on, Until the palace of the West We enter, with the sinking sun. And forward still, until the East Releases the aspiring day; And forward till the hours have ceased, Oh Earth! now art thou far away.

...*...*...*...*

The mountains truly have a glorious roughness; I do not hear the pyramids are smooth; The ocean grandly foams into abruptness; Does God peal thunder down a well-oiled groove? Thou, with a poet's roughness, friend, would'st quarrel; Staggering o'er the ridges of ploughed speech, You move uneasily. Well, the apparel Of verse is trivial. Try the sense to reach.

THE COUNT MONTE-LEONE: OR, THE SPY IN SOCIETY.[7]

TRANSLATED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE FROM THE FRENCH OF H. DE ST. GEORGES.

XX.--THE GOOD AND THE BAD ANGEL.

The Count of Monte-Leone was cast down on receiving from the minister an order to leave France. So many interests bound him to his country; not that he cherished still the hope of being loved by Aminta, and of one day giving her his name. His ruin had dissipated all his bright dreams of future happiness. But he resided in the same place as the marquise; he breathed the same air that she breathed. To live near her thus, without seeing her, without telling her of that love which consumed his soul, was indeed cruel--it was a bitter sorrow to him every hour and every moment. But to remove himself from her and France was to die. And then, his political work--that work, his life and glory--that work which he loved because it avenged him of kings in avenging his father, the victim of a king--in which he believed he saw the regeneration of the world--that great work, in fine, of which the confidence of almost all the _Ventes_ of Europe rendered him in some way the master and arbiter--it was necessary to renounce at the very moment of accomplishment. He must abandon his associates, his brothers, who relied in the hour of danger on his devotion and energy, and on the firm and bold will with which he had often controlled chance, and by which he had produced safety from apparent shipwreck. Had the Count been denounced? was the plan for the completion of which he and his friends toiled known? He told Taddeo, Von Apsbery, and d'Harcourt, of the order he had received, and they had consulted about it. Their plans, as it will be seen, though difficult, were susceptible of penetration. The house of the false Matheus as yet appeared unsuspected, and that was a great point. It was the holy ark in which were deposited the archives of the association, and the names of the agents, and if it were violated, all was lost. The expulsion from France of the Count might be the signal of the persecutions about to be begun against Carbonarism. At once, by means of a spontaneity which was one of the characteristics of the association, all the _Vente_ of Paris were informed of the measures adopted against Count Monte-Leone. The mighty serpent then coiled up its innumerable rings and then its federal union apparently ceased in the whole capital. The orders were transmitted, received, and executed the very night after the decree of the minister had been signified to Monte-Leone. The friends during the night could not fancy why the order had been given. Monte-Leone seemed, as it were, struck by a new idea and said: "Perhaps it has no political motive, but has been dictated by private vengeance." He then paused, for he saw Taddeo's eyes fixed on him. He continued--"I have a few hours left to ascertain it, and will do so, not for my own sake, for whatever motive it may have, it will not trouble me less, but for your sake, my friends, who will remain here to defend the breach and to receive the enemy's attack."

It was then resolved that up to the time of Monte-Leone's departure, he should not again visit Matheus's house, nor receive the adieus of his friends even at his hotel. All this took place on the night after the interview of the stranger and M. H----, and on the day Louis XVIII. received the visit of the Prince de Maulear. In relation to private revenge the Count could think of no one except the beautiful and passionate Duchess of Palma, who had loved him so devotedly that she wished even to die for him. This passionate woman he had driven to despair. For some time, though, calmness and resignation seemed to occupy her once desolate heart. The Count rarely visited her, but occasionally went to her hotel. Every time he did so, he found her more reasonable and calm. The Duchess evidently avoided all allusion to their old relations. She inquired calmly after his affairs, his pleasures, and his friends. When her mind recurred to the past, as a skiff drifts towards the river it has left, an effort of will was required again to push it into the wide stream of worldliness and indifference. The Count, however, was a delicate and acute observer, and sounded the abyss of her mind through the flowers which grew across its brink. The Count then went to his hotel at the _Champs Elysees_, to clear up his suspicions, and to ascertain if his expulsion had not been caused by the Duchess of Palma. Monte-Leone was ushered in and found her with a few visitors. The features of the Duchess evidently became flushed at the sound of Monte-Leone's name. This, however, was but a flash of light in the dark, and the pale and beautiful face of La Felina soon became cold and passionless. "I expected you, Signor," said she, "when I learned from the Duke the unpleasant event which has occurred. I did not think you would leave the city without seeing me."

"Signora," said the Count, "you were right. But you are mistaken in calling the terrible blow, the almost humiliating attack to which I have been subjected, a disagreeable event."

"Certainly," said La Felina, "it is a catastrophe, and I can understand how severe it must be. We will talk of it by and by, however, when we are _alone_."

The last words of the Duchess were a dismissal to those in the room, and a few moments after they left. When the ambassadress had seen the last visitor leave, she rang the bell by her side. A footman came, to whom she said, "Remember I am at home to no one, not even to the Duke, if he take it into his head to ask for me. Now," said she to the Count, who was surprised at the precautions she had taken, "we are now alone, and can talk together safely. You tell me you are ordered to leave France?"

"At once, without the assignment of any reason."

"Have you not seen the Minister and asked an explanation?"

"I did not think it dignified to do so. Besides, my legal protector in France, the Duke of Palma, the Neapolitan ambassador, alone can defend me. I am, too, unwilling to ask justice, even, far less a favor, from his excellency."

"You are right," said the Duchess. "You would not have been successful, for at the instance of the Duke himself have you been ordered away."

The reply of the Duchess was clear and precise. The Count had every reason to suspect she had participated in the affair, but wished to be sure of it.

"And has not the Duchess discovered why the Duke has done so?"

"Certainly," said La Felina. "The Duke has little confidence in me, not deigning to initiate me in the mysteries of diplomacy. This is not the case, though, with the secretaries. Now," said she kindly, "you must know that nothing which relates to you is uninteresting and I therefore sought to discover why such a stern course had been adopted."

"Indeed."

"Your Neapolitan enemies, or perhaps your _friends_, have caused this. The court of Naples had, by means of the Duke of Palma, pointed you out to that of France as maintaining communications with Italy, which endangered the peace of the country. You are accused of being engaged in a plot to control from Paris the insurrectionary movements of the two Sicilies. You may," said she, "be innocent of those crimes, but you have left terrible recollections behind you in Naples, and your name will long continue a standard of revolt and sedition."

"The court of Naples," said the Count, "does me honor by believing me thus powerful and formidable. I do not see, however, the use of bringing so dangerous a person to Italy."

The Duchess said, "At home, it will be able to watch you more closely than at a distance. I trust, however, we will be able to defeat their plans and keep you here."

"What say you?" said the Count.

"I say that I am willing to abandon many schemes, but will not be diverted from being useful to you--from defending you against your enemies--nor cease to be what I once was, a secret providence, an AEgis against danger. You know I learned this long ago, and am happy to be again able to assume the part."

The Count did not know what to think, and his face expressed doubt and incredulity.

"Well, well," said she bitterly, "you suspect, you doubt me, and do not think me generous enough to return good for evil. So be it; judge me by my actions rather than my words. The former will soon convince you of my devotion."

"What devotion, Signora, do you speak of?" said the Count with curiosity.

"Plainly speaking, of the most sublime of all devotion--of making you happy at the expense of myself. I wish to retain you here in France, where the happiness of which I speak exists, to keep you by her who loves you and by whom you are loved."

"What say you?" said the Count, "would you do so?"

"I will try," said Felina. "I have been forced to adopt strange and extreme means," added she, with a smile. "You know serious cases require violent remedies, and I had no choice."

"Felina," said the Count, with emotion, "I have just committed an offence against you, for which I blush, and which my frankness alone can excuse. When you were busy in my behalf I fancied you the cause of my troubles."

"That is very natural, and I am not at all surprised," said the Duchess. "People in this world are not apt to repay evil with good. I, however, do not wish to appear to you to be better than I am. Perhaps I am less deserving than you think. Time, it is said, cures the greatest mortifications, and dissipates the deepest passions. Three months ago I did not think it possible that I could have acted thus on your behalf. Then I was but a poor despised woman, passionate and deserted. Now I am your friend, sincere and devoted."

"You are an angel," said the Count, with a deep transport of gratitude.

"An angel," said the Duchess. "Then there are only good angels. But," continued she, as if she were unwilling to suffer the Count to think on what she had said, "let us descend from heaven, where you give me so excellent a resting place, to earth. Speak to me of your plans and of her you love."

"Of her I love!" said the Count, with hesitation.

"Certainly; have not all your old hopes returned? Has not the death of the Marquis revived your old passion?"

"Felina," said the Count, "should I talk to you of such matters?"

"Why not? am I not the first to mention them? You must, from my _sang-froid_, see that I can now listen to your confessions and hear all your tender sentiments. The French proverb says: _'Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coute_;'[8] I have already taken that. Treat me as a sister, but as a sister you love, and let me at least have the satisfaction of knowing that my self-denial has made you happy."

"Happy!" said the Count, relapsing into sad thoughts, "may I always be happy, as you seem to wish me! I do not know that I may not hope some day for her to share my fate. She once refused my hand. I do not know but that her heart at last listens to mine; but that which Count Monte-Leone, amid all his luxury, once could offer, the poor and exiled Italian does not now propose."

"Really," said Felina, "I am predestined to make you happy. By a single word I am about to dissipate the clouds around you, and light up your brow and heart with joy."

"That is impossible," said the Count. "I henceforth have nothing, and have lost even hope."

"The present," said the Duchess, "is less sombre than you think it. You are yet rich, almost as you ever were."

The features of the Count expressed the greatest astonishment.

"Listen to me," said the Duchess. "Yesterday one of my Neapolitan friends came to see me. He spoke of you, and I did not conceal the interest with which you had inspired me. He told me he had a confidential letter for Count Monte-Leone from his banker, Antonio Lamberti. The man is not so bad as he is thought to be; for, forced to give way before the burden of his obligations, he only pretended to fail. United by friendship, and especially by political opinions, with you, he has saved your fortune, and will send you the income until he can arrange his affairs and send you the capital."

"Can this be true?" said the Count, beside himself.

"All this can be effected only on certain conditions, that you will answer the letter of Lamberti, which now should be at your hotel."

Monte-Leone could not repress his joy. "Rich," said he; "yet rich! Fortune has now its value for _her_ sake."

Scarcely had he uttered the last word when the face of the Duchess changed its expression. Her eyes glared with madness, and a mortal pallor covered her face.

"Excuse me," said the Count, as he saw this change. This was however but a flash, and by her powerful self-control Mme. de Palma became calm and smiling. She said "convalescents sometimes have relapses. Time is indispensable for a radical cure. The storm has passed, and the old nature reappears but for a moment, and gives place to the new but true friend, who rejoices with you at your unanticipated good fortune. It will secure your happiness."

"My friend," added she, reaching out her hand to Monte-Leone, "you must be impatient to ascertain if what I have said is true. Go home, and you will find my prediction correct."

"Felina," said the Count, "if your hopes are not realized, if you be not again my good star, I shall not be less grateful to you."

"Gratitude is cold, indeed," said Felina. "I ask your friendship."

"It is all yours," said the Count.

"Well, go now," said the Duchess, with a smile.

She was right, for when he reached his hotel, his old and faithful Giacomo, who, since his master's misfortune, had discharged his servants, and now performed all his functions, with the addition of those of valet, factotum, and cook, was busy with preparations for the departure of Monte-Leone. The old man gave him a letter, saying that it had been brought during his absence. The Count opened it, and read as follows:

"COUNT MONTE-LEONE: You will lose nothing by Antonio Lamberti. He is not a person to destroy one of our great association. You will find within a check for fifty thousand livres, drawn in your favor by one of the first houses in Naples, on the house of Casimer Perier of Paris. This is the interest at five per cent. on the million deposited by you with Antonio Lamberti. Every year the same sum will be paid down, and before six months you will receive security for your principal. One condition only is interposed on the return of your fortune. This is indispensable--that you maintain the most profound secrecy in relation to your new resources, and attribute them to any other than the real cause. The least indiscretion on your part will awake attention in relation to means employed to save from the wreck of Antonio Lamberti your own fortune."

This letter was signed, _A Brother of the Venta of Castel-a-Mare_.

Count Monte-Leone, though master of himself in adversity, could not repress his joy as he read this saving letter. As he had said at the house of La Felina, it was not for himself but for another that he rejoiced at this return of prosperity.

"A fine time, indeed, to be laughing," said Giacomo, ill-tempered as possible, "when we are being driven from the country as if we were spotted with plague. Only think, a Monte-Leone expelled, when his ancestor, Andrea Monte-Leone, Viceroy of Sicily, received royal honors in every town he passed through. You, however, have no shame. No, Signor," added he, as he saw Monte-Leone smiling. "Had I been in your place, I would have picked a quarrel and killed the damned minister who has forced us to resume our wandering gipsy life. Besides we are ruined gipsies. At my age to begin my wanderings, to be badly lodged, badly fed, like the servant of a pedler. If I were only twenty I would undertake a game of dagger-play with my minister."

"That is very fine, Giacomo," said Monte-Leone, "but the dagger is not the fashion in France. As for your apprehensions of the future, you may get rid of them by leaving me."

The wrath of the old man disappeared at these words of his master, and great tears streamed down his furrowed cheeks.

"Leave you! I leave you, when you are lost and ruined, Count?" said the good man. "Your father would not have spoken thus to me."

"Come, come, old boy, you know well enough I cannot get on without you. If you did not scold me every day, if you did not bark everlastingly at me, like those old servants to whom age gives impunity--if I did not hear every morning and night your magisterial reprimands, I would have fancied I missed some luxury. Be easy, however, Giacomo. You saw me happy just now because my sky began to grow bright, because our fortune is about to change, because we are nearer good fortune than you thought."

Full of these happy ideas, and anxious to take advantage of the few hours yet under his control, in case his departure should be enforced, the Count went to the hotel of the Prince. His heart beat violently when he was shown into the saloon of the Marquise, and he was glad that her not being in the room enabled him to repress his agitation. Aminta came in soon after. When Monte-Leone was announced, she felt almost as he had done.

She spoke first, but with a voice full of agitation. "We had almost despaired of seeing you, Count, for the Prince told me you were about to go. You have however neglected us for so long a time that we knew not whether we might expect you to bid us adieu."

The fact was, that since the news of his ruin the Count had not called to see Aminta. He felt that every interview made his departure more painful and the wreck of his hopes more terrible.

"Madame," said he, without replying immediately to her kind reproach, "you are not mistaken, for an exile comes to bid you farewell. That exile, however, will bear away a perpetual memory of your kindness."

"You will see _our_ country," said the Marquise, with an effort.

"I shall see my country, but not that which made it dear to me."

"You will find many friends there," said the Marquise, becoming more and more troubled.

"Friends are like swallows, Signora, they love the summer, but leave when winter comes."

"You must have thought the Prince and myself were like them," said Aminta, "and that winter was come. You have not been for a long time to see us."

"Ah, Signora, had I known--had I guessed--such a sympathy would have made me wish for misfortune."

"No, Count, not so. It should, however, aid you to bear it."

"There are misfortunes," said the Count, "which often disturb the strongest mind and destroy the greatest courage."

"Ah, Signor, should the loss of a fortune cause such regret?"

"But what if the loss of fortune," continued the Count, "involved that of the only blessing dreamed of--if this loss deprived you even of the right to be happy--then, Signora, do you understand, what would be the effect of such a loss?"

The future fate of the Count was thus exhibited to Aminta. She saw at once that this noble and energetic man, born to command, must be proscribed, wandering, and wretched. The idea was too much for her heart, already crushed by the idea of a separation which became every moment more painful to her, and she therefore formed in her mind a generous resolution.

"Signor," said she, "there are hearts which are attracted rather than alienated by misfortune, and sentiments which they would conceal from the happy, they confess to those who suffer."

Monte-Leone, perfectly overcome, fell at the Marquise's feet. He was about to confess the unexpected good fortune which had befallen him. He, however, forgot all, and covered the hand which the Marquise abandoned to him with kisses. The Prince de Maulear entered, and appeared surprised but not offended by what he saw. "Do not disturb yourself, dear Count,--I know the meaning of all that, and expected it. But if, however, you are making an exhibition of your despair and misery, you have lost your time; for you will not go. The King places a high estimate on you, and will not forget you. He told me so."

XXI.--THE SECRET PANEL.

Three hours after the revelation made to M. H---- by his mysterious visitor in the cabinet of the chief of the political police, a man about fifty years of age rang at the door of a room on the second story of a furnished house in Jacob-street. He looked like a substantial citizen with a property of fifty thousand francs--or an income of 2,500 francs at five per cent. The mulberry frock of this man, over a vest of yellow silk, spotted with snuff, and a cravat of white mousseline, with gloves of sea-green, and pantaloons of brown cloth twisted like a cork-screw around his legs, an ivory-headed cane, and all the _et cetera_, might appropriately belong to a shopkeeper, retired from business, living in some _thebaide_ of the streets d'Enfer or Vaugirard, and sustaining their intellects by the leaders of "The White Flag" of Martainville, and by witnessing once a year some chef-d'oeuvre of Picard at the Odeon.

We will make no conjectures about the social position of this gentleman,--he will hereafter explain himself. Almost before the bell he rang had ceased to sound, the door was opened by another person. The latter was tall, dark and athletic, so that we would really have taken him for the lover of Mlle. Celestine Crepineau, had he worn the magnificent moustache and voluminous whiskers of the bear-hunter, which the lady admired so much. His costume, too, was different from that of the Spaniard. He wore a blue frock over his chest, at the bottom hole of which was a bit of red ribbon, not a little discolored.

"Ah! M. Morisseau," said the inmate of the room, "you are welcome, but late. The dinner is cold. And," added he in a low tone, "the dinner of _a brigand of the Loire_, as they call such fragments of the imperial guard as myself, must be hot, it being too small to eat in any other way."

"I think it always excellent, Monsieur _Rhinoceros_," said Morisseau.

"Permit me," said the brigand of the Loire,--for so the man called himself--"My name is not Rhinoceros. A certain African animal has that beautiful name, as I have often told you during the many games of _dominoes_ we have played together at the _Cafe Lemblin_, whither you are attracted by my company. My name is _Rinoccio--Paolo Rinoccio_, born in Corsica, as my foreign accent tells you. I am the countryman of _him_." He made a military salute. "I served ten years beneath the Eagles. You, too, adore our Emperor. Each Buonapartist has a hand for his brother," continued he, shaking that of Morisseau. "Already thinking alike, eight days ago, over M. Lemblin's cognac, we swore eternal friendship. You, therefore, deigned to visit the warrior in his tent, in Jacob-street, to share the bread and soup of the soldier, and drink to the return of _him_ of Austerlitz."

