visit thee, and to counsel thee against thy foes. My murdered Ferdinand is buried beneath the battlements of these walls he was a vassal of thy great father's, and I was high in confidence with thy noble mother, then but a young maid, when Ferdinand first whispered his tale of love to me.

Thy mother, as with thee, would oft beguile my ear of men's treachery towards our helpless sex, and fain would have, had me enter the walls of the holy sanctuary, (for such they call it) to shun the embraces of Ferdinand; but I disdained the vile hypocrisy they practised to deceive me, and I married Ferdinand, in spite of all their arts. Thy mother, Augustina, never forgave me for disobeying her high authority, and I fled with my husband to avoid her anger. Remote, far in the wilds of Bohemian plains, I passed a life of peaceful bliss, in the arms of him who adored me, till the ruthless war broke out, and drove me frantic. Bound in the service of the Emperor Josephus, my husband left me, to sojourn in foreign climes,— to wield his sword in the service of his sovereign and his country, Alas!, my sweetest lady, thou knowest then my woes began: Ferdinand unwillingly fought against your noble father, the great Albino! but he was taken prisoner, and brought hither. In vain I sought to obtain an interview with my wretched husband, but that was peremptorily denied; and, ah, I grieve to say, it was thy haughty and vindictive mother that refused this request to a wretched wife. I saw not Ferdinand, nor was granted permission to enter these walls, till told that he had fallen in battle, under the allied forces of your noble father. At your intercession, thou lovely kind-hearted maid, thy mother

granted me her protection, and I came here a disconsolate widow, to attend, as a menial servant, in her household concerns! at the thought, I spurned! but my humble fortunes tempted me to accept of it."

"And blest was the hour that you did so for my sake, my dearest Antoinette," cried the daughter of Albino; "for, till you came, I had no companionno friend to whom I could unburden my sorrows, or impart my secret griefs; and you are the only one to whom my mother will intrust me."

"And yet, I have had such fearful dreams-such dreadful foreboding dreams about my Ferdinand, that I would fain suspect he was hardly used."

"And why thinkest thou so, my Antoinette?" uttered Augustina, in a tremulous and faultering accent. Thy late gallant husband, as I have heard, perished in the wars at least, I have heard my mother say so. And hath not my great father and my brother perished also? In the battle's heat have they not both fallen?"

"True, it hath been said so," uttered the now weeping Antoinette. "Thy father and thy brother died in valiant glory; but a different tale has reached my ear of my lost Ferdinand, in which, thy mother and the priest, Benvolio, has had some share. But let this matter pass, I will not grieve thy young heart with such appalling terrors. I have heard such tales, that in this gothic castle have been performed, as would blanch thy roseate cheek with fear, were I to reveal them.-Didst thou hear last night where they bestowed the page of St. Julian? a goodly warrior, they say,—a most gallant