lizards and dragons, on guard over this heap of gold it has nothing to do with; and these three arrant sponges have come in a body to share it among themselves. If I load myself up

with all this booty while they are asleep, I shall not fail to wake the Kardouon, who will wake these others, for he is always on the alert; and I shall have to deal with the lizard, the woodcutter, and the fakir and the lawyer-two species who are after prey and capable of defending it. Prudence warns me it is better to make believe sleep beside them, so long as the shadows have not yet fallen, since it seems they propose to pass the night here; and afterwards I will profit by the darkness to kill them one by one with a good stroke of the canjar. This place is so unfrequented that I am not afraid of any hindrance to-morrow in carrying off this wealth; indeed, I don't propose to leave without having made a breakfast of the Kardouon, whose flesh is very delicate, so I have heard my father say." He in turn slept, dreaming of assassinations, pillages, and Kardouons broiled over the coals.

This is the history of the KING OF THE SANDS, who was a robber, and called so to distinguish him from others.

VI. THE SAGE LOCKMAN.

The following day there chanced on the same spot the sage Lockman, the philosopher and poet; Lockman, the lover of human beings, the preceptor of peoples, and the counselor of kings; Lockman, who often sought the remotest solitudes to meditate on nature and on God.

And Lockman walked with a lagging step, because he was enfeebled by his great age; for he had attained, that very day, the three hundredth anniversary of his birth.

Lockman halted at the spectacle which the neighborhood of the tree in the desert presented him there, and reflected a moment.

"The picture which your divine goodness has displayed to my vision," he exclaimed at last, "comprises, O sublime Creator of all things! unspeakable admonitions; and my soul is overwhelmed, in contemplating it, with admiration for the lessons which flow from your works, and with compassion for the insensate beings who do not recognize your hand.

"Here is a treasure, as men express it, which has perhaps many times cost its owner his peace of mind and of soul.

"Here is the Kardouon, who has found these pieces of gold, and who, enlightened only by the feeble instinct with which you have provided his species, has taken them for slices of roots dried up by the sun.

"Here is the poor Xaïloun, whose eyes have been dazzled by the brilliancy of the Kardouon's vesture, because his intelligence could not pierce, by mounting up to you, the shadows which envelop him like the swaddling-clothes of a cradled infant, and adore in this magnificent apparel the all-powerful hand which thus adorns at its will the humblest of its creatures.

"Here is the fakir Abhoc, who trusted in the natural timidity of the Kardouon and the imbecility of Xailoun to remain sole possessor of so much wealth, and render himself opulent all his declining age.

"Here is Doctor Abhac, who has counted on the dispute which must be excited on awaking by the division of these treacherous vanities of fortune, to become an intermediary between the claimants and exact a double portion for his fee.

"Here is the KING OF THE SANDS, who came last, revolving fatal ideas and projects of death, in the wonted manner of those deplorable men whom your sovereign grace abandons to the passions of the earth; and who promised himself, perhaps, to butcher the first comers during the night, so far as I can judge by the desperate violence with which his hand has grasped his canjar.

“And all five are asleep forever under the poisonous shade of the Upas, the baleful seeds of which a breath of your anger has blown from the depths of the forests of Java.”

When he had said what I have just related, Lockman fell upon his face and worshiped God.

And when Lockman had arisen, he passed his hand through his beard and continued.

"The respect which is due to the dead," he went on, "forbids us to leave their remains a prey to the beasts of the desert. The living judge the living, but the dead belong to God."

And he detached the pruning-knife from Xailoun's belt to dig three graves.

In the first grave he placed the fakir Abhoc.

In the second grave he placed Doctor Abhac.

In the third grave he buried the KING OF THE SANDS. "As for thee, Xailoun," continued Lockman, "I will carry thee far from the deadly influence of the tree-poison, so that

thy friends, if any there remain to thee on the earth since the death of the Kardouon, may come to weep thee without danger in the spot where thou reposest; and I will do thus, my friend, because thou hast spread thy cloak over the sleeping Kardouon to preserve him from the cold.”

Then Lockman carried Xailoun far from thence, and dug him a grave in a little blossomy ravine, which the springs of the desert bathed often but never overflowed, under trees whose foliage floating in the wind effused around it only coolness and fragrance.

And when he had finished this, Lockman a second time passed his hand through his beard; and after some reflection, Lockman went to seek the Kardouon, who was dead beneath the poisonous tree of Java.

After which Lockman dug a fifth grave for the Kardouon above Xailoun's, on a lee side better exposed to the warmth of the sun, whose dawning rays awaken the gayety of the lizards.

"God preserve me," said Lockman, "from separating in death those who loved one another!"