"M. Rhinoceros,--no, no, Rhino,--damn the name," said the Corsican's guest, "it is indeed an honor for me to sit at the table of so brave a man--for that reason, I accepted your invitation."

"Sit down, then, and let us drink to the health of the little corporal."

As he spoke he filled two glasses and emptied his own. M. Morisseau simply moistened his lips. "The Emperor," he said, on receiving his part of the soup, "the Emperor, M. Rhino, was my god."

"And that of France," said the Corsican.

"He was my god and my best customer; I had the honor to be his furrier."

"His what?"

"His furrier. I furnished his majesty's robes--not only his own, but those of all the kings he made. You know the Emperor used to make a king a year, and he used to insist that all his brothers and friends should reign only in my robes. I had the honor, therefore, of wrapping up the august forms of Kings Louis, Joseph, Jerome, Bernadotte and Murat, without particularizing the sovereign princes, grand dukes, and grand judges, who to please _him_ dealt with me."

"To _his_ health," said the Corsican, and he emptied the second glass. "You never served, Monsieur Morisseau?"

"Yes," said the furrier, "I marched beneath the imperial eagles. I belonged to the glorious army of the _Sambre_ and _Meuse_. I even now suffer in my _femur_."

"From a ball?"

"No, from the rheumatism, contracted during a forced march during the winter of '93. Having been surprised during the night by the enemy, I had not time to dress myself comfortably, and was compelled to march fifteen leagues barefooted, and in my drawers. That, by the bye, was the usual uniform of our army. Those who were best dressed only wore shoes and pantaloons. To dress thus, though, something more than our pay was necessary, which we never got."

"You were then discharged?"

"Yes, for my rheumatism became very severe. But for it I might now be a general. I asked a pension as having been wounded in service. It was, however, refused me--a great injustice."

"The soup is gone. It is a very indigestible food, and we must therefore attack the enemy in his strong-holds. Two glasses of vin de Beaume will settle him."

"But," said Morisseau, as he saw his host filling up his glass, "my head is very weak, and I have not gotten drunk since I left the service."

"So be it, dear Morisseau. I will go for the second service, which the restorateur leaves in the kitchen. Excuse my having no servant, but two old soldiers like us can do without attendants."

Rinoccio went into the next room. When Morisseau was alone he took a little vial from his pocket, opened it, and poured a few drops into the Corsican's glass, the third portion of the contents of which he had swallowed. Scarcely had he replaced the vial when the Corsican entered, having a plate on which were two large pork chops, with a gravy of _cornichons_. "The second entry will make a man drink like a fish," said the Corsican.

"Let us drink, then," said Morisseau, knocking his glass against his host's.

"Let us drink," said the latter; and Morisseau's eyes glared as he saw him bear the glass to his lips. His joy, however, was short. "Let us drink something better than this," said the Corsican, who, as he spoke, threw away the contents of his glass. "I have some champagne given me by my General, one of the old guard, and I shall never find a more suitable occasion to uncork it." He took from a shelf near the table a long wire-fastened bottle, covered with a venerable dust.

Morisseau was not yet in despair, for he relied for an opportunity to use his vial on the third service. Paolo dexterously uncorked the bottle, and poured out a glass of perfumed wine to the imperial furrier, who, when he had knocked his glass against the Corsican's, drank it down, while the latter, just when he got it to his mouth, saw a fragment of cork on its brim. He took it out with his knife, lifted up the glass, and said: "To the Emperor. May he whom the enemies call the Corsican Ogre, soon eat up the Prussians, Austrians, and beggarly Cossacks. May he cut them into cat's-meat. May he cut off the _ailles de Pigeon_ of all the _Voltigeurs de Louis XVI._ restored by the Bourbons. May he--"

Rinoccio paused in his speech, for his guest looked pale and disturbed, and seemed about to go to sleep.

"_Per Bacco!_" said M. Morisseau, at once speaking the purest Italian, "what did that devil give me to drink?"

"Probably," said the Corsican, in the same tongue, "what you would have given me, had I not taken care to empty in the fireplace the glass into which you had poured some narcotic or other."

"Christ!" said the furrier, "the beggar saw me!"

"Perfectly, Signor Pignana."

"He knows me," said the false furrier, attempting to rise.

The Corsican, however, pushed him back, and Pignana sank stupidly on his seat.

"Curse you, Stenio, you shall pay for this!..."

"Ah, ah," said the Corsican, "so two played at the same game. Funny! and we were both good actors. I do not ask you," continued he, ironically, "why you came hither, and why you consented to share my frugal meal, for I know already, and will tell you. You met me in Paris, my presence annoyed you and your friends, and I know why. You watched and pursued me to find where I lived, and you succeeded. You joined me at the Cafe Lemblin, and we neither seemed to recognize each other. I asked you to dine, and you accepted my invitation, for with the drug you have you intended to put me to sleep, and expected then to be able to examine all my plans. You would have failed, Signor Pignana, for I do not live in this house. I took this room only for your especial benefit, and intend to give it up to-morrow. Do not, therefore, be disturbed, my good fellow; but go to sleep, and digest your dinner."

"But I will not go to sleep," said Signor Pignana, attempting again to rise, "I will not go to sleep here, in the house of a man I think capable of any thing."

"Not exactly that," said the Corsican, "but I am capable of much."

"What do you wish to do with me?" said Pignana, articulating with great pain, for his tongue began to grow heavy and his ideas confused.

"That you must not know; but do not be afraid, your life and health being dear to me. I would not deprive the Carbonari of so skilful an agent, who is so daring and prudent as you are. Lest, however, you should be uneasy and your sleep be troubled, I will tell you what I mean, and you will yourself admire my plan."

Half stupid with sleep and terror, Pignana glared at Stenio Salvatori.

"Here," said he, lifting up Pignana from the floor and placing him on a kind of sofa, "lie there, and then you can both sleep better and hear me more at your ease. You will for twelve hours have the most pleasant dreams imaginable. A glass will make you sleep twelve hours--a bottle for eternity." Pignana made a gesture expressive of the greatest terror. "Do not be so uneasy," said Stenio, "and remember you have had only a glass. To-morrow, at six o'clock, you will wake up, with a slight headache, but in other respects perfectly well. Then the master of the house will come to ask after you. If you are generous, you will give him something to drink your health. Otherwise you will thank him and go, for all has been paid for. You see I do things genteelly, and know how to receive my friends. You will then leave this house, and go about your usual business, and will never mention this matter."

"Eh? who will prevent me?" muttered Pignana.

"Oh, you will take care not to do so. For if you own that you have been duped, your confederates will think you a fool, and dismiss you without wages. Now this would be bad--just on the eve of their success. If you tell them how long you have slept, they will think you an idiot, for I never saw any one take to champagne so kindly as you did just now, my dear Pignana. Now, adieu, for I must go. Be still," said he, pushing Pignana down with all his strength. "No, no, do not take the trouble to go with me--you are too kind. Go to sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep, my dear fellow." He left the room, and sleep took possession of its prey. Pignana felt his ideas grow gradually more confused, and his real life pass away. A few minutes after Stenio's departure, M. Pignana was sound asleep. Stenio then slowly opened the door of the room, and glided like a shadow over the floor to the sleeper, into whose pockets he placed his hand. "Nothing here--not here. The devil, can it be that it is not about him!" A smile of triumph, however, soon appeared on his lips, for he had found what he wanted. He discovered a kind of pocket in the waistcoat of the false tradesman, and felt in it. "Here it is!" said he. Pignana moved. Stenio paused, and then took from the sleeper's pocket a door-key. He then left, and did not return....

While the events recorded above were transpiring, about eight o'clock on the evening, in Jacob-street, Mlle. Celestine Crepineau waited as Desdemona might have done for Othello, singing the melancholy romance of "The Willow." This was to console her for the prolonged absence of the bear-hunter, who had not been during the whole day in her lodge. The finger of Celestine furtively wiped away the tears which dripped down her long aquiline nose. Hope now and then arose in her heart, but that hope was betrayed. A man with a stern voice asked for Dr. Matheus, and went to his room. Seven times hope was enkindled in her heart only to be disappointed. She became angry, and as she could not confess to that passion in relation to the bear-hunter, and must have some pretext, she vented her temper on the Doctor's visitors. "How soon will this be over?" said she. "All Paris has come this evening to see my handsome lodger. What brings all these _savans_ hither? They will keep me awake until late hours, and then Mr. Nunez will say maliciously in the morning, 'Your eyes, Mlle. Celestine, are very heavy this morning. What have you been dreaming?' Then he will take liberties altogether inconvenient to a person of my sex."

The seven blows on the knocker had announced the union of eight persons, including Von Apsberg, in the ground-floor parlor, the apartment through which the unfortunate Pignana used to go and come. Two of the Doctor's friends were d'Harcourt and Taddeo Rovero. The others we will tell by and by.

"Gentlemen," said Von Apsberg, when they were in council, "our meeting should, as usual, be presided over by Count Monte-Leone. Since, however, the order of expulsion, of which he was notified and which almost immediately was revoked, for some unknown reason, it seemed best that he should not be present. Monte-Leone is the head of the great brotherhood of Carbonarism. We therefore propose to render a succinct account of its situation in Europe, and particularly in France. Its position is peculiar, and we cannot deny that its existence is threatened on all sides. Secret and shrewd spies have penetrated in Germany the secret labors of our three societies, _The Tugenbund_ at Berlin, _The Burschenschaft_ and _The Teutonia_ at Vienna and Leipsic. Their chiefs, Johan and Plischer, have been arrested."

"Death to spies!" said Matheus's seven hearers.

"This is not all," continued Matheus. "The plans of Count Labisbel have failed in Spain, and the Italian _vente_ have been discovered by a shrewd police. The prisons of Naples, Venice, and Milan are already filled with our brethren."

There was consternation on every face.

"We are assured," said Matheus, "that the informations on which these arrests have been made have come from Paris. Now, this information could only have been obtained from our secret papers, as we alone in France correspond with the supreme venta of Europe. To these papers none have access but four brothers, Monte-Leone, Rovero, d'Harcourt, and myself. We inform you of these facts in obedience to our articles of association, that you may place us four on trial."

These words were uttered with deep excitement. The three persons present of the four mentioned by Von Apsberg sat still, and the others rose.

"On my honor and conscience," said General A----, "I declare that such an idea is unworthy of you and us." The banker F----, Count de Ch----, a Peer of France, Ober the merchant, the lawyer B----, and professor C----, said the same. They then gave their hands affectionately to the three friends, who acknowledged their salute.

"Let the denunciation come whence it may, our brothers yet are victims of it. They suffer for us," said Taddeo, "and we will act for them."

"Yes," said Von Apsberg, "we will act, and decidedly, for time presses us, and we must anticipate our enemies unless we would be anticipated. Let all opinions centre, then, without hesitation, on the one principle which is the basis and keystone of Carbonarism, viz., '_That might is not right--that the kings of Europe reign either by virtue of a convention or by virtue of arms. The Bourbons in France reign by virtue of the allied sovereigns. We therefore declare that the Carbonari have associated to restore to all the nations of the continent, and to France especially, the free exercise of the right to choose the government which suits them best. We all swear to maintain this principle!_"

"We swear," said the Carbonari.

"Gentlemen," said Von Apsberg, "the time of action will be fixed by Count Monte-Leone at a meeting to take place January 25th, 1820, in the masonic lodge of _The Friends of Truth_. Until then let each one individually contribute to do all he can towards the reconstruction of our new edifice from the ruins of the old."

"I take charge of the army," said General A----, "the regiments in garrison at Befort are ours, and the others will follow their example."

"I take charge of the colleges," said professor C----.

The lawyer B---- said, "We have many friends in the bar."

Count Ch---- said, "And in the chamber of peers."

The banker F---- added, "There will be no scarcity of money."

The last who spoke was the merchant Ober, who said, "The influence of trade is on our side."

Von Apsberg said, "We will not meet again till the twenty-fifth of January, 1820. The supreme _vente_, composed of the Count, Rovero, the Viscount, and myself, will communicate only with the five central _ventas_ of Paris, the representative of which you are. Be active, then, in the _ventas_ which depend on you, members of which are ignorant of your identity. Make yourself known to but one member of each venta, and communicate with Count Monte-Leone only in that brilliant society to which the high position of him and of yourselves gives access, and where the government will least suspect the existence of treason. Confide the rolls of our ventas, and of our new associates to him alone, for it is his duty to deposit them among our archives. Now, brethren of right and duty, confide alone in Monte-Leone, the soul of honor and of prudence. To all others, silence or death."

"Silence or death," repeated his seven associates, and their voices sounded like the chorus of a solemn hymn....

A few minutes after the room was deserted. The Carbonari had gone, and Matheus returned to his laboratory. The door of the library was then opened gently, and two men were seen concealed behind the secret panel. They were H----, the chief of the political police, and the bear-hunter, the brigand of the Loire, or Stenio Salvatori.

"I have them," said M. H----.

"Not yet," said Stenio, "but thanks to our associate, Count Monte-Leone, by whose aid I have brought you hither...."

The door was shut without noise....

The next day, when he awoke, Pignana found the key of the room in his pocket.

BOOK II.

PART II.--I. CLOUDS IN THE HORIZON.

A month had rolled by since the Carbonari had met at the house of Von Apsberg. They were as prudent as possible. There was no meeting of the members of this vast society, yet such were the advantages of its mechanism, that communication and intercourse was never interrupted for a day. All action emanated from the high _venta_, which was known only to the presidents of the seven central ventas, through whom its instructions were communicated by means of _agents_ to the secondary ventas; a few men where thus enabled to discipline ten thousand. Count Monte-Leone was the soul of all this enterprise, and on him all the threads of this huge net united. The Count, the invisible providence of this invisible world, alone could give it external life and utter the _fiat lux_ of eternity. More pleasant and delightful ideas had possession of the Count. The future occupied him with a force and intensity he thought most contradictory to his political duties. Since Aminta had unveiled her heart to him, she had, as it were, returned to her usual bearing. The life of Monte-Leone, though, was entirely changed. The happiness he had long desired was about to dawn on him. In a few months he would be the husband of that Aminta he had so much loved and so regretted. The Count was received almost as a son by the Prince, and as a husband by Aminta. Taddeo looked on him entirely as a brother, and began to realize the happiest dream of his life--the marriage he had so desired. Gladly availing himself of the liberty accorded him, of coming familiarly to the hotel of the Prince de Maulear, the Count was perfectly happy. He passed the whole day there, and when night came mingled most unwillingly with society. The order of expulsion which he had received, and which had been so mysteriously revoked, added to the interest which had been entertained for him by all Paris. The opposition was especially attentive to him, for he was esteemed a decided enemy of the French Government, and of all monarchies. This ostracism which he had escaped, attracted the attention to him, for which the people of Paris were already prepared, by the history of his Neapolitan adventures. In 1850 he would have been called the lion of the day, and the greatest curiosity would have been paid to all his adventures. So great was the attention excited by the account of Monte-Leone's loss of fortune, that people were surprised to see him resume his usual mode of life, keep possession of his hotel, indulge in the same expenses of carriages, attendants, etc. He altered nothing, not even the luxury of his house, from what had been its condition before the papers and he himself had announced that the failure of Lamberti made him entirely poor, and forced him to sell his diamonds and other personal property to be able to live, as cheaply as possible.

The Count, who had been forced to conceal the manner in which his property had been restored, told his friends, Taddeo, d'Harcourt and Von Apsberg, that certain important funds had been recovered from the general wreck; and they, delighted with his good fortune, did not fail to congratulate him. The world was more curious; the enemies of the Count especially, who were ultra-monarchists, were numerous, active, and malicious. They wrote to Naples, and ascertained that the ruin of Monte-Leone was total, acquiring also certainty that he had no funds in any European bank, and no property. They therefore made an outcry of astonishment when they saw all the external appearance of opulence in the possession of one they knew without the means of so splendid and imposing an establishment. The Count knew nothing of this, and continued his old life. It is, all know, true that rumors of this kind reach their object last of all, when they are calculated to be injurious.

One of the dominant ideas which actuated us in the preparation of this history, we can here dwell upon, and we ask leave to do so briefly. There exists in French society, polished and elegant as it is, a hideous monster known to all, though no one disturbs it. Its ravages are great; almost incalculable. It saps reputations, poisons, dishonors, and defiles the splendor of the most estimable fame. This minotaurus, which devours so many innocent persons, is especially fearful, because its blows are terrible. It presents itself under the mildest and gentlest forms, and is received every where in the city. We find it in our rooms, in the interior of our families, in the palaces of the opulent, and the garrets of the poor. It has no name, being a mere figure of speech, a very word. It is composed of but one phrase, and is called--THEY SAY. "Do you know such a one?" is often asked, and the person is pointed out.

"_No_; but they say his morals are very bad. He has had strange adventures, and his family is very unhappy."

"Are you sure?"

"No, I know nothing about it. But they say so."

"This young woman, so beautiful, so brilliant, so much admired--Do you know her?"

"No. _They say_ that it is not difficult to please her, and that more than one has done so."

"But she appears so decent, so reserved."

"Certainly; but _they say_----"

"Do not trust that gentleman who has such credit and is thought so rich. Be on your guard--"

"Bah! his fortune is immense: see what an establishment he has."

"Yes! But _they say_ he is very much involved."

"Do you know the fact?"

"Not I. _They say_ though--"

This _they say_ is heard in every relation of life. It is deadly mortal, and not to be grasped. It goes hither and thither, strikes and kills manly honor, female virtue, without either sex being ever conscious of the injury done. Each as he reads these lines will remember cases illustrating the truth of what we say. The Count suffered from the influence of the evil we mention; and as all were ignorant whence his fortune came, each one adopted a thousand conjectures and suspicions, which, as is always the case, were most malicious. This is the way of the world. Now the consequences of this _they say_ are plain. By its means they had dared to attack a reputation which hitherto had been considered unassailable. This _they say_ came in the end. The Marquise de Maulear was the only person who knew whence came the resources of Monte-Leone; and after he had confided to her, the charming woman had said, "It was very wrong in you not to tell me previously of your good fortune. For instance, when I thought you a fugitive and ruined, I suffered you to read my heart. Had you told me this before, you would not have seen within it."

"Do not make me regret my misery which procured me such exquisite pleasure as knowing that you loved me."

In the long and pleasant conversations of the Count and Marquise, he was frequently embarrassed in relation to the duties imposed on him as chief of the _Carbonari_. Aminta never dared to speak to him in relation to that subject, though she was more anxious about it. On this point alone the Count was impenetrable, avoiding with care all that related to his political plans, and giving the Marquise no information about them.

One day Aminta, the Prince de Maulear, the Countess of Grandmesnil, and Taddeo, were in the drawing-room. The Countess did not love the young Marquise, whom she looked on as the indirect cause of her nephew's death. Neither did she love the Count, whose attentions to Aminta were by no means to her taste. The old lady was aware of Monte-Leone's opinions, and lost no opportunity to open all her batteries on liberals, jacobins and foreigners, who sought to make France the receptacle of the trouble and contests of which it had already drank so deeply. The Countess said--

"You know the news, brother?" The Prince de Maulear was then playing a game of chess with Monte-Leone. "We have now, thank God and M. Angles, one miserable Jacobin the less to deal with."

"Check to your king!" said the Prince to Monte-Leone.

"To be sure," said she, following out the tenor of her own thoughts, "it would be check to the King, if the opinions of those persons were to triumph. M. Angles, however, watches over them and us."

For an instant the Count neglected his game. He as well as Taddeo heard what she had said, and both seemed anxious to hear her out.

"May I venture to inquire, Countess," said the Count, holding his piece in his hand, and hesitating to place it on the board, "who is the terrible Jacobin from whom the world is delivered?"

"One of the most dangerous alive, Count," said the old lady, with an air of triumph. "The man, it is said, had his connections established through the whole army."

"Check to your king," said the Prince, who was weary of the delay.

"True," said the Count, with visible abstraction; and he played his game so badly that the Prince won it without difficulty. The latter said:

"Check-mate--victory--victory!"

"Yes, brother," said the Countess, "a great victory. For the Jacobin is a general. General B----, one of those vile Buonapartists, to whom, at a time like this, a regiment should never have been trusted."

The Count and Taddeo grew pale when they heard the General's name. He was one of the seven chiefs of ventas at the house of Von Apsberg.

"Why was the General arrested?" said the Prince.

"Oh, some plot. The Jacobins and Buonapartists are always at that business. The details are not yet known. It is certain, however, that he was arrested this morning at his hotel. I heard so at the Duchess de Feltre's, whom I visited to-day."

"Strange!" said the Prince; "on the day before yesterday he gave a ball. Were you not there, Count?" said he to Monte-Leone.

"Yes," said the Count; "I was one of the last to leave. It was then two o'clock in the morning."

"At noon his generalship was in the Conciergerie. A bad business for him, for the government has decided to use the greatest severity against all conspirators. Happily, the police is very expert, and it is said of every three conspirators one is a spy. A thing very satisfactory to society, but decidedly unfortunate for the plotters."

"I think," said the Count, indignantly, "that the conspirators are calumniated. They are bound by such oaths, and are so devoted to their opinions, that there can be but few traitors among them."

"My dear Count," said the Prince, "the spirit of Monte-Leone of Castle del Uovo is yet visible, and you do not seem to have recovered from your old disease. When you speak of conspirators you seem to defend your friends. I hope, however, for your sake, and for the sake of those who love you," said he, pointing to Aminta, "that you have renounced for ever your old enterprises. His Majesty, Louis XVIII., the other day spoke highly of you, relying much on your devotion, and he cannot have to do with an ingrate."

"Ah!" said Taddeo, with stupefaction, as he looked at his associate, "the King of France relies on the devotion of Monte-Leone!"

"I know not why," said the Count, not a little moved by this _brevet_ of royalism. "I confess, though, that I shall be surprised to give any chagrin or uneasiness to my friends."

These words were in a manner wrung from the Count by the paleness and agitation of Aminta since the commencement of the conversation. This new declaration increased Taddeo's surprise.

"Well, well," said the Prince, "there is pardon for every sin. We know, and we look on you as a wandering sheep returned to the fold. See, however, what are the consequences of a bad reputation. An insurrection breaks out in Italy, and you are at once thought to be its accomplice in France. You are about to be expelled from the country and treated as an enemy, when we acquire a certainty. What do I say? when the King of France and his ministers swear by you alone!"

This series of praises in relation to his royalty evidently increased the bad humor of the Count, as well as the astonishment of Taddeo. Monte-Leone was about to reply, even though he destroyed his influence with the Prince and Marquise. He was about to repel the fanciful compliments to his loyalty, when the Countess of Grandmesnil folded up her work. This was the usual signal for dispersion, and all were about to leave, when the Marquise said to Monte-Leone, "Count, will you remain here a few moments? I wish to speak to you of the charity in which you were kind enough to unite with me."

The Count went anxiously to Aminta's side.

The Prince said, with a smile, "No one ever refuses to speak with a pretty woman. That is even the weak side of our ministers. Talk, then, with my daughter-in-law, and neither the Countess nor I will trouble you." He then took the Countess's arm, and led her from the room. Taddeo remained, for his interest with the Count was too grave to permit him to leave thus. Aminta said but a few words to Monte-Leone. The deep emotion of the young woman, however, gave them a serious character. "Listen," said she. "I do not know what is about to happen, but your agitation, and that of Taddeo, when the Countess spoke of General B----, did not escape me. A painful presentiment assures me that you are involved in some secret plot, and that new dangers menace you. In the name of all that is dear to you, in the name of your love to me, I conjure you to abandon those ideas, or I shall die of terror and despair." She then, without speaking a word more, kissed her brother, and retired. The Count stood as if he were struck with a thunderbolt. Taddeo took his hand, and said, "Come, come," wresting the Count from the painful thoughts Aminta had called up. "Come, the arrest of General B---- may ruin all." They entered Monte-Leone's carriage, and drove to the Duke d'Harcourt. They hoped to find the Vicomte, and take him to Matheus, for the opinion of each of the four was necessary in considering the best means of warding off the peril which menaced the association. D'Harcourt was in, but Monte-Leone and Taddeo had not expected the spectacle which awaited them. The Vicomte had one of those sudden attacks, forerunners of the cruel disease which had devastated his family. The pleasures of the winter, in which the imprudent young man madly indulged, and perhaps also the cares and anxieties of his political relations, the nocturnal ventas he was often obliged to attend, had severely shaken his already feeble health, and caused a cough, every utterance of which sounded to his father like a funeral knell. The Count and Taddeo found him in bed. Von Apsberg was by his side, and opposite the doctor was the charming Marie, glancing alternately from the doctor to the patient. The Duke leaned on the fireplace, and gently scolded Rene for his folly and imprudence. The arrival of the two friends produced a cessation to this, but the Duke continued: "Come, gentlemen, and assist me to produce some effect on your friend; for, unassisted, even I cannot. Tell him that such an exposure of his life, in folly and dissipation, is a double crime, when his health is so dear to an old man who has no other son." Tears came into the Duke's eyes as he spoke, which Marie kissed away.

"Now, Rene," said she, "you see how unhappy you make us all. Promise, then, to be more reasonable."

"Father," said Rene, giving the Duke his hand, "I will promise you to do the impossible thing, to be prudent. Besides, you have a powerful auxiliary in my friend Monte-Leone, who has committed not a few follies in his time. He has however begun a new life, and will soon be entirely converted by Hymen."

"What," said Marie, "is the Count about to be married?"

"Mademoiselle," said the Count, "your brother is indiscreet, and you can never take half that he says as literal."

"Then," said Marie, "you are in love--that is about the half of his statement." And Marie blushed.

Von Apsberg said, as he remarked the embarrassment of the young girl, "Our patient needs the warmth and mildness of the south. Magnetism with the Vicomte will be powerless, and he must avoid cold and dampness. He must also be prudent, and that is the greatest difficulty. I however rely on his promise and his devotion to us. Adieu, Messieurs," said he, bowing to Taddeo and Monte-Leone. "Do not make him talk, or suffer him to sit up too long." The Duke left, accompanied by Marie, whose last look seemed to recommend her brother to the doctor. Perhaps, though, this glance had another signification, for the eyes of young women mean a great deal. As soon as the four associates were alone, the Count told Matheus of the arrest.

Von Apsberg thought: "The General cannot be in danger. Only one evidence of his participation could have been found, and that Monte-Leone gave me on the day before yesterday. I am sure I placed it in the secret drawer of my laboratory, the key of which I alone keep."

"What proof do you mean?" asked d'Harcourt, whose memory was troubled by illness.

"A proof," said Monte-Leone, "which would be overwhelming in the case of the General and a number of our brethren--the roll of the venta over which he presides. This roll he has signed. He gave it to me at two in the morning of the day before yesterday, and I gave it to Von Apsberg on the next day."

"Then it matters not. Though the General has been arrested, the mystery of ventas has not been penetrated. I am assured that skilful and incessant espionage hovers around us, and the time for action should be no longer delayed."

"But," said the Count, to whom this idea recalled what the Marquise had said, "we should not raise a flag we cannot defend. The forces the General controlled are indispensable to our success."

"To replace soldiers," said Von Apsberg, "we shall have opinion on our side. Our various ventas will be valiant soldiers, and will be encouraged when they see themselves so much more numerous than they expect."

"Do not let us be hasty," said Monte-Leone. "The six chiefs of the principal ventas, like the brave General, must give me the lists of ventas, and only when we are sure of their number will we act."

His three friends then adopted Monte-Leone's opinion, and they separated, mutually recommending prudence to each other. There remained, however, a species of surprise, and an injurious impression in relation to Monte-Leone's hesitation. He had usually been the most decided of the four.

When Von Apsberg returned home, he went to his laboratory, and opened the bureau in which the papers of the association were kept. He satisfied himself that the lists of the various ventas were safe. He breathed freely and slept soundly, without any trouble on account of the arrest of the General. On the next day, however, a letter, hastily written with a pencil, was brought him by a man who at once disappeared. It was from General A----, and was as follows:

"The list of our associates, certified by myself, is in the possession of the prefect of police. I saw it myself, and I am ruined."

Von Apsberg uttered a cry of terror. He was utterly confounded.

II.--THEY SAY.

The arrest of General A---- produced a double effect in Paris. The city began to have confidence in the vigilant police, which sought for and arrested the enemies of order every where and in every rank, while the chiefs of the great association of Carbonarism trembled when they saw the government on the track of their plans and projects. They then asked on all sides what could have been the motive of the incarceration of the General, and how they had discovered the criminal, or rather the criminals, for the principal associates of the _venta_ over which the General presided, were arrested after their chief. Still other arrests were subsequently made. Nothing, however, transpired, either in relation to the offence of which the General was accused, or the secret means by which the police had acquired information of them. The police acted prudently and with great skill, for the General and his associates were but a small part of an immense plot. Time and secret service alone would give the government a clue to follow all the secret labyrinths of this vast plot, which menaced France and Europe. A conspiracy and military plot was talked of, and the trial of the affair was understood to be postponed until time should throw more light on the matter. The authorities were not in a hurry, they needed other aims, and waited patiently to procure them. Thus passed a month; and as in Paris every thing is soon forgotten, people paid no attention to General A---- and his imprisonment. Public attention, however, was reattracted to this mysterious affair. The entertainments, concerts, and receptions of the court, made the city joyous. The gold of countless visitors from foreign nations gave activity to commerce, and there was an universal spirit of rivalry in luxury and opulence. Then the Duchess de Berri gave those charming balls, of which those who were admitted even now talk of.

The mystery of the note written to Von Apsberg by General A----, in which he assured him he had seen the list of the venta, he had himself certified to in the hands of the prefect of police, remained impenetrable to the supreme _venta_, for Von Apsberg had the list the Count had given him. The General was in close confinement, and no intercourse could be had with him. The six other chiefs of the ventas were ignorant of this incident of the arrest of their confederate. The four brothers of the central venta had resolved not to suffer the circumstance to transpire, because the Count fancied this circumstance would chill their zeal, and make them uneasy about the new lists. On these lists, as we have said, the decision of the time of action was made to depend, as it would reveal to the four chiefs the exact number of their confederates in Paris. According to the statutes of carbonarism, the signatures of the brethren were sacred engagements, which made it indispensable for them to give their aid to the undertaking when the hour and day should be appointed. The lists were, then, a kind of declaration of war against the government, in which they must either conquer or die. This is the prudence of all bad causes. Persons thus involved have no confidence that their associates will keep their oaths, and put remorse and repentance out of the question by allowing no alternative between ruin and safety. The Vicomte d'Harcourt, but slightly recovered from his indisposition, seldom left his father's house, and participated but slightly in the pleasures of the season. Taddeo, whose devotion to the Neapolitan ambassadress constantly increased, visited her every day, and went nowhere else. Though aware that she was constantly anxious to speak of the Count, he did not despair of being able some day to touch her heart. So great were his attentions, that in society he was looked on as the _cicisbeo_ of the Duchess. The Duke of Palma, devoted to his opera-loves, seemed not at all offended at the frequent visits of Taddeo Rovero, whose attentions did not at all shock his Italian ideas. Von Apsberg lived more retired than ever, and rarely left his laboratory except when he went to the Duke d'Harcourt's. There the intelligent doctor was kindly received by all the family, Marie included, and his fair patient's health seemed visibly to improve, as those flowers which have been too long neglected always do when attended to by a skilful horticulturist. Monte-Leone devoted to the society of Paris, of which he was passionately fond, all the hours which he passed away from the Marquise. This, however, was a duty, for there only could he meet the Carbonari who belonged to the upper class without giving rise to suspicion. The trial of General A---- was soon to take place, and the preparations for it had already been begun. Revelations or anxious inquiries might destroy the association. Concert was required to avoid this, and Count Monte-Leone gave this information to MM. C----, the lawyer B----, the baron de Ch----, the banker F----, and the rich merchant Ober, who was perhaps from his extended commercial relations, the most important of the Carbonari.

A great dinner was given by the banker F---- to enable the chiefs to confer with Monte-Leone. But in addition to these personages, and in order that public attention should not be fixed on them alone, F---- had invited the _elite_ of the capital, several peers of France, some illustrious soldiers, many deputies, and several women famous for their rank and beauty. Insensibly conversation assumed a political tone, as at that time every thing did. Monte-Leone, whom the abuses of the French government and the _camarilla_ of the Tuilleries made most indignant, gave vent to his opinions and complained bitterly of the acts of the ministry. He compassionated the people, whose liberties were being swept away, and reprobated the censorship of the liberty of the press and of freedom of speech--the only resource of the oppressed and the only means of reaching the oppressors. The master of the house, M. F----, agreed with the Count in the liberal opinions he had expressed. Led on by the example, B---- and C---- testified their sympathy with what the Count had said, and their wish to see a change in the fortune of a country where the institutions satisfied neither the wants nor the rights of the oppressed. This discussion, which had been provoked by the Count, was so bold and so decided that many of the guests looked on with terror, fearing they would be compromised by the expression of such revolutionary ideas. Just then many of the guests of M. F----, taking him aside from the table, asked anxiously if he was satisfied of the discretion of all the persons present, and also of their honor. M. F---- energetically repelled such fears, saying: "The people whom I receive are not all friends of the government. Nothing, however, said here will be repeated, for the minister of police has no representative at my table." The words of their host in a degree satisfied some of the most timid. It was then said openly that amid the most eminent persons met with in society were found individuals in the secret pay of M. Angles, and that many ruined and extravagant nobleman did not hesitate to exist in this manner. People said that in the drawing-room of M. F---- Monte-Leone had determined to defy the government, and they looked on his conduct under existing circumstances as most imprudent.

During the evening, and when all were engaged, the chiefs of _ventas_ took occasion, one by one, to isolate themselves from company and gave the Count the rolls. It was then agreed, also, that the last of these documents being complete, notice should be given without delay, and during the trial of the General, of the day for the commencement of the insurrectionary movement by which Carbonarism was to be revealed to France and to Europe. The terrible plan, however, was foiled by various events which attacked the society unexpectedly.

Four days after the dinner of M. F----, he, the lawyer B----, the baron Ch----, who had taken so decided a part in the discussion provoked by Monte-Leone, and who, on that very evening, had given him the fatal lists of his associates, were arrested. The first was taken in his office, the second just as he left his cabinet, and the third on his way to the opera. The capital was amazed at this news. All the other guests of F---- began to examine their consciences, and sought to recall whether or not they had given utterance to any governmental heresy at the fatal dinner, and whether they had not uttered something rash. They were doubtful if any opinion at all might not expose them to the resentment and vigilance of an adroit and secret police. It seemed beyond a doubt that the remarks of the persons who had been arrested had provoked this rigorous action, and that some ear in the pay of the police had heard their dangerous conversation, and noted the violent expression of their opinions. The conduct of all the guests was then passed in review, and the public and private life of each examined. Their domestic history and life were inquired into, and their weak points, habits, errors, and tastes, were scrutinized.

No rank, family, sex, or social position, was neglected, and not even intrigues, life, nor money, were considered sufficient to shield the informer. All were anxious to tear away the mask from the common enemy, to crush the serpent, who, sliding stealthily into society, gnawed its very heart and lacerated that bosom which sheltered it.

The arrest of General A---- then recurred to the memory of all. This event had taken place after a ball which the General had given. It was after an entertainment given by F---- that he, too, had lost his liberty. On this occasion two other important men had shared the fate of the rich banker, and, like him, they had both been energetic, violent, and pitiless denouncers of a ministry which defied public opinion and outraged the nation. People then remembered that Count Monte-Leone had provoked the conversation--that he had gone farther than any one else on the dangerous ground--and that his daring had surpassed that of the master of the house and his guests. All expected he would be arrested also. This fear was especially well founded, as Monte-Leone concealed neither his liberal opinions nor his revolutionary doctrines, and in fact every thing in his previous conduct pointed him out as one of the persons to whom the attention of the police would especially be directed. People were, therefore, amazed to see Monte-Leone preserve his liberty, and that one of the four speakers who had been most imprudent enjoyed entire impunity. Astonishment, however, was not all, for strange reports were soon circulated, and rumors were heard in every direction. The impunity of the Count became the universal subject of conversation. His private life was taken in hand, and his whole career, as it were, extended on the anatomical table of moral anatomy. The scalpel of public opinion, it is well known, pitilessly dissects every subject it wishes thoroughly to understand. The THEY SAY, that terrible creature to which we have already referred, began to play its part. It was heard every where. "THEY SAY Count Monte-Leone cannot be a stranger to what is passing. He was seen to talk to General A---- on the night of the ball for a long time."

"What! Count Monte-Leone?--a man of his rank?"

"Ah, these Italian noblemen are all suspicious."

"He--a liberal--a revolutionist!"

"Listen to me. People often change their opinions in this world, especially when fortune disappears, and want of money and care supervene. _They say_ he is completely ruined, yet he is still very luxurious in his mode of life."

"True--that is strange."

"Oh, no, not at all. _They say_ the strong box of the police enables him to maintain his style."

"That may be."

"_They say_, also, that the order to leave France given by the minister was but a trick to divert suspicion and keep him here usefully."

"Do you think so? Then he is a villain, and should be avoided. He is a----"

"Oh, I know nothing of it--but _they say_ so."

_They_ did say so, but when that awful rumor was first pronounced _they_ did not. These words were produced by the terror which the events of the day produced on the mind of every friend, even of the three imprisoned Carbonari. Perhaps some malevolent spirit disseminated them. This rumor was circulated from house to house, like a drop of oil, which though first scarcely perceptible, sullies the fairest fabrics utterly. A trifling fault is thus made to do the part of an atrocious crime. At first the rumor was whispered. It then grew bolder, and finally fortified itself by a thousand corroborations furnished by chance or gossip. Every person who detailed it added to its incidents and arguments. Within one month after the dinner all Paris heard of the terrible offence against society attributed to Count Monte-Leone. As is always the case, however, the three friends of the Count were the last to hear of this slander. Every one who was aware of their intimacy took care not to speak to them of the rumor, for no one wished to involve himself by repeating a story entirely unsubstantiated, and the origin of which was unknown. The consequence was that the three persons who could have refuted the calumny were entirely ignorant of the stigma attached to their friend. Monte-Leone had no more suspicion than his friends had in relation to the horrible fable.

The other chiefs of the principal ventas, who might have told him what was said, terrified at the fate of their associates, lived apart, refused to see any one, and thus heard none of the imputations against the high-priest of Carbonarism. Then commenced a series of mistakes, surprises, and mortifications, in which Monte-Leone would see no insult. His life, however, became an enigma, the explanation of which he could not divine. Certain rooms under various pretexts were closed to him. Often persons who once had been most anxious to secure his attendance at their entertainments pretended to forget him. The world did not dare, however, to brave an enemy whose secret power it was ignorant of, but it exhibited a certain coldness and oblivion which deeply wounded him. His most intimate acquaintances avoided him with studied care, and when they accepted his hand did so with a marked expression of annoyance. An immense void existed around him. His hotel was a solitude, and the houses of others were shut to him. The Count at first thought he found a motive for this in the apprehension all entertained of his affiliation with some secret association. When he saw that the police paid no attention to him, he was compelled to seek some other reason for his public proscription. What this cause was he did not divine and could not ask, for a position of this kind is such that an honorable man thinks it beneath him to ask for an explanation of merely natural occurrences. Wounded, disgusted, and grieved by the strange existence created for him, Monte-Leone felt himself at once a prey to the distrust which ostracism of this kind creates in the bosom of all who are subject to it. The world thought that by avoiding society Count Monte-Leone confessed the justice of its allegations. He became every day more attentive to the charming woman he adored, and who only waited the time when the proprieties of society would permit her to make him her husband. In her affection he found a consolation for all the external chagrin which annoyed him, for a mute terror had taken possession of the Carbonari since the occurrence of the many arrests, the motives of which were as yet wrapped in such impenetrable mystery. An event which was altogether unexpected made his position yet more complicated. He was one evening in one of the few houses to which he was yet invited. This was the house of M. L----, where the Marquis de Maulear had lost such immense sums to the Englishman who subsequently ruined him. M. L----, either more prudent or circumspect than others, had not listened to the reports which were circulated about Monte-Leone, and had invited him to his magnificent hotel in the Rue d'Antin.

Monte-Leone had avoided the crowd, and walked down the long avenue of exotic flowers and camelias, then almost unknown in Paris. He came upon a boudoir where several men were speaking. The Count was about to go back, when his name struck on his ear. "Yes, gentlemen," said one of the speakers, in a most indignant tone, "you may well be astonished at my presence here, while my family is in tears, and my prospects blasted and made desperate. Only eight days since I came to Paris, and am here to find Count Monte-Leone, my challenge to whom, to deliver which I have sought him every where, should be as solemn as the vengeance I will exact."

No sooner had the Count heard these words than he rushed into the boudoir, and stood face to face with the speaker, who was a young man of twenty-eight or thirty, wearing the uniform of the royal navy. His countenance was mild and noble, but bore an expression of perfect fury when he saw Monte-Leone.

"Monsieur," said the Count, "you will not have to look farther for the person of whom you have dared to speak thus. I am thankful that I am here to spare you farther trouble in looking for me, though why you do so I cannot conceive."

"He was listening to us," said the young man to his friends, in a tone of the deepest contempt. "Well, after all, that is right enough."

"Chance," said the Count, resuming his _sang-froid_ and control over himself, which he always maintained in such emergencies, "led me within sound of your voice. You and I also should be glad that this is the case, for it seems to me a ball is a bad place for such an explanation as you seem to wish."

"All places are good," said the naval officer, in a most insolent tone, "to tell you what I think of you. To repeat to you the epithet you have overheard, and which I am willing yet again to declare to all in these rooms."

"Sir," said Monte-Leone, with the same calmness, "will you tell me first to whom I speak?"

"My name is A----, and I am a lieutenant of the royal navy. My father is the person whom your infamous denunciations have caused to be imprisoned in the Conciergerie!"

"What!" said the Count, "are you the son of General A----?"

"What influences me I cannot and will not tell you; for then it would be out of the question for me to meet you."

"Gentlemen," said the Count, speaking to those who witnessed this scene, to which the attention of many others had now been called, "this young man is mad. I, more than any person, have pitied his father, and I wish to give General A---- a new proof of my sympathy, by granting his son a delay until to-morrow, to enable him to repair the incredible injury he has done me. Here is my card," said he, placing it on a table, "and I shall wait until to-morrow for an explanation of the unintelligible conduct of Lieutenant A----."

As soon as the Count had finished he left the boudoir, and the Lieutenant's friends kept possession of him, taking him out of the hotel. On the next day Monte-Leone received the following note:

"COUNT--Instead of making an apology to you, I maintain all I said. You are a coward and a scoundrel, and you know why. I repeat, that if my voice articulated or my hand traced, why I speak thus, it would be impossible for me to kill you and avenge myself. Do not therefore ask me to make an explanation of what you know perfectly well. If you are unmoved by what I now say, and if I do not bring you out, I will have recourse to other means. I will await you and your witnesses to-day at two o'clock, at the _bois de Bologne_, behind Longchamp. I have selected this hour in order that I might previously see my father.

"GUSTAVE A----,

"Lieutenant, Royal Navy."

"All hell is let loose against me," said the Count, as he perused this letter. "Why can I not penetrate the awful mystery which enshrouds me!"

Taking a pen, he wrote the following words, which he gave to the bearer of the challenge:

"I will be at the _bois de Bologne_ at two o'clock."

FOOTNOTES:

[7] Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1850, by Stringer & Townsend, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New-York.

Continued from page 54.

[8] _Anglice._ Only the first step is troublesome.--TR.

From Fraser's Magazine.

POULAILLER, THE ROBBER.

Cartouche had been arrested, tried, condemned, and executed, some seven or eight years, and no longer occupied the attention of the good people of Paris, to whom his almost melodramatic life and death had afforded a most interesting and enduring topic. They were languishing, like the Athenians of old, for something new, when there arose a rumor that another robber, more dexterous, more audacious, more extraordinary, ay, and more cruel than Cartouche, was roaming about the streets of their city. What was his name? whence did he come? were questions in the mouth of every one, as each of his numerous daring acts was made public,--questions which no one could answer.

In vain was every arm of the police put in requisition--crime after crime was committed with impunity, and terror reigned supreme.

At last the criminal himself disdained concealment, and all Paris--nay, a considerable portion of Europe--trembled at the name of POULAILLER.

He appeared about the year 1730, and astonished the world by deeds, some of them so shocking, and at the same time so wonderful, that they gave some color to the belief of many that he was aided by supernatural agency.

This belief was supported by a history of the circumstances attending his birth.

There lived in a village on the coast of Brittany a man, poor but of good repute, and well beloved by his neighbors,--an intrepid mariner, but poor as Job himself when his friends came to comfort him. A robust and well-knit frame, combined with a fine frank countenance, well bronzed by the sea-breezes, was looked on favorably by all, and by none more than by the young lasses whose furtive glances rested with pleasure on the manly form and gallant bearing of Jacques Poulailler.

His strength was prodigious, and his temerity upon the ocean incredible.

Such qualities are appreciated in every country; and among the beauties of the village, one remarkable for her superiority in wealth, as well as natural gifts, was attracted by them, and Jacques Poulailler had the good fortune to find favor in the eyes of her who was known in her little world as _La belle Isabeau Colomblet_.

At no great distance from this maritime village, on the crest of a rock lashed by the waves, which at high tides was perfectly insulated, dwelt a personage of whose origin every one was ignorant. The building where he had established himself had long been of evil fame throughout the country, and was only known as _La Tour Maudite_. The firesides resounded with tales of terror enacted in this lonely and ominous theatre. Fiends, in the olden time had made it their abode, as was currently reported and believed. From that time, it was asserted that no human being could dwell there without having previously entered into a compact with the evil one. The isolation of the place, the continued agitation of the waves at its base, the howlings of the wind around its frowning battlements, the traces of the thunderbolts that from time to time had blackened and almost charred its walls, the absence of bush or tree, or any thing in the shape of blossom or verdure--for neither wall-flower nor even moss would grow there--had produced their effect on the superstitious spirit of the neighbors, and the accursed place had remained untenanted by any thing earthly for forty or fifty years.

One gloomy day, however, a man was seen prowling about the vicinity. He came and went over the sands, and, just as a storm was rising, he threw himself into a boat, gained the offing, and disappeared.

Every one believed that he was lost; but next morning there he was. Surprised at this, the neighbors began to inquire who he could be; and at last learned that he had bought the tower of the proprietor, and had come to dwell there. This was all the information that their restless curiosity could obtain. Whence did he come, and what had he done? In vain were these questions asked. All were querists, and none found a respondent. Two or three years elapsed before his name transpired. At last it was discovered, nobody knew how, that his name was Roussart.

He appeared to be a man above six feet in height, strongly built, and apparently about thirty years of age. His countenance was all but handsome, and very expressive. His conduct was orderly, and without reproach, and, proving himself to be an experienced fisherman, he became of importance in that country.

No one was more weatherwise than Roussart, and no one turned his foreknowledge to such good account. He had been seen frequently to keep the sea in such fearful tempests, that all agreed that he must have been food for fishes if he had not entered into some agreement with Satan. When the stoutest hearts quailed, and ordinary men considered it suicidal to venture out, Roussart was to be seen braving the tumult of winds and waves, and always returned to the harbor safe and sound.

People began to talk about this, and shook their heads ominously. Little cared Roussart for their words or gestures; but he was the only one in the commune who never went to church. The cure at last gave out that he was excommunicated; and from that time his neighbors broke off all communication with him.

Things had arrived at this point, when it was rumored that the gallant fisherman, Jacques Poulailler, had touched the heart of _La belle Isabeau_. Soon their approaching marriage became the topic of the village; and, finally, one Sunday, after mass, the bans were first published by the vicar. The lads of the village, congregated on the shore, were congratulating Poulailler on the auspicious event, when Roussart suddenly appeared among them.

His presence was a surprise. He had always avoided the village meetings as much as others had sought them; and this sudden change in his habits gave a new impulse to curiosity.

The stranger appeared to seek some one with his eyes, and presently walked straight up to the happy Jacques, who, intoxicated with joy, was giving and receiving innumerable shakes of the hand.

"Master Poulailler," said Roussart, "you are going to be married, then?"

"That seems sure," replied Poulailler.

"Not more sure than that your first-born will belong to the evil one. I, Roussart, tell you so."

With that he turned on his heel, and regained his isolated dwelling, leaving his auditors amazed by his abrupt and extraordinary announcement, and poor Jacques more affected by it than any one else.

From that moment Roussart showed himself no more in the neighborhood, and soon disappeared altogether, without leaving a trace to indicate what had become of him.

Most country people are superstitious,--the Bretons eminently so, and Jacques Poulailler never forgot the sinister prophecy of Roussart. His comrades were not more oblivious; and when, a year after his marriage, his first-born came into the world, a universal cry saluted the infant boy as devoted to Satan. _Donne au diable_ were the words added to the child's name whenever it was mentioned. It is not recorded whether or no he was born with teeth, but the gossips remarked that during the ceremony of baptism the new-born babe gave vent to the most fearful howlings. He writhed, he kicked, his little face exhibited the most horrible contortions; but as soon as they carried him out of the church, he burst out into laughter as unearthly as it was unnatural.

After these evil omens every body expected that the little Pierre Poulailler would be ugly and ill-formed. Not a bit of it--on the contrary, he was comely, active, and bold. His fine fresh complexion and well-furnished mouth were set off by his brilliant black eyes and hair, which curled naturally all over his head. But he was a sad rogue, and something more. If an oyster-bed, a warren, or an orchard was robbed, Pierre Poulailler was sure to be the boy accused. In vain did his father do all that parent could to reform him--he was incorrigible.

Monsieur le cure had some difficulty to bring him to his first communion. The master of the village exhausted his catalogue of corrections--and the catalogue was not very short--without succeeding in inculcating the first notions of the Christian faith and the doctrine of the cross. "What is the good of it?" would the urchin say. "Am not I devoted to the devil, and will not that be sufficient to make my way?"

At ten years of age Pierre was put on board a merchant-ship, as cabin-boy. At twelve he robbed his captain, and escaped to England with the spoil. In London he contrived to pass for the natural son of a French Duke; but his numerous frauds forced him again to seek his native land, where, in his sixteenth year, he enlisted as a drummer in the regiment of Champagne, commanded by the Count de Varicleres. Before he had completed his eighteenth year he deserted, joined a troop of fortune-telling gipsies, whom he left to try his fortune with a regular pilferer, and finally, engaged himself to a rope-dancer. He played comedy, sold orvietan with the success of Doctor Dulcamara himself, and in a word, passed through all the degrees which lead to downright robbery.

Once his good angel seemed to prevail. He left his disreputable companions and entered the army honorably. For a short time there were hopes of him; it was thought that he would amend his life, and his superiors were satisfied with his conduct. But the choicest weapon in the armory of him to whom he had been devoted was directed against him. A _vivandiere_--the prettiest and most piquante of her tribe--raised a flame in his heart that burnt away all other considerations; but he might still have continued in a comparatively respectable course, if the sergeant-major had not stood forward as his rival. The coquette had in her heart a preference for Pierre; and the sergeant, taking advantage of his rank, insulted his subordinate so grossly that he was repaid by a blow. The sergeant's blood was up, and as he rushed to attack Pierre, the soldier, drawing his sabre, dangerously wounded his superior officer, who, after lingering a few days, went the way of all flesh. Pierre would have tasted the tender mercies of the provost-marshal; but fortunately the regiment was lying near the frontier, which our hero contrived to cross, and then declared war against society at large.

The varied knowledge and acquirements of the youth--his courage, true as steel, and always equal to the occasion--the prudence and foresight with which he meditated a _coup de main_--the inconceivable rapidity of his execution--his delicate and disinterested conduct towards his comrades--all contributed to render him famous, in the _famosus_ sense, if you will, and to raise him to the first place.

Germany was the scene of his first exploits. The world had condemned him to death, and he condemned the world to subscribe to his living.

At this period, he had posted himself in ambush on the crest of a hill, whence his eye could command a great extent of country; and certainly the elegance of his mien, his graceful bearing, and the splendor of his arms, might well excuse those who did not take him for what he really was. He was on the hillside when two beautiful young women appeared in sight. He lost no time in joining them; and, as youth is communicative, soon learnt, in answer to his questions, that, tired of remaining in the carriage, they had determined to ascend the hill on foot.

"You are before the carriage, then, mademoiselle?"

"Yes, sir; cannot you hear the whip of the postillions?"

The conversation soon became animated, and every moment made a deeper inroad into the heart of our handsome brigand: but every moment also made the situation more critical. On the other side of the hill was the whole band, ranged in order of battle, and ready to pounce upon the travellers. Having ascertained the place of abode of his fair companions, and promised to avail himself of the first opportunity to pay his compliments to them there, he bade them politely adieu; and having gained a path cut through the living rock, known but to few, descended with the agility of a chamois to his party, whom he implored not to attack the carriage which was approaching.

But, if Poulailler had his reasons for this chivalrous conduct, his band were actuated by no such motives, and they demurred to his prayer. He at once conquered their hesitation by bidding them name the value that they put on their expected booty, purchased the safety of the travellers by the sum named, and the two fair daughters of the Baron von Kirbergen went on their way full of the praises of the handsome stranger whose acquaintance they had made, and in blissful ignorance of the peril they had passed.

That very day, Poulailler left his lieutenant in the temporary command of the band, mounted his most beautiful horse, followed his beloved to the castle of her father, and introduced himself as the Count Petrucci of Sienna, whom he had lately robbed, and whose papers he had taken care to retain with an eye to future business.

His assumed name, backed by his credentials, secured for him a favorable reception, and he well knew how to improve the occasion. An accomplished rider, and bold in the chase, he won the good opinion of the Baron; while his musical and conversational talent made him the pet of the drawing-room. The young and charming Wilhelmina surrendered her heart to the gay and amiable cavalier; and all went merrily, till one fine morning Fortune, whose wheel is never stationary, sent the true count to the castle. It was no case of the two Sosias, for no two persons could well be more unlike; and as soon as the real personage saw his representative, he recognized him as the robber who had stolen his purse as well as his name.

Here was a pretty business. Most adventurers would have thrown up the game as desperate; but our hero, with a front worthy of Fathom himself, boldly proclaimed the last visitor to be an impostor, and argued the case so ably, and with such well-simulated indignation at the audacity of the newcomer, that the Baron was staggered, and despatched messengers to the partners of a mercantile house at Florence, to whom the true Petrucci was well known.

To wait for the result of the inquiry would have been a folly of which Poulailler was not likely to be guilty; so he made a moonlight flitting of it that very night--but not alone. Poor Wilhelmina had cast in her lot with her lover for good or for evil, and fled with him.

The confusion that reigned in the best of all possible castles, the next morning, may be conceived; but we must leave the Baron blaspheming, and the Baroness in hysterics, to follow the fugitives, who gained France in safety, and were soon lost in the labyrinths of Paris.

There he was soon joined by his band, to the great loss and terror of the honest people of the good city. Every day, M. Herault, the lieutenant of police, was saluted by new cases of robbery and violence, which his ablest officers could neither prevent nor punish. The organization of the band was so complete, and the head so ably directed the hands, that neither life nor property was considered safe from one moment to another. Nor were accounts of the generosity of the chief occasionally wanting to add to his fame.

One night, as Poulailler was traversing the roofs with the agility of a cat, for the purpose of entering a house whose usual inmates were gone into the country, he passed the window of a garret whence issued a melancholy concert of sobs and moans. He stopped, and approached the apartment of a helpless family, without resources, without bread, and suffering the pangs of hunger. Touched by their distress, and remembering his own similar sufferings before Fortune favored him, he was about to throw his purse among them, when the door of the chamber opened violently, and a man, apparently beside himself, rushed in with a handful of gold, which he cast upon the floor.

"There," cried he, in a voice broken by emotion, "there, take--buy--eat; but it will cost you dear. I pay for it with my honor and peace of mind. Baffled in all my attempts to procure food for you honestly, I was on my despairing return, when I beheld, at a short distance from me, a tall but slight-made man, who walked hurriedly, but yet with an air as if he expected some one. Ah! thought I, this is some lover; and yielding to the temptation of the fiend, I seized him by the collar. The poor creature was terrified, and, begging for mercy, put into my hands this watch, two gold snuff-boxes, and those Louis, and fled. There they are; they will cost me my life. I shall never survive this infamy."

The starving wife re-echoed these sentiments; and even the hungry children joined in the lamentations of the miserable father.

All this touched Pierre to the quick. To the great terror of the family, he entered the room, and stood in the midst.

"Be comforted," said he to the astonished husband; "you have robbed a robber. The infamous coward who gave up to you this plunder is one of Poulailler's sentinels. Keep it; it is yours."

"But who are you?" cried the husband and wife;--"who are you, and by what right is it that you thus dispose of the goods of another?"

"By the right of a chief over his subalterns. I am Poulailler."

The poor family fell on their knees, and asked what they could do for him.

"Give me a light," said Pierre, "that I may get down into the street without breaking my neck."

This reminds one of the answer which Rousseau gave to the Duc de Praslin, whose Danish dog, as it was running before the carriage, had upset the peripatetic philosopher.

"What can I do for you?" said the Duke to the fallen author of _La Nouvelle Heloise_, whose person he did not know.

"You can tie up your dog," replied Jean-Jacques, gathering himself up, and walking away.

Poulailler having done his best to render a worthy family happy, went his way, to inflict condign punishment on the poltroon who had so readily given up the purse and the watches.

The adventures of this accomplished robber were so numerous and marvellous, that it is rather difficult to make a selection. One evening, at the _bal de l'Opera_, he made the acquaintance of a charming woman, who, at first, all indignation, was at length induced to listen to his proposal, that he should see her home; and promised to admit him, "if Monseigneur should not be there."

"But who is this Monseigneur?" inquired Pierre.

"Don't ask," replied the fair lady.

"Who is he, fairest?"

"Well, how curious you are; you make me tell all my secrets. If you must know, he is a prince of the church, out of whose revenues he supports me; and I cannot but show my gratitude to him."

"Certainly not; he seems to have claims which ought to be attended to."

By this time they had arrived at an elegantly furnished house, which they entered, the lady having ascertained that the coast was clear; and Poulailler had just installed himself, when up drove a carriage--Monseigneur in person.

The beauty, in a state of distraction, threw herself at the feet of her spark, and implored him to pass into a back cabinet. Poulailler obeyed, and had hardly reached his hiding-place, when he beheld, through the glazed door, Monseigneur, who had gone to his Semele in all his apostolical magnificence. A large and splendid cross of diamonds, perfect in water, shot dazzling rays from his breast, where it was suspended by a chain of cat's-eyes, of great price, set in gold; the button and loop of his hat blazed with other precious stones; and his fingers sparkled with rings, whose brilliants were even greater and more beautiful than those that formed the constellation of his cross.

It is very seldom that the human heart, however capacious, has room for two grand passions in activity at the same time. In this instance, Poulailler no sooner beheld the rich and tempting sight, than he found that the god of Love was shaking his wings and flying from his bosom, and that the demon of Cupidity was taking the place of the more disinterested deity. He rushed from his hiding-place, and presented himself to the astonished prelate with a poinard in one hand and a pistol in the other, both of which he held to the sacred breast in the presence of the distracted lady. The bishop had not learnt to be careless of life, and had sufficient self-possession in his terror not to move, lest he should compromise his safety, while Poulailler proceeded to strip him with a dexterity that practice had rendered perfect. Diamonds, precious stones, gold, coined and ornamental, rings, watch, snuff-box, and purse, were transferred from the priest to the robber with marvellous celerity; then turning to the lady, he made her open the casket which contained the price of her favors, and left the house with the plunder and such a laugh as those only revel in who win.

The lieutenant of police began to take the tremendous success of our hero to heart, and in his despair at the increasing audacity of the robber, caused it to be spread amongst his spies, archers, and sergeants, that he who should bring Poulailler before him should be rewarded with one hundred pistoles, in addition to a place of two thousand livres a year.

M. Herault was seated comfortably at his breakfast, when the Count de Villeneuve was announced. This name was--perhaps is--principally borne by two celebrated families of Provence and Languedoc. M. Herault instantly rose and passed into his cabinet, where he beheld a personage of good mien, dressed to perfection, with as much luxury as taste, who in the best manner requested a private interview. Orders were immediately issued that no one should venture to approach till the bell was rung; and a valet was placed as sentinel in an adjoining gallery to prevent the possibility of interruption.

"Well, Monsieur le Comte, what is your business with me?"

"Oh, a trifle;--merely a thousand pistoles, which I am about to take myself from your strong box, in lieu of the one hundred pistoles, and the snug place, which you have promised to him who would gratify you by Poulailler's presence. I am Poulailler, who will dispatch you to the police of the other world with this poisoned dagger, if you raise your voice or attempt to defend yourself. Nay, stir not--a scratch is mortal."

Having delivered himself of this address, the audacious personage drew from his pocket some fine but strong whip-cord, well hackled and twisted, and proceeded to bind the lieutenant of police hand and foot, finishing by making him fast to the lock of the door. Then the robber proceeded to open the lieutenant's secretaire, the drawers of which he well rummaged, and having filled his pockets with the gold which he found there, turned to the discomfited lieutenant with a profound bow, and after a request that he would not take the trouble to show him out, quietly took his departure.

There are some situations so confounding, that they paralyze the faculties for a time; and the magistrate was so overcome by his misfortune, that, instead of calling for aid, as he might have done when the robber left him, he set to work with his teeth, in vain endeavors to disengage himself from the bonds which held him fast. An hour elapsed before any one ventured to disturb M. Herault, who was found in a rage to be imagined, but not described, at this daring act. The loss was the least part of the annoyance. A cloud of epigrams flew about, and the streets resounded with the songs celebrating Poulailler's triumph and the defeat of the unfortunate magistrate, who dared not for some time to go into society, where he was sure to find a laugh at his expense.

But ready as the good people of Paris were with their ridicule, _they_ were by no means at their ease. The depredations of Poulailler increased with his audacity, and people were afraid to venture into the streets after nightfall. As soon as the last rays of the setting sun fell on the Boulevards, the busy crowds began to depart; and when that day-star sank below the horizon, they were deserted. Nobody felt safe.

The Hotel de Brienne was guarded like a fortress, but difficulty seemed to give additional zest to Poulailler. Into this hotel he was determined to penetrate, and into it he got. While the carriage of the Princess of Lorraine was waiting at the Opera, he contrived to fix leathern bands, with screws, under the outside of the bottom of the body, while his associates were treating the coachman and footman at a _cabaret_, slipped under the carriage in the confusion of the surrounding crowd when it drew up to the door of the theatre, and, depending on the strength of his powerful wrists, held on underneath, and was carried into the hotel under the very nose of the Swiss Cerberus.

When the stable-servants were all safe in their beds, Poulailler quitted his painful hiding-place, where the power of his muscles and sinews had been so severely tested, and mounted into the hay-loft, where he remained concealed three nights and four days, sustaining himself on cakes of chocolate. No one loved good cheer better than he, or indulged more in the pleasures of the table; but he made himself a slave to nothing, save the inordinate desire of other men's goods, and patiently contented himself with what would keep body and soul together till he was enabled to make his grand _coup_.

At last, Madame de Brienne went in all her glory to the Princess de Marsan's ball, and nearly all the domestics took advantage of the absence of their mistress to leave the hotel in pursuit of their own pleasures. Poulailler then descended from the hay-loft, made his way to the noble dame's cabinet, forced her secretaire, and possessed himself of two thousand Louis d'or and a port-folio, which he doubtless wished to examine at his ease; for, two days afterwards, he sent it back, (finding it furnished with such securities only as he could not negotiate with safety,) and a polite note signed with his name, in which he begged the Princess graciously to receive the restitution, and to accept the excuses of one who, had he not been sorely pressed for the moderate sum which he had ventured to take, would never have thought of depriving the illustrious lady of it; adding, that when he was in cash, he should be delighted to lend her double the amount, should her occasions require it.

This impudent missive was lauded as a marvel of good taste at Versailles, where, for a whole week, every one talked of the consummate cleverness and exquisite gallantry of the _Chevalier_ de Poulailler.

This title of honor stuck, and his fame seemed to inspire him with additional ardor and address. His affairs having led him to Cambray, he happened to have for a travelling companion the Dean of a well-known noble Belgian chapter. The conversation rolled on the notorieties of the day, and Poulailler was a more interesting theme than the weather. But our chevalier was destined to listen to observations that did not much flatter his self-esteem, for the Dean, so far from allowing him any merit whatever as a brigand, characterized him as an infamous and miserable cutpurse, adding, that at his first and approaching visit to Paris, he would make it his business to see the lieutenant of police, and reproach him with the small pains he took to lay so vile a scoundrel by the heels.

The journey passed off without the occurrence of any thing remarkable; but about a month after this colloquy M. Herault received a letter, informing him that on the previous evening, M. de Potter, _chanoine-doyen_ of the noble chapter of Brussels, had been robbed and murdered by Poulailler, who, clad in the habits of his victim, and furnished with his papers, would enter the barrier St. Martin. This letter purported to have been written by one of his accomplices, who had come to the determination of denouncing him in the hope of obtaining pardon.

The horror of M. Herault at the death of this dignified ecclesiastic, who was personally unknown to him, was, if the truth must be told, merged in the delight which that magistrate felt in the near prospect of avenging society and himself on this daring criminal. A cloud of police officers hovered in ambush at each of the barriers, and especially at that which bore the name of the saint who divided his cloak with the poor pilgrim, with directions to seize and bring into the presence of M. Herault a man habited as an ecclesiastic, and with the papers of the Dean of the Brussels chapter. Towards evening the Lille coach arrived, was surrounded and escorted to the hotel des Messageries, and at the moment when the passengers descended, the officers pounced upon the personage whose appearance and vestments corresponded with their instructions.

The resistance made by this personage only sharpened the zeal of the officers who seized him, and, in spite of his remonstrances and cries, carried him to the hotel of the police, where M. Herault was prepared with the proofs of Poulailler's crimes. Two worthy citizens of Brussels were there, anxious to see the murderer of their friend, the worthy ecclesiastic, whose loss they so much deplored: but what was their joy, and, it must be added, the disappointment of M. Herault, when the supposed criminal turned out to be no other than the good Dean de Potter himself, safe and sound, but not a little indignant at the outrage which he had sustained. Though a man of peace, his ire so far ruffled a generally calm temper, that he could not help asking M. Herault whether Poulailler (from whom a second letter now arrived, laughing at their beards) or he, M. Herault, was the chief director of the police?

William of Deloraine, good at need--

By wily turns, by desperate bounds, Had baffled Percy's best bloodhounds. Five times outlawed had he been, By England's king and Scotland's queen.

But he was never taken, and had no occasion for his

----neck-verse at Hairibee,

even if he could have read it. Poulailler was arrested no less than five times, and five times did he break his bonds. Like Jack Sheppard and Claude du Val, he owed his escape in most instances to the frail fair ones, who would have dared any thing in favor of their favorite, and who, in Jack's case, joined on one occasion without jealousy in a successful effort to save him.

Poulailler was quite as much the pet of the petticoats as either of these hempen heroes. With a fine person and accomplished manners, he came, saw, and overcame, in more instances than that of the fair daughter of the Baron von Kirbergen; but, unlike John Sheppard or Claude Du Val, Poulailler was cruel. Villains as they were, John and Claude behaved well, after their fashion, to those whom they robbed, and to the unhappy women with whom they associated. In their case, the "ladies" did their utmost to save them, and men were not wanting who endeavored to obtain a remission of their sentence. But Poulailler owed his fall to a woman whom he had ruined, ill-treated, and scorned. The ruin and ill-treatment she bore, as the women, poor things, will bear such atrocities; but the scorn roused all the fury which the poets, Latin and English, have written of; and his cruelties were so flagrant, that he could find no man to say, "God bless him."

Wilhelmina von Kirbergen had twice narrowly escaped from a violent death. Poulailler, in his capricious wrath, once stabbed her with such murderous will, that she lay a long time on the verge of the grave, and then recovered to have the strength of her constitution tried by the strength of a poison which he had administered to her in insufficient quantities. Henry the Eighth forwarded his wives, when he was tired of them, to the other world by form of what was in his time English law; but when Poulailler "felt the fulness of satiety," he got rid of his mistresses by a much more summary process. But it was not till this accomplished scoundrel openly left Wilhelmina for a younger and more beautiful woman, that she, who had given up station, family, and friends, to link herself with his degrading life, abandoned herself to revenge.

She wrote to him whom she had loved so long and truly, to implore that they might once more meet before they parted in peace for ever. Poulailler, too happy to be freed on such terms, accepted her invitation, and was received so warmly that he half repented his villainous conduct, and felt a return of his youthful affection. A splendid supper gave zest to their animated conversation; but towards the end of it, Poulailler observed a sudden change in his companion, who manifested evident symptoms of suffering. Poulailler anxiously inquired the cause.

"Not much," said she; "a mere trifle--I have poisoned myself, that I may not survive you."

"Quoi, coquine! m'aurais-tu fait aussi avaler le boucon?" cried the terrified robber.

"That would not have sufficiently avenged me. Your death would have been too easy. No, my friend, you will leave this place safe and well; but it will be to finish the night at the Conciergerie; and, to-morrow, as they have only to prove your identity, you will finish your career on the wheel in the Place de Greve."

So saying, she clapped her hands, and, in an instant, before he had time to move, the Philistines were upon him. Archers and other officers swarmed from the hangings, door, and windows. For a few moments, surrounded as he was, his indomitable courage seemed to render the issue doubtful; but what could one man do against a host armed to the teeth? He was overpowered, notwithstanding his brave and vigorous resistance.

His death, however, was not so speedy as his wretched mistress prophesied that it would be. The love of life prevailed, and in the hope of gaining time which he might turn to account in effecting his escape, he promised to make revelations of importance to the state. The authorities soon found out that he was trifling with them, and the _procureur-general_, after having caused him to be submitted to the most excruciating torture, left him to be broken on the wheel alive. He was executed with all the accursed refinement of barbarity which disgraced the times; and his tormenters, at last, put the finishing stroke to his prolonged agonies, by throwing him alive into the fire that blazed at his feet.

Nothing can justify such penal atrocities. If any thing could, Poulailler, it must be admitted, had wrought hard to bring down upon himself the whole sharpness of the law of retaliation. Upwards of one hundred and fifty persons had been murdered by him and his band. Resistance seemed to rouse in him and them the fury of devils. Nor was it only on such occasions that his murderous propensities were glutted.

At the village of St. Martin, he caused the father, the mother, two brothers, a newly-married sister, her husband, and four relations, or friends, to be butchered in cold blood.

One of his band was detected in an attempt to betray him. Poulailler had him led to a cellar. The traitor was placed upright in an angle of the wall, gagged, and there they built him in alive. Poulailler, with his own hand, wrote the sentence and epitaph of the wretch on the soft plaster; and there it was found some years afterward, when the cellar in which this diabolical act of vengeance was perpetrated passed into the hands of a new proprietor.

It was current in the country where Poulailler first saw the light, and where his father, mother, brethren, and sisters, still lived an honorable life, embittered only by the horrible celebrity of their relation, that, on the night which followed the day of Pierre's execution, the isolated tower, which had been uninhabited since its last occupant had so mysteriously disappeared, seemed all on fire, every window remaining illuminated by the glowing element till morning dawned. During this fearful nocturnal spectacle, it was affirmed that infernal howlings and harrowing cries proceeded from the apparently burning mass, and some peasants declared that they heard Pierre Poulailler's name shouted from the midst of the flames in a voice of thunder.

The dawn showed the lonely tower unscathed by fire; but a fearful tempest arose, and raged with ceaseless fury for thrice twenty-four hours. The violence of the hurricane was such, that it was impossible during that time for any vessel to keep the sea; and when at length the storm subsided, the coast was covered with pieces of wreck, while the waves continued for many days to give up their dead at the base of the rock, from whose crest frowned _La Tour Maudite_.

From Hogg's Instructor.

THE LATE D. M. MOIR.

BY GEORGE GILFILLAN.

Pleasant and joyous was the circle wont to assemble now and then (not _every_ night, as the public then fondly dreamed) in Ambrose's, some twenty-five years ago: not a constellation in all our bright sky, at present, half so brilliant. There sat John Wilson, "lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye," his hair somewhat thicker, and his eye rather brighter, and his complexion as fresh, and his talk as powerful, as now. There Lockhart appeared, with his sharp face, _adunco naso_, keen poignant talk, and absence of all enthusiasm. There Maginn rollicked and roared, little expecting that he was ever destined to stand a bankrupt and ruined man over Bunyan's dust, and cry, "Sleep on, thou Prince of Dreamers!" There De Quincey bowed and smiled, while interposing his mild but terrible and unanswerable "buts," and winding the subtle way of his talk through all subjects, human, infernal, and divine. There appeared the tall military form of old Syme, alias Timothy Tickler, with his pithy monosyllables, and determined _nil admirari_ bearing. There the Ettrick Shepherd told his interminable stories, and drank his interminable tumblers. There sat sometimes, though seldom, a young man of erect port, mild gray eye, high head, rich quivering lips, and air of simple dignity, often forgetting to fill or empty his glass, but never forgetting to look reverently to the "Professor," curiously and admiringly to De Quincey, and affectionately to all: it was Thomas Aird. There occasionally might be seen Macnish of Glasgow, with his broad fun; Doubleday of Newcastle, then a rising litterateur; Leitch, the ventriloquist, (not professionally so, and yet not much inferior, we believe, to the famous Duncan Macmillan); and even a stray Cockney or two who did not belong to the Cockney school. There, too, the "Director-general of the Fine Arts," old Bridges, (uncle to our talented friend, William Bridges, Esq. of London,) was often a guest, with his keen black eye, finely-formed features, rough, ready talk, and a certain smack audible on his lips when he spoke of a beautiful picture, a "leading article" in "Maga," or of some of the queer adventures (_quorum pars fuit_) of Christopher North. And there, last, not least, was frequently seen the fine fair-haired head of Delta, the elegant poet, the amiable man, and the author of one of the quaintest and most delightful of our Scottish tales, "Mansie Wauch."