And when he had spoken thus, Lockman a third time passed his hand through his beard; and after having reflected, Lockman returned to the foot of the Upas tree.

After which he dug there a very deep grave, and in it interred the treasure.

"This precaution," he said, smiling within his heart, “may save the life of a man or that of a Kardouon."

After which Lockman resumed his path with great fatigue, in order to lie down near the grave of Xaïloun; and he felt himself sinking before he arrived there, on account of his great age.

And when Lockman had reached the grave of Xaïloun, he sank all at once, let himself fall on the earth, lifted his soul toward God, and died.

This is the history of the sage Lockman.

VII. THE SPIRIT OF GOD.

The following day there chanced to be in the air one of those Spirits of God whom you have never seen except in your dreams, who hovered, again soared aloft, seemed at times to lose himself in the eternal azure, descended once more, and balanced

himself at heights that thought cannot measure, on great blue wings, like a giant butterfly.

As he came closer and closer, one might see displayed the locks of his blonde hair like gold from the furnace; and he let himself move at the will of the zephyrs which rocked him, throwing out his ivory arms and his head abandoned to all the little uses of the sky.

Then he alighted, springing with his feet upon the frail boughs without weighing down a leaf, without bending a flower; and then he flew, caressing it with the fluttering of his wings, around the new-made grave of Xailoun.

"What!" he cried, "so Xailoun is dead, Xailoun whom heaven awaits on account of his innocence and his simplicity?"

And from his large blue wings, which caressed the grave of Xailoun, he let fall on the midst of the earth which covered it a little feather which suddenly took root there, sprouted, and developed into the most beautiful plume that ever was seen to crown the coffin of a king; this he did the better to find the place again.

Then he perceived the poet, who was asleep in death as in a joyous dream, and all whose features were smiling with peace and happiness.

"My Lockman too," said the Spirit, "wished to grow young again to resemble us, though he had passed but a small number of seasons among men, who have not had time, alas! to profit by his lessons. Come nevertheless, my brother, come with me, awake from death to follow me; come to the eternal day, come to God!"

At the same instant he applied a kiss of resurrection to the forehead of Lockman, lifted him lightly from his bed of moss, and plunged with him into the sky, so deep that the eagle's eye would fatigue itself in searching for them before being fully opened to their departure.

This is the history of the Angel.

VIII. THE END OF THE GOLDEN DREAM.

That which I have just related to you passed infinite ages ago, and since that time the name of the sage Lockman has never departed from the memories of men.

And since that time the Upas ever spreads its boughs, whose shade brings death, between the springs that flow forever. This is the history of the World.

ROGER MALVIN'S BURIAL.

BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.

(From "Mosses from an Old Manse.")

[NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE: American story-writer; born at Salem, Mass., July 4, 1804; died at Plymouth, N.H., May 19, 1864. His official positions, in the customhouse at Salem and as United States consul at Liverpool, furnished him with many opportunities for the study of human nature. His literary popularity was of slow growth, but was founded on the eternal verities. His most famous novels are "The Scarlet Letter," 1850; "The House of the Seven Gables," 1851; "The Blithedale Romance," 1852; "The Marble Faun," 1860; "Septimius Felton," posthumous. He wrote a great number of short stories, inimitable in style and full of weird imagination. "Twice-told Tales," first series, appeared in 1837; "Mosses from an Old Manse," 1846; "The Snow Image and Other Twice-told Tales," in 1852; "Tanglewood Tales," in 1853.]

ONE of the few incidents of Indian warfare naturally susceptible of the moonlight of romance was that expedition undertaken for the defense of the frontiers in the year 1725, which resulted in the well-remembered "Lovell's Fight." Imagination, by casting certain circumstances judicially into the shade, may see much to admire in the heroism of a little band who gave battle to twice their number in the heart of the enemy's country. The open bravery displayed by both parties was in accordance with civilized ideas of valor; and chivalry itself might not blush to record the deeds of one or two individuals. The battle, though so fatal to those who fought, was not unfortunate in its consequences to the country; for it broke the strength of a tribe and conduced to the peace which subsisted during several ensuing years. History and tradition are unusually minute in their memorials of this affair; and the captain of a scouting party of frontier men has acquired as actual a military renown as many a victorious leader of thousands. Some of the incidents contained in the following pages will be recognized, notwithstanding the substitution of fictitious names, by such as have heard, from old men's lips, the fate of the few combatants who were in a condition to retreat after "Lovell's Fight."

The early sunbeams hovered cheerfully upon the tree tops, beneath which two weary and wounded men had stretched their limbs the night before. Their bed of withered oak leaves