That brilliant circle was dissolved long ere we knew any of its members. We question if it was ever equalled, except thrice: once by the Scriblerus Club, composed of Swift, Pope, Arbuthnot, Gay, and Bolingbroke; again by the "Literary Club," with its Johnson, Burke, Garrick, Beauclerk, Gibbon, and Fox: and more recently by the "Round-table," with its Hazlitt, Hunt, Lamb, and their minor companions. It is now, we need not say, entirely dissolved, although most of its members are yet alive, and although its doings and sayings have been of late imitated in certain symposia, reminding us, in comparison with the past, of the shadowy feasts of the dead beside real human entertainments. The "nights" of the North are diviner than the "days."

From this constellation, we mean, at present, to cut out one "bright, particular star," and to discourse of him. This is Delta, the delightful. We have not the happiness of Dr. Moir's acquaintance, nor did we ever see him, save once. It was at the great Edinburgh Philosophic Feed of 1846, when Macaulay, Whately, and other lions, young and old, roared, on the whole, rather feebly, and in vulgar falsetto, over their liberal provender. Delta, too, was a speaker, and his speech had two merits, at least, modesty and brevity, and contrasted thus well with Whately's egotistical rigmarole, Macaulay's labored paradox, and Maclagan's inane bluster. He was, we understood afterwards, in poor health at the time, and did not do justice to himself. But we have been long familiar with his poems in "Blackwood" and the "Dumfries Herald," to which he occasionally contributed. We remember well when, next to a paper by North, or a poem by Aird, we looked eagerly for one by Delta in each new number of "Ebony;" and we now cheerfully proceed to say a few words about his true and exquisite genius.

We may call Delta the male Mrs. Hemans. Like her, he loved principally the tender, the soft, and the beautiful. Like her, he excelled in fugitive verses, and seldom attempted, and still more seldom succeeded, in the long or the labored poem. Like her, he tried a great variety of styles and measures. Like her, he ever sought to interweave a sweet and strong moral with his strains, and to bend them all in by a graceful curve around the Cross. But, unlike her, his tone was uniformly glad and genial, and he exhibited none of that morbid melancholy which lies often like a dark funeral edge around her most beautiful poems: and this, because he was a _masculine_ shape of the same elegant genus.

Delta's principal powers were cultured sensibility, fine fancy, good taste, and an easy, graceful style and versification. He sympathized with all the "outward forms of sky and earth, with all that was lovely, and pure, and of a good report" in the heart and the history of humanity, and particularly with Scottish scenery, and Scottish character and manners. His poetry was less a distinct power or vein, than the general result and radiance of all his faculties. These exhaled out of them a fine genial enthusiasm, which expressed itself in song. We do not think, with Carlyle, that it is the same with _all_ high poets. _He_ says--"Poetry, except in such cases as that of Keats, where the whole consists in a weak-eyed maudlin sensibility, and a certain vague tunefulness of nature, is no separate faculty, no organ which can be superadded to the rest, or disjoined from them, but rather the result of their general harmony and completion." Now, 1st, Carlyle is here grossly unjust to Keats. Had the author of Hyperion nothing but maudlin sensibility? If ever man was devoured, body and soul, by that passion for, and perception of, the beauty and glory of the universe, which is the essence of poetry, it was poor Keats. He was poetry incarnate--the wine of the gods poured into a frail earthy vessel, which split around it. Nor has Burns, of whom Carlyle is here writing, left any thing to be compared, in ideal qualities, in depth, and massiveness, and almost Miltonic magnificence, with the descriptions of Saturn, and the Palace of the Sun, and the Senate of the Gods in "Hyperion." Burns was the finest lyrist of his or any age; but Keats, had he lived, would have been one of the first of _epic_ poets. 2dly, We do not very well comprehend what Carlyle means by the words "no organ, which can be superadded to, or disjoined from the rest." If he means that no culture can add, or want of it take away, poetic faculty, he is clearly right. But, if he means that nature never confers a poetic vein distinct from, and superior to, the surrounding faculties of the man, we must remind him of certain stubborn facts. Gay and Fontaine were "fable-trees," Goldsmith was an "inspired idiot." Godwin's powerful philosophic and descriptive genius seemed scarcely connected with the man; he had to _write_ himself _into_ it, and his friends could hardly believe him the author of his own works! Even Byron was but a common man, except at his desk, or "on his stool" as he himself called it. He had to "_call_" his evil spirit from the vasty deep, and to lash himself very often into inspiration by a whip of "Gin-_twist_." And James Hogg was little else than a _haverer_, till he sat down to write poetry, when the "faery queen" herself seemed to be speaking from within him. Nay, 3dly, we are convinced that many men, of extraordinary powers otherwise, have in them a vein of poetry as distinct from the rest as the bag of honey in the bee is from his sting, his antennae, and his wings, and which requires some special circumstance or excitement to develop it. Thus it was, we think, with Burke, Burns, and Carlyle himself. All these had poetry in them, and have expressed it; but any of them might have _avoided_, in a great measure, its expression, and might have solely shone in other spheres. For example, Burke has written several works full, indeed, of talent, but without a single gleam of that real imagination which other of his writings display. What a contrast between his "Thoughts on the Present Discontents," or his "Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful," (an essay containing not one sublime, and not two beautiful sentences in it all,) and the "rare and regal" rhetorical and poetic glories of his "Essay on the French Revolution," or his "Letters on a Regicide Peace!" Burns might have been a philosopher of the Dugald Stewart school, as acute and artificially eloquent as any of them, had he gone to Edinburgh College instead of going to Irvine School. Carlyle might have been a prime-minister of a somewhat original and salvage sort, had it been so ordered. None of the three were so essentially poetical, that all their thoughts were "twin-born with poetry," and rushed into the reflection of metaphor, as the morning beams into the embrace and reflection of the lake. All were _stung_ into poetry: Burke by political zeal and personal disappointment, Burns by love, and Carlyle by that white central heat of dissatisfaction with the world and the things of the world, which his temperament has compelled him to express, but which his Scottish common sense has taught him the wisdom of expressing in earnest masquerade and systematic metaphor. But, 4thly, there is a class of poets who have possessed more than the full complement of human faculties, who have added to these extensive accomplishments and acquirements, and yet who have been so constituted, that imaginative utterance has been as essential to their thoughts as language itself. Such were Dante, Milton, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, &c., and such are Wilson, Bailey, Aird, and Yendys. These are "nothing, if not poetical." All their powers and acquisitions turn instinctively toward poetic expression, whether in verse or prose. And near them, although on a somewhat lower plane, stood Delta.

Poetry, with Delta, was rather the natural outflow of his whole soul and culture combined, than an art or science. His poetry was founded on feelings, not on principles. Indeed, we fancy that little true poetry, in any age, has been systematic. It is generally the work of sudden enthusiasm, wild and rapid ecstasy acting upon a nature _prefitted_ for receiving the afflatus, whether by gift or by accomplishment, or by both united. Even the most thoroughly furnished have been as dependent on moods and happy hours as the least. The wind of inspiration bloweth where it listeth. Witness Milton and Coleridge, both of whom were masters of the theory of their art, nay, who had studied it scientifically, and with a profound knowledge of cognate sciences, and yet both of whom could only build up the lofty rhyme at certain seasons, and in certain circumstances, and who frequently perpetrated sheer dulness and drivel. The poetry of Homer, of Eschylus, of Lucretius, of Byron, of Shelley, of Festus--in short, the most of powerful poetry--has owed a vast deal more to excitement and enthusiasm than to study or elaborate culture. The rhapsodists were the first, have been the best, and shall be the last of the poets. And with what principles of poetic art were the bards of Israel conversant? And what systems of psychology or aesthetics had Shakspeare studied? And in what college were trained the framers of the ballad-poetry of the world--the lovers who soothed with song their burning hearts--the shepherds who sang amid their green wildernesses--the ploughmen who modulated to verse the motion of their steers--the kings of the early time who shouted war-poetry from their chariots--the Berserkars whose long hair curled and shook as though life were in it, to the music of their wild melodies--and the "men of sturt and strife," the rough Macpherson-like heroes, whose spirits sprang away from the midst of flood and flame, from the gallows or the scaffold, on whirlwinds of extempore music and poetry? Poetry, with them, was the irresistible expression of passion and of imagination, and hence its power; and to nothing still, but the same rod, can its living waters flow amain. Certain fantastic fribbles of the present day may talk of "principles of art," and "principles of versification," and the necessity of studying poetry as a science, and may exhaust the resources of midnight darkness in expressing their bedrivelled notions; but _our_ principle is this--"Give us a gifted intellect, and warm true heart, and stir these with the fiery rod of passion and enthusiasm, and the result will be genuine, and high, and lasting poetry, as certainly as that light follows the sun."

It may, perhaps, be objected, besides, that Delta has left no large or great poem. Now, here we trace the presence of another prevalent fallacy. Largeness is frequently confounded with greatness. But, because Milton's Paradise Lost is both large and great, it does not follow that every great poem must be large, any more than that every large poem must be great. Pollok's Course of Time is a large and a clever, but scarcely a great poem. Hamlet and Faust may be read each in an hour, and yet both are great poems. Heraud's Judgment of the Flood is a vast folio in size, but a very second-rate poem in substance. Thomas Aird's Devil's Dream covers only four pages, yet who ever read it without the impression "this is a great effort of genius." Lalla Rookh was originally a quarto, but, although brilliant in the extreme, it can hardly be called a poem at all. Burns's Vision of Liberty contains, in the space of thirty-two lines, we hesitate not to say, all the elements of a great poem. Although Delta's poems be not large, it is not a necessary corollary that they are inferior productions. And if none of them, perhaps, fill up the whole measure of the term "great," many of them are beautiful, all are genuine, and some, such as Casa Wappy, are exquisite.

Health is one eminent quality in this pleasing writer. Free originally from morbid tendencies, he has nursed and cherished this happy tone of mind by perusing chiefly healthy authors. He has acted on the principle that the whole should be kept from the sick. He has dipped but sparingly into the pages of Byron and Shelley, whereas Wordsworth, Wilson, Southey, and Scott, are the gods of his idolatry. Scott is transcendently clear. Indeed, we think that he gives to him, _as a poet_, a place beyond his just deserts. His ease, simplicity, romantic interest, and Border fire, have blinded him to his faults, his fatal facility of verse, his looseness of construction, and his sad want of deep thought and original sentiment. To name him beside or above Wordsworth, the great consecrated bard of his period, is certainly a heresy of no small order. One or two of Wordsworth's little poems, or of his sonnets, are, we venture to say, in genuine poetical depth and beauty, superior to Scott's _five_ larger poems put together. _They_ are long, lively, rambling, shallow, and blue, glittering streams. Wordsworth's ballads are deep and clear as those mountain pools over which bends the rowan, and on which smiles the autumn sky, as on the fittest reflector of its own bright profundity and solemn clearness.

Well did Christopher North characterize Delta as the poet of the spring. He was the darling of that darling season. In all his poetry there leaped and frolicked "vernal delight and joy." He had in some of his verses admirably, and on purpose, expressed the many feelings or images which then throng around the heart, like a cluster of bees settling at once upon flower--the sense of absolute newness, blended with a faint, rich thrill of recollection--the fresh bubbling out of the blood from the heart-springs--the return of the reveries of childhood or youth--the intolerance of the fireside--the thirst after nature renewed within the soul--the strange glory shed upon the earth, all red and bare though it yet be--the attention excited by every thing, "even by the noise of the fly upon the sunny wall, or the slightest murmur of creeping waters"--the springing up of the sun from his winter declinature--the softer and warmer lustre of the stars--and the new emphasis with which men pronounce the words "hope" and "love." To crown a spring evening, there sometimes appears in the west the planet Venus, bright yellow-green, shivering as with ecstasy in the orange or purple sky, and rounding off the whole scene into the perfection of beauty. The Scottish poet of spring did not forget this element of its glory, but sung a hymn to that fair star of morn and eve worthy of its serene, yet tremulous splendor.

Delta was eminently a national writer. He did not gad abroad in search of the sublime or strange, but cultivated the art of staying at home. The scenery of his own neighborhood, the traditions or the histories of his own country, the skies and stars of Scotland, the wild or beautiful legends which glimmer through the mist of its past--these were "the haunt and the main region of his song," and hence, in part, the sweetness and the strength of his strains. Indeed, it is remarkable that nearly all our Scottish poets have been national and descriptive. Scotland has produced no real epic, few powerful tragedies, few meditative poems of a high rank, but what a mass of poetry describing its own scenery and manners, and recording its own traditions. King James the Sixth, Gawin Douglas, Davie Lyndsay, Ramsay, Fergusson, Ross of the "Faithful Shepherdess," Burns, Beattie, Sir Walter Scott, Wilson, Aird, Delta, and twenty more, have been all more or less national in their subject, or language, or both. We attribute this, in a great measure, to the extreme peculiarity of Scottish manners, _as they were_, and to the extreme and romantic beauty of Scottish scenery. The poetic minds, in a tame country like England, are thrown out upon foreign topics, or thrown in upon themselves; whereas, in Scotland, they are arrested and detained within the circle of their own manners and mountains. "Paint _us_ first," the hills seem to cry aloud. A reason, too, why we have had few good tragedies or meditative poems, may be found in our national narrowness of creed, and in our strong prejudice against dramatic entertainments. As it is, we have only Douglas, and three or four good plays of Miss Baillie's, to balance Shakspeare, Ben Jonson, and all that galaxy--not to speak of the multitudes who have followed--and only the "Grave," the "Minstrel," and the "Course of Time," to compare with the works of George Herbert, Giles Fletcher, Quarles, Milton, Young, Cowper, and Wordsworth.

We find in Delta little meditative power or tendency. His muse had no "speculation" in her eye. Whether from caution, or from want of the peculiar faculty, he never approached those awful abysses of thought which are now attracting so many poets--attracting them, partly from a desire to look down into their darkness, and partly from a passion for those strange and shivering flowers which grow around their sides. Leigh Hunt, in his late autobiography, when speaking of Blanco White, seems to blame all religious speculation, as alike hopeless and useless. But, in the present day, unless there be religious speculation, there can, with men of mind, be little religion--no creed--nor even an approximation toward one. Would Mr. Hunt destroy that link, which in every age has bound us to the infinite and eternal? Would he bring us back to mere brute worship, and brute belief? Because we cannot at present form an infallible creed, should we beware of seeking to form a creed at all? Because we cannot see all the stars, must we never raise our eyes, or our telescopes, to the midnight heavens? Because HE has been able to reach no consistent and influential faith, ought all men to abandon the task? So far from agreeing with this dogmatic denunciation, we hold that it argues on the part of its author--revered and beloved though he be--a certain shallowness and levity of spirit--that its tendency is to crush a principle of aspiration in the human mind, which may be likened to an outspringing angel pinion, and that it indirectly questions the use and the truth of all revelation. We honor, we must say, Blanco White, in his noble struggles, and in his divine despair, more than Leigh Hunt, in his denial that such struggles are wiser than a maniac's trying to leap to the sun, and in the ignoble conceptions of man's position and destiny which his words imply. And, notwithstanding his chilling criticism, so unlike his wont, we believe still, with Coleridge, that not Wordsworth, nor Milton, have written a sonnet, embodying a thought so new and magnificent, in language so sweet and musical, and perfectly fitted to the thought, like the silvery new moon sheathed in a transparent fleecy cloud, as that of Blanco White's beginning with "Mysterious Night."

Delta, we have already said, gained reputation, in prose, as well as in verse. His _Mansie Wauch, Tailor in Dalkeith_, is one of the most delightful books in the language. It is partly, it is true, imitated from Galt; but, while not inferior to him in humor, it has infused a far deeper vein of poetry into the conception of common Scottish life. Honor to thee, honest Mansie! Thou art worth twenty Alton Lockes, the metaphysical tailor (certainly one of the absurdest creations, and surrounded by the most asinine story of the age, although redeemed by some glorious scenes, and _one_ character, Sandy Mackay, who is just Thomas Carlyle _humanized_). But better than thee still, is thy 'prentice, Mungo Glen, with decline in his lungs, poetry in his heart, and on his lips one of the sweetest laments in the language! Many years have elapsed since we read thy life, but our laughter at thy adventures, and our tears at the death of thy poor 'prentice, seem as fresh as those of yesterday!

Why did Delta only open, and never dig out, this new and rich vein? He alone seemed adequate to follow, however far off, in the steps of the Great Wizard. Aird seemed to have exhausted his tale-writing faculty, exquisite as it was. Wilson's tales, with all their power, lack repose; they are too troubled, tearful, monotonous, and tempestuous. Galt, Miss Ferrier, the authoress of the Odd Volume, Macnish, &c., are dead....

We had not the pleasure of hearing Delta's recent lectures. They were, chatty, conversational, lively, full of information, although neither very eloquent, nor very profound. He knew too well the position in which he stood, and the provender which his audience required! Nor, we confess, did we expect to meet in them with a comprehensive or final vidimus of the poetry of the last fifty years. His Edinburgh eye has been too much dazzled and overpowered by the near orbs of Walter Scott and Wilson, to do justice to remoter luminaries. Nor was criticism exactly Delta's forte. He had not enough of subtility--perhaps not enough of profound native instinct--and, perhaps, _some_ will think, not enough of bad blood. But his criticism must, we doubt not, be always sincere in feeling, candid in spirit, and manly in language. Still, we repeat, that his power and mission were in the description of the woods and streams, the feelings and customs, the beauties and peculiarities, of 'dear Auld Scotland.'

It may, perhaps, be necessary to add, that the name Delta was applied to Dr. Moir, from his signature in "Black wood," which was always [Symbol: Delta]; that he was a physician in Musselburgh, and the author of some excellent treaties on subjects connected with his own profession; and that while an accomplished litterateur and beautiful poet, he never neglected his peculiar duties, but stood as high in the medical as in the literary world.

From Fraser's Magazine.

THE DESERTED MANSION.

A few years ago, a picture appeared in the Exhibition of the Royal Academy, which peculiarly impressed my imagination; it represented an ancient ruinous dwelling, surrounded by dilapidated gardens, set in sombre woods. The venerable trees, the moat filled with nettles and rubbish, the broken fences, green stagnant waters, the gabled, turreted, many-windowed, mouldering mansion, a perfect medley of chaotic architecture. The _visible silence_, the spirit of supreme desolation brooding over the precincts, filled my mind with involuntary sadness; while fancy conjured up strange, wild tales of other days, in connection with the scene. I could not shake off the belief that reality was portrayed on the canvas; and writing an account of the various pictures to a friend who resided in the country, I dwelt on this particular one, and my singular impressions respecting it. When I next received a letter from my friend, she remarked how unaccountable my fancies were; fancies which were, however, based on the foundation of truth.

She went on to say, that reading my letter to Mrs. L----, an octogenarian in wonderful preservation, that lady informed her of the locality of my deserted mansion, and also of its history; the picture being actually painted for Mrs. L----'s son; and the tale attached to it, which my friend eventually gave me in the old lady's own words, was as follows:

"Fifty years ago, the mansion of St. Elan's Wood was reckoned ancient, but it was a healthful, vigorous age, interesting and picturesque. Then, emerald turf lined the sides of the moat, and blooming flowers clustered within its sloping shelter; white drapery fluttered within the quaint latticed windows, and delicate climbers festooned them without; terraced walks and thick hollow hedges were in trim order, fountains sparkled in the sunshine, and blushing roses bent over and kissed the clear rejoicing waters.

"Fifty years ago, joyous laughter resounded amid the greenwood glades, and buoyant footsteps pressed the greensward; for the master of St. Elan's had brought home a bride, and friends and relatives hastened thither to offer congratulations, and to share the hospitalities of the festive season.

"Lady St. Elan was a very young wife; a soft-eyed, timid creature; her mother had died during her daughter's infancy, and her father (an officer of high rank in the army) being abroad, a lady whom we shall call Sabina, by whom she had been educated, accompanied her beloved pupil, now Lady St. Elan, to this new home. The death of Lady St. Elan's father, and the birth of a daughter, eventually mingled rejoicing and mourning together, while great anxiety was felt for the young mother, whose recovery was extremely tedious. The visits of eminent physicians, who were sent for from great distances, evinced the fears which were still entertained, even when the invalid roamed once more in the pleasant garden and woods around. Alas! it was not for the poor lady's bodily health they feared; the hereditary mental malady of her family on the maternal side, but which had slumbered for two generations, again darkly shadowed forth its dread approaches. Slight, indeed, had been the warning as yet, subtle the demonstrations of the deadly enemy, but enough to alarm the watchful husband, who was well acquainted with the facts. But the alarm passed away, the physicians came no more, and apparent health and strength, both mental and physical, were fully restored to the patient, while the sweet babe really deserved the epithets lavished on it by the delighted mother of the 'divinest baby in the world.'

"During the temporary absence of her husband, on affairs of urgent business, Lady St. Elan requested Sabina to share her chamber at night, on the plea of timidity and loneliness; this wish was cheerfully complied with, and two or three days passed pleasantly away.

"St. Elan was expected to return home on the following morning, and when the friends retired to rest on the previous night, Sabina withdrew the window curtains, to gaze upon the glorious landscape which stretched far away, all bathed in silver radiance, and she soon fell into a tranquil slumber, communing with holy thoughts and prayerful aspirations. She was suddenly awakened by a curious kind of sound in the room, accompanied by a half-stifled jeering laugh. She knew not how long sleep had lulled her in oblivion, but when Sabina turned round to see from whence the sound proceeded, imagine her horror and dismay at beholding Lady St. Elan standing near the door, sharpening a large knife on her slipper, looking wildly round now and then, muttering and jibing.

"'Not sharp enough yet--not sharp enough yet,' she exclaimed, intently pursuing her occupation.

"Sabina felt instinctively, that this was no practical _joke_; she knew instinctively the dread reality--by the maniac's eye--by the tone of voice--and she sprang from the bed, darting towards the door. It was locked. Lady St. Elan looked cunningly up, muttering--

"'So you thought I was so silly, did you? But I double-locked it, and threw the key out of the window; and perhaps you may spy out in the moonshine you're so fond of admiring,' pointing to an open casement, at an immense height from the ground--for this apartment was at the summit of a turret, commanding an extensive view, chosen for that reason, as well as for its seclusion and repose, being so far distant from the rest of the household.

"Sabina was not afflicted with weak nerves, and as the full danger of her position flashed across her mind, she remembered to have heard that the human eye possesses extraordinary power to quell and keep in abeyance all unruly passions thus terrifically displayed. She was also aware, that in a contest where mere bodily energy was concerned, her powers must prove utterly inadequate and unavailing, when brought into competition with those of the unfortunate lady during a continuance of the paroxysm. Sabina feigned a calmness which she was far from feeling at that trying moment, and though her voice trembled, yet she said cheerfully, and with a careless air--

"'I think your knife will soon be sharp enough, Lady St. Elan; what do you want it for?'

"'What do I want it for?' mimicked the mad woman; 'why what should I want it for, Sabina, but to cut your throat with?'

"'Well, that is an odd fancy,' exclaimed Sabina, endeavoring not to scream or to faint: 'but you had better sit down, for the knife is not sharp enough for that job--there--there's a chair. Now give me your attention while you sharpen, and I'll sit opposite to you; for I have had such an extraordinary dream, and I want you to listen to it.'

"The lady looked maliciously sly, as much as to say, 'You shall not cheat me, if I _do_ listen.' But she sat down, and Sabina opposite to her, who began pouring forth a farrago of nonsense, which she pretended to have dreamt. Lady St. Elan had always been much addicted to perusing works of romantic fiction, and this taste for the marvellous was, probably, the means of saving Sabina's life, who, during that long and awful night, never flagged for one moment, continuing her repetition of marvels in the _Arabian Night's_ style. The maniac sat perfectly still, with the knife in one hand, the slipper in the other, and her large eyes intently fixed on the narrator. Oh, those weary, weary hours! When, at length, repeated signals and knocks were heard at the chamber-door, as the morning sun arose, Sabina had presence of mind not to notice them, as her terrible companion appeared not to do so; but she continued her sing-song, monotonous strain, until the barrier was fairly burst open, and St. Elan himself, who had just returned, alarmed at the portentous murmurs within, and accompanied by several domestics, came to the rescue.

"Had Sabina moved, or screamed for help, or appeared to recognize the aid which was at hand, ere it could have reached her, the knife might have been sheathed in her heart. This knife was a foreign one of quaint workmanship, usually hanging up in St. Elan's dressing-room; and the premeditation evinced in thus secreting it was a mystery not to be solved. Sabina's hair which was black as the raven's wing, when she retired to rest on that fearful night, had changed to the similitude of extreme age when they found her in the morning. Lady St. Elan never recovered this sudden and total overthrow of reason, but died--alas! it was rumored, by her own hand--within two years afterwards. The infant heiress was entrusted to the guidance of her mother's friend and governess; she became an orphan at an early age, and on completing her twenty-first year was uncontrolled mistress of the fortune and estates of her ancestors.

"But long ere that period arrived, a serious question had arisen in Sabina's mind respecting the duty and expediency of informing Mary St. Elan what her true position was, and gently imparting the sad knowledge of that visitation overshadowing the destinies of her race. It was true that in her individual case the catastrophe might be warded off, while, on the other hand, there was lurking, threatening danger; but a high religious principle seemed to demand a sacrifice, or self-immolation, in order to prevent the possibility of a perpetuation of the direful malady.

"Sabina felt assured that were her noble-hearted pupil once to learn the facts, there would be no hesitation on her part in strictly adhering to the prescribed line of right; it was a bitter task for Sabina to undertake, but she did not shrink from performing it when her resolution became matured, and her scruples settled into decision, formed on the solid basis of duty to God and man. Sabina afterwards learnt that the sacrifice demanded of Mary St. Elan was far more heroic than she had contemplated; and when that sweet young creature devoted herself to a life of celibacy, Sabina did not know, that engrossed by 'first love,' of which so much has been said and sung, Mary St. Elan bade adieu to life's hope and happiness.

"With a woman's delicate perception and depth of pity, Sabina gained that knowledge; and with honor unspeakable she silently read the treasured secrets of the gentle heart thus fatally wounded--the evil from which she had sedulously striven to guard her pupil, had not been successfully averted--Mary St. Elan had already given away her guileless heart. But her sorrows were not doomed to last; for soon after that period when the law pronounced her free from control respecting her worldly affairs, the last of the St. Elans passed peacefully away to a better world, bequeathing the mansion house and estate of St. Elan's Wood to Sabina and her heirs. In Sabina's estimation, however, this munificent gift was the 'price of blood:' as but for _her_ instrumentality, the fatal knowledge would not have been imparted; but for _her_ the ancestral woods and pleasant home might have descended to children's children in the St. Elan's line,--tainted, indeed, and doomed; but now the race was extinct.

"There were many persons who laughed at Sabina's sensitive feelings on this subject, which they could not understand; and even well-meaning, pious folk, thought that she carried her strict notions, too far. Yet Sabina remained immovable; nor would she ever consent that the wealth thus left should be enjoyed by her or hers.

"Thus the deserted mansion still remains unclaimed, though it will not be long ere it is appropriated to the useful and beneficent purpose specified in Mary St. Elan's will--namely, failing Sabina and her issue, to be converted into a lunatic asylum--a kind of lunatic alms-house for decayed gentlewomen, who, with the requisite qualifications, will here find refuge from the double storms of life assailing them, poor souls! both from within and without."

"But what became of Sabina, and what interest has your son in this picture?" asked my friend of old Mrs. L----, as that venerable lady concluded her narration; "for if none live to claim the property, why does it still remain thus?"

"Your justifiable curiosity shall be gratified, my dear," responded the kindly dame. "Look at my hair--it did not turn white from age: I retired to rest one night with glossy braids, black as the raven's wing, and they found me in the morning as you now behold me! Yes, it is even so; and you no longer wonder that Sabina's son desired to possess this identical painting; my pilgrimage is drawing towards its close--protracted as it has been beyond the allotted age of man--but, according to the tenor of the afore-named will, the mansion and estate of St. Elan must remain as they now stand until I am no more; while the accumulated funds will amply endow the excellent charity. Were my son less honorable or scrupulous, he might, of course, claim the property on my decease; but respect for his mother's memory, with firm adherence to her principles, will keep him, with God's blessing, from yielding to temptation. He is not a rich man, but with proud humility he may gaze on this memorial picture, and hand it down to posterity with the traditionary lore attached; and may none of our descendants ever lament the use which will be made, nor covet the possession, of this deserted mansion."

From Hogg's Instructor.

ILLUSTRATIONS OF MOTIVES.

Certain it is, that in the universe there can be but one infallible Judge of motives. None but its Maker can see into the secret springs, and clearly comprehend the motions, of the mind. Nevertheless, "the will for the deed" is an old understanding among mankind, in virtue of that inward life whose world and workings they know to extend so far beyond the visible. It is, indeed, the privilege, and in some sense a necessity of human reason, to inquire after, at least, obvious motives, since the smallest acquaintance with character or history cannot be formed without taking them into account. Thus, in the biographies of notable men, in the histories of nations, and in the gossip which constitutes the current history of most neighborhoods, and is relished alike by the denizens of court and hamlet, nobody is satisfied with knowing merely what was done, for the demand invariably follows, Why they did it? That query is often necessary to legal, and always to moral justice. It must be, so to speak, a most mechanical and surface life, whose daily doings the beholder can fully explain, independent of any reference to inward feelings, unuttered memories, or concealed hopes. How many deeds and whole courses of action, chameleon-like, utterly change their complexions, according to the light of attributed motives! Through that medium, the patriot of one party becomes the heartless and designing knave of another; and the fanatical revolutionists of their own generation turn to fearless reformers with the next. Many an act, on the details of which most historians are agreed, is held up by one to the world's praise, and by another to universal censure. Henri Quatre, says the first, conformed to Catholicism rather than continue a civil war in his kingdom; while a second remarks of the same monarch, that he sacrificed his faith for a crown. When Frederick-William of Prussia was just at the hottest of that persecution of his celebrated son, for which, together with his love of tall soldiers, he is best known to the world, the grand dispute amongst his favorite guards at Potsdam was, whether the kicks, cuffs, and imprisonments, which the old king bestowed so liberally on his heir-apparent, were intended to prevent young Fritz turning an infidel, or arose from his father's fears that he might be a greater man than himself! On no subject are mankind more apt to differ, probably because there are few on which observation affords so much inferential and so little direct evidence.

Approaching the innermost circles of private life, we find that the views entertained of motives exercise a still greater influence in determining our estimation of kindred, friends, or lovers. Volpone, in Ben Jonson's play, even had he been capable of it, could have no cause for gratitude to his numerous friends for all their gifts and attentions, knowing so perfectly as he did, that they came but in expectation of a legacy; and many a well-portioned dame has seen cause for applying to her most attentive suitor those lines of a homely Scottish song--

"My lad is sae muckle in love wi' my siller, He canna hae love to spare for me."

There is a strange difference of opinion existing at times between the principals and the spectators of these particular affairs. Few, it has been said, can penetrate the motives of others in matters regarding themselves. Yet most people are wonderfully sharp-sighted where their neighbors are concerned; and the world--as every one of us is apt to call that fraction of society in which we live, and move, and have our associations--though generally not over charitable, is rarely wrong in its conclusions.

He was a keen observer of life who remarked that the rapid changes to which most of human friendships and enmities are liable, could be no matter of surprise to one who took note of the motives from which they generally originate. Poor and unsubstantial enough these doubtless are, in many a case. There have been friendships that owed their growth solely to showers of flattery, and bitter enmities have spontaneously sprung up in the soil of envy. It was said of Goldsmith, that he could never hear a brother poet, or, indeed, any citizen of the world of letters, praised, without entertaining a temporary aversion to that individual, and a similar effect was always produced by the smallest sign of increasing literary consequence. A report that M---- had been taken particular notice of by such a nobleman of those patronizing times, or that his works had been admired in some segment of the fashionable circle, was sufficient to make the author of the "Deserted Village" find all manner of faults with him and his, till time, or his habitual good nature, wiped the circumstance out of Goldsmith's remembrance.

This reminds one of Madame de Montespan, a belle of that order which reigned most triumphantly at the court of Louis XIV., who never could forgive her rival, even when disgraced and dead, because she had once got a ride in the royal carriage. It is curious that the learned and the fair, far as their general pursuits, and visibilities, too, are known to be apart, should, according to common report, approximate so nearly in their motives to enmity or friendship. George Colman used to say, that, if one had any interest in getting up a quarrel between either two fine ladies or two literary men, he had nothing to do but to praise the one energetically to the other, and the higher his enthusiasm rose, the fiercer would be the war.

It was asserted of both the elder and younger Scaliger, that they never applauded any scholar with all their might, but one who was manifestly inferior to themselves; and of Madame de Maintenon, that she never honored any one with her special friendship who was not, in some considerable point, beneath her. There is still a large class of characters, in all whose attachments a something to despise seems the indispensable ingredient. The perpetual triumph of being always "king of the company" has a binding attraction for such minds. It confers a kind of dictatorship to have the advantage of one's friends. Nothing else can explain the amount of patronage and befriending generally lavished on the most worthless members of families or societies; and the half-grudge, half-surveillance, which, under the covert of mere mouth-honor, often surrounds great or successful abilities.

A strange motive to enmity is illustrated in the life of General Loudoun, one of the Scotch Jacobites, who, on the defeat of his party, entered the Austrian service, and rose to the rank of field-marshal in the wars of Maria Theresa. He had taken the town of Seidlitz from the Prussians. It was a great stroke in favor of the empress queen, and might have been rewarded with a coronet, but, in his haste to send her majesty the intelligence, Loudoun transmitted it through her husband, the Emperor Francis, who had a private interest in the matter, having long carried on a speculation of his own in victualling not only his wife's troops, but those of her Prussian enemy. King Maria, as she was styled by her Hungarian subjects, had also some special reasons for allowing him to have neither hand nor voice in her concerns--a fact which the marshal had never learned, or forgotten; and her majesty was so indignant at receiving the news through such a channel, that, though she struck a medal to commemorate the taking of Seidlitz, Loudoun was rewarded only with her peculiar aversion throughout the remaining seventeen years of her reign, for which the good wishes of that imperial speculator in forage and flour afforded but poor consolation.

Of all the important steps of human life, that by which two are made one appears to be taken from the greatest variety of motives. Doubtless, from the beginning it was not so; but manifold and heterogeneous are those which have been alleged for it in the civilized world. Goethe said he married to attain popular respectability. Wilkes, once called the Patriot, when sueing his wife, who chanced to have been an heiress, for the remains of her property, declared that he had wedded at twenty-two, solely to please his friends; and Wycherly the poet, in his very last days, worshipped and endowed with all his worldly goods, as the English service hath it, a girl whom poverty had made unscrupulous, in order to be revenged on his relations.

Princes of old were in the habit of marrying to cement treaties, which were generally broken as soon after as possible; and simple citizens are still addicted to the same method of amending their fortunes and families. There was an original motive to double blessedness set forth in the advice of a veteran sportsman in one of the border counties. His niece was the heiress of broad lands, which happened to adjoin an estate belonging to a younger brother of the turf; and the senior gentleman, when dilating to her on the exploits they had performed together by wood and wold, wound up with the following sage counsel--"Maria, take my advice, and marry young Beechwood, and you'll see this county hunted in style."

The numbers who, by their own account, have wedded to benefit society, in one shape or another, would furnish a strong argument against the accredited selfishness of mankind, could they only be believed. The general good of their country was the standing excuse of classic times, and philosophers have occasionally reproduced it in our own. Most people seem to think some apology necessary, but none are so ingenious in showing cause why they should enter the holy state, as those with whom it is the second experiment. The pleas of the widowed for casting off their weeds are generally prudent, and often singularly commendable. Domestic policy or parental affection supply the greater part of them; and the want of protectors and step-mothers felt by families of all sizes is truly marvellous, considering the usual consequences of their instalment.

It is to be admired, as the speakers of old English would say, for what noble things men will give themselves credit in the way of motives, and how little resemblance their actions bear to them. Montaigne was accustomed to tell of a servant belonging to the Archbishop of Paris, who, being detected in privately selling his master's best wine, insisted that it was done out of pure love to his grace, lest the sight of so large a stock in his cellar might tempt him to drink more than was commendable for a bishop. A guardian care of their neighbors' well-being, somewhat similar, is declared by all the disturbers of our daily paths. Tale-bearers and remarkers, of every variety, have the best interests of their friends at heart; and what troublesome things some people can do from a sense of duty is matter of universal experience. Great public criminals, tyrants, and persecutors in old times, and the abusers of power in all ages, have, especially in the fall of their authority, laid claim to most exalted motives. Patriotism, philanthropy, and religion itself, have been quoted as their inspirers. The ill-famed Judge Jeffries said, his judicial crimes were perpetrated to maintain the majesty of the law. Robespierre affirmed that he had lived in defence of virtue and his country. But perhaps the most charitable interpretation that ever man gave to the motives of another, is to be found in the funeral sermon of Frederick, Prince of Wales, and father of George III. The preacher, after several judicious remarks on the virtues of the royal deceased, concludes, "That in the extreme to which these were carried, they appeared like vices; for so great was his generosity, that he ruined half the tradesmen in London; and so extraordinary his condescension, that he kept all sorts of bad company."

It is strange, that while motives abstractly virtuous have produced large additions to the sum of mortal ills, little of private, and still less of public, good has sprung, even casually, from those that are evil in themselves. "If either the accounts of history, or the daily reports of life, are to be at all credited," said one who had learned and thought much on this subject, "the greatest amount of crime and folly has been committed from motives of religion and love, as men, for the most part, know them; while those of avarice, revenge, and fear, have originated the most extraordinary actions and important events."

The sins of revenge have usually a leaven of what Bacon calls "wild justice" in them. Those of avarice are, from their very nature, notorious; but perhaps no motive has ever prompted men to such varied and singular actions as that of fear. The working of fear was singularly exhibited in the conduct of a certain Marquis of Montferrat, who lived at the period of the famous Italian wars, waged between Charles V. of Germany and Francis I. of France. The marquis was an Alpine feudatory of the former, and served him long and faithfully, till a German astrologer of high repute in those days assured him, from the stars, that the emperor would be eventually overthrown, and all his partisans utterly ruined. To avoid his probable share in that prediction, the marquis turned traitor to his friend and sovereign, for Charles had trusted him beyond most men; but the next year, the emperor was completely victorious, by both sea and land. The marquis had fallen, fighting in vain for Francis, and his fief was bestowed on a loyal vassal of the emperor.

Divines and philosophers have had many controversies concerning motives. A great dispute on this subject is said to have engaged the learned of Alexandria, about the accession of the emperor Julian, whom, says a biographer, "some of his subjects named the Apostate, and some the Philosopher." The controversy occupied not only the Christian Platonists, for whose numbers that city was so celebrated, but also the Pagan wisdom, then shedding its last rays under favor of the new emperor. Yet neither Christians nor Pagans could entirely agree with each other, and such a division of opinion had never been heard, even in Alexandria. Things were in this state, says the tradition, when there arrived in the capital of Egypt a Persian, whose fame had long preceded him. He had been one of the Magi, at the base of the Caucasus, till the Parthians laid waste his country, when he left it, and travelled over the world in search of knowledge, and, in both east and west, they called him Kosro the Wise. Scarce was the distinguished stranger fairly within their gates when the chiefs of the parties determined to hear his opinion on matter; and a deputation, consisting of a Christian bishop, a Jewish rabbi, a Platonist teacher, and a priest of Isis, waited on the Persian one morning, when he sat in the portico of a long-deserted temple, which some forgotten Egyptian had built to Time, the instructor. The rabbi and the priest were for actions. The Platonist and the bishop were motive men, but in the manner of those times, for even philosophy has its fashions, the four had agreed that each should propose a question to Kosro, as his own wisdom dictated. Accordingly, after some preparatory compliments, touching the extent of his fame and travels, the Platonist, who was always notable for circumlocution, opened the business by inquiring what he considered the chief movers of mankind.

"Gain and vanity," replied Kosro.

"Which is strongest?" interposed the rabbi, in whom the faculty of beating about in argument was scarcely less developed.

"Gain was the first," said the Persian. "Its worship succeeded the reign of Ormuz, which western poets call the golden age, and I know not when it was; but, in later ages, vanity has become the most powerful, for every where I have seen men do that for glory which they would not do for gain; and many even sacrifice gain to glory, as they think it."

"But, wise Kosro," demanded the priest, impatient with what he considered a needless digression, "tell us your opinion--Should men be judged by their motives or their actions?"

"Motives," said Kosro, "are the province of divine, and actions of human, judgment. Nevertheless, because of the relation between them it is well to take note of the former when they become visible in our light, yet not to search too narrowly after them, but take deeds for their value; seeing, first, that the inward labyrinth is beyond our exploring; secondly, that most men act from mingled motives; and, thirdly, that if, after the thought of a western poet, there were a crystal pane set in each man's bosom, it would mightily change the estimation of many."

And the bishop made answer--"Kosro, thou hast seen the truth; man must at times perceive, but God alone can judge of, motives."

From Sharpe's London Journal.

THE LAST DAYS OF THE EMPEROR ALEXANDER.

FROM THE FRENCH OF ALEX. DUMAS, BY MISS STRICKLAND.

The knowledge of an extensively organized conspiracy embittered the last years of the Emperor Alexander, and increased his constitutional melancholy. His attachment to Tzarsko Zelo made him linger longer at his summer palace than was prudent in a man subject to erysipelas. The wound in his leg reopened with very unfavorable symptoms, and he was compelled to leave his favorite residence in a closed litter for St. Petersburgh; and the skill and firmness of Mr. Wyllie, his Scotch surgeon, alone saved the diseased limb from amputation. As soon as he was cured, he returned again to Tzarsko Zelo, where the spring found him as usual alone, without a court or chamberlain, only giving audience to his ministers twice a-week. His existence resembled rather that of an anchorite weeping for the sins of his youth, than that of a great Emperor who makes the happiness of his people.

He regulated his time in the following manner:--in summer he rose at five, and in winter at six o'clock every morning, and as soon as the duties of the toilette were ended, entered his cabinet, in which the greatest order was observed. He found there a cambric handkerchief folded, and a packet of new pens. He only used these pens in signing his name, and never made use of them again. As soon as he concluded this business, he descended into the garden, where, notwithstanding the report of a conspiracy which had existed two years against his life and government, he walked alone with no other guards than the sentinels always stationed before the palace of Alexander. At five he returned, to dine alone, and after his solitary meal was lulled to sleep by the melancholy airs played by the military band of the guard regiment on duty. The selection of the music was always made by himself, and he seemed to sink to repose, and to awake, with the same sombre dispositions and feelings which had been his companions throughout the day.

His empress Elizabeth lived like her consort, in profound solitude, watching over him like an invisible angel. Time had not extinguished in her heart the profound passion with which the youthful Czarowitz had inspired her at first sight, and which she had preserved in her heart, pure and inviolate. His numerous and public infidelities could not stifle this holy and beautiful attachment, which formed at once the happiness and misery of a delicate and sensitive woman.

At this period of her life, the Empress at five-and-forty retained her fine shape and noble carriage, while her countenance showed the remains of considerable beauty, more impaired by sorrow than time. Calumny itself had never dared to aim her envenomed shafts at one so eminently chaste and good. Her presence demanded the respect due to virtue, still more than the homage proper to her elevated rank. She resembled indeed more an angel exiled from heaven, than the imperial consort of a Prince who ruled a large portion of the earth.

In the summer of 1825, the last he was destined to see, the physicians of the Emperor unanimously recommended a journey to the Crimea, as the best medicine he could take. Alexander appeared perfectly indifferent to a measure which regarded his individual benefit, but the Empress, deeply interested in any event likely to restore her husband's health, asked and obtained permission to accompany him. The necessary preparations for this long absence overwhelmed the Emperor with business, and for a fortnight he rose earlier, and went to bed later, than was customary to him.

In the month of June, no visible alteration was observed in his appearance, and he quitted St. Petersburgh, after a service had been chanted, to bring down a blessing from above on his journey. He was accompanied by the Empress, his faithful coachman, Ivan, and some officers belonging to the staff of General Diebitch. He stopped at Warsaw a few days, in order to celebrate the birthday of his brother, the Grand-Duke Constantine, and arrived at Tangaroff in the end of August 1825. Both the illustrious travellers found their health benefitted by the change of scene and climate. Alexander took a great liking to Tangaroff, a small town on the borders of the sea of Azof, comprizing a thousand ill-built houses, of which a sixth-part alone are of brick and stone, while the remainder resemble wooden cages covered with dirt. The streets are large, but then they have no pavement, and are alternately loaded with dust, or inundated with mud. The dust rises in clouds, which conceals alike man and beast under a thick veil, and penetrates every where the carefully closed jalousies with which the houses are guarded, and covers the garments of their inhabitants. The food, the water, are loaded with it; and the last cannot be drunk till previously boiled with salt of tartar, which precipitates it; a precaution absolutely necessary to free it from this disagreeable and dangerous deposit.

The Emperor took possession of the governor's house, where he sometimes slept and took his meals. His abode there in the daytime rarely exceeded two hours. The rest of his time was passed in wandering about the country on foot, in the hot dust or wet mud. No weather put any stop to his outdoor exercise, and no advice from his medical attendant nor warning from the natives of Tangaroff, could prevail upon him to take the slightest precaution against the fatal autumnal fever of the country. His principal occupation was, planning and planting a great public garden, in which undertaking he was assisted by an Englishman whom he had brought with him to St. Petersburgh for that purpose. He frequently slept on the spot on a camp-bed, with his head resting upon a leather pillow.

If general report may be credited, planting gardens was not the principal object that engrossed the Russian Emperor's attention. He was said to be employed in framing a new Constitution for Russia, and unable to contend at St. Petersburgh with the prejudices of the aristocracy, had retired to this small city, for the purpose of conferring this benefit upon his enslaved country.

However this might be, the Emperor did not stay long at a time at Tangaroff, where his Empress, unable to share with him the fatigues of his long journeys, permanently resided, during his frequent absences from his head quarters. Alexander, in fact, made rapid excursions to the country about the Don, and was sometimes at Tcherkask, sometimes at Donetz. He was on the eve of departure for Astracan, when Count Woronzoff in person came to announce to his sovereign the existence of the mysterious conspiracy which had haunted him in St. Petersburgh, and which extended to the Crimea, where his personal presence could alone appease the general discontent.

The prospect of traversing three hundred leagues appeared a trifle to Alexander, whom rapid journeys alone diverted from his oppressive melancholy. He announced to the Empress his departure, which he only delayed till the return of a messenger he had sent to Alapka. The expected courier brought new details of the conspiracy, which aimed at the life, as well as the government of Alexander. This discovery agitated him terribly. He rested his aching head on his hands, gave a deep groan, and exclaimed, "Oh, my father, my father!" Though it was then midnight, he caused Count Diebitch to be roused from sleep and summoned into his presence. The general, who lodged in the next house, found his master in a dreadfully excited state, now traversing the apartment with hasty strides, now throwing himself upon the bed with deep sighs and convulsive starts. He at length became calm, and discussed the intelligence conveyed in the dispatches of Count Woronzoff. He then dictated two, one addressed to the Viceroy of Poland, the other to the Grand-Duke Nicholas.

With these documents all traces of his terrible agitation disappeared. He was quite calm, and his countenance betrayed nothing of the emotion that had harassed him the preceding night.

Count Woronzoff, notwithstanding his apparent calmness, found him difficult to please, and unusually irritable, for Alexander was constitutionally sweet-tempered and patient. He did not delay his journey on account of this internal disquietude, but gave orders for his departure from Tangaroff, which he fixed for the following day.

His ill-humor increased during the journey; he complained of the badness of the roads and the slowness of the horses. He had never been known to grumble before. His irritation became more apparent when Sir James Wyllie, his confidential medical attendant, recommended him to take some precaution against the frozen winds of the autumn; for he threw away with a gesture of impatience the cloak and pelisse he offered, and braved the danger he had been entreated to avoid. His imprudence soon produced consequences. That evening he caught cold, and coughed incessantly, and the following day, on his arrival at Orieloff, an intermittent fever appeared, which soon after, aggravated by the obstinacy of the invalid, turned to the intermittent fever common to Tangaroff and its environs in the autumn.

The Emperor, whose increasing malady gave him a presage of his approaching death, expressed a wish to return to the Empress, and once more took the route to Tangaroff; contrary to the prayers of Sir James Wyllie, he chose to perform a part of the journey on horseback, but the failure of his strength finally forced him to re-enter his carriage. He entered Tangaroff on the fifth of November, and swooned the moment he came into the governor's house. The Empress, who was suffering with a complaint of the heart, forgot her malady, while watching over her dying husband. Change of place only increased the fatal fever which preyed upon his frame, which seemed to gather strength from day to day. On the eight, Wyllie called in Dr. Stephiegen, and on the thirteenth they endeavored to counteract the affection of the brain, and wished to bleed the imperial patient. He would not submit to the operation, and demanded iced water, which they refused. Their denial irritated him, and he rejected every thing they offered him, with displeasure. These learned men were unwise, to deprive the suffering prince of the water, a safe and harmless beverage in such fevers. In fact, nature herself sometimes, in inspiring the wish, provides the remedy. The Emperor on the afternoon of that day wrote and sealed a letter, when perceiving the taper remained burning, he told his attendant to extinguish it, in words that plainly expressed his feelings in regard to the dangerous nature of his malady. "Put out that light, my friend, or the people will take it for a bier candle, and will suppose I am already dead."

On the fourteenth of November, the physicians again urged their refractory patient to take the medicines they prescribed, and were seconded by the prayers of the Empress. He repulsed them with some haughtiness, but quickly repenting of his hastiness of temper, which in fact was one of the symptoms of the disease, he said, "Attend to me, Stephiegen, and you too, Sir Andrew Wyllie. I have much pleasure in seeing you, but you plague me so often about your medicine, that really I must give up your company if you will talk of nothing else." He however was at last induced to take a dose of calomel.

In the evening, the fever had made such fearful progress that it appeared necessary to call in a priest. Sir Andrew Wyllie, at the instance of the Empress, entered the chamber of the dying prince, and approaching his bed, with tears in his eyes advised him "to call in the aid of the Most High, and not to refuse the assistance of religion as he had already done that of medicine."

The Emperor instantly gave his consent. Upon the fifteenth, at five o'clock in the morning, a humble village priest approached the imperial bed to receive the confession of his expiring sovereign.--"My father, God must be merciful to kings," were the first words the Emperor addressed to the minister of religion; "indeed they require it so much more than other men." In this sentence all the trials and temptations of the despotic ruler of a great people--his territorial ambition, his jealousy, his political ruses, his distrusts and over-confidences, seem to be briefly comprehended. Then, apparently perceiving some timidity in the spiritual confessor his destiny had provided for him, he added, "My father, treat me like an erring man, not as an Emperor." The priest drew near the bed, received the confession of his august penitent, and administered to him the last sacraments. Then having been informed of the Emperor's pertinacity in rejecting medicine, he urged him to give up this fatal obstinacy, remarking, "that he feared God would consider it absolutely suicidal." His admonitions made a deep impression upon the mind of the prince, who recalled Sir Andrew Wyllie, and, giving him his hand, bade him do what he pleased with him. Wyllie took advantage of this absolute surrender, to apply twenty leeches to the head of the Emperor; but the application was too late, the burning fever continually increased, and the sufferer was given over. The intelligence filled the dying chamber with weeping domestics, who tenderly loved their master.

The Empress still occupied her place by the bed-side, which she had never quitted but once, in order to allow her dying husband to unbosom himself in private to his confessor. She returned to the post assigned her by conjugal tenderness directly the priest had quitted it.

Two hours after he had made his peace with God, Alexander experienced more severe pain than he had yet felt. "Kings," said he, "suffer more than others." He had called one of his attendants to listen to this remark with the air of one communicating a secret. He stopped, and then, as if recalling something he had forgotten, said in a whisper, "they have committed an infamous action." What did he mean by these words? Was he suspicious that his days had been shortened by poison? or did he allude, with the last accents he uttered, to the barbarous assassination of the Emperor Paul? Eternity can alone reveal the secret thoughts of Alexander I. of Russia.

During the night, the dying prince lost consciousness. At two o'clock in the morning, Count Diebitch came to the Empress, to inform her that an old man, named Alexandrowitz, had saved many Tartars in the same malady. A ray of hope entered the heart of the imperial consort at this information, and Sir Andrew Wyllie ordered him to be sent for in haste. This interval was passed by the Empress in prayer, yet she still kept her eyes fixed upon those of her husband, watching with intense attention the beams of life and light fading in their unconscious gaze. At nine in the morning, the old man was brought into the imperial chamber almost by force. The rank of the patient, perhaps, inspiring him with some fear respecting the consequences that might follow his prescriptions, caused his extreme unwillingness. He approached the bed, looked at his dying sovereign, and shook his head. He was questioned respecting this doubtful sign. "It is too late to give him medicine; besides, those I have cured were not sick of the same malady."

With these words of the peasant physician, the last hopes of the Empress vanished; but if pure and ardent prayers could have prevailed with God, Alexander would have been saved.

On the sixteenth of November, according to the usual method of measuring time, but on the first of December, if we follow the Russian calendar, at fifty minutes after ten in the morning, Alexander Paulowitz, Emperor of all the Russias, expired. The Empress, bending over him, felt the departure of his last breath. She uttered a bitter cry, sank upon her knees, and prayed. After some minutes passed in communion with heaven, she rose, closed the eyes of her deceased lord, composed his features, kissed his cold and livid hands, and once more knelt and prayed. The physicians entreated her to leave the chamber of death, and the pious Empress consented to withdraw to her own.[9]

The body of the Emperor lay in state, on a platform raised in an apartment of the house where he died. The presence-chamber was hung with black, and the bier was covered with cloth of gold. A great many wax tapers lighted up the gloomy scene. A priest at the head of the bier prayed continually for the repose of his deceased sovereign's soul. Two sentinels with drawn swords watched day and night beside the dead, two were stationed at the doors, and two stood on each step leading to the bier. Every person received at the door a lighted taper, which he held while he remained in the apartment. The Empress was present during these masses, but she always fainted at the conclusion of the service. Crowds of people united their prayers to hers, for the Emperor was adored by the common people. The corpse of Alexander I. lay in state twenty-one days before it was removed to the Greek monastery of St. Alexander, where it was to rest before its departure for interment in St. Petersburgh.

Upon the 25th December, the remains of the Emperor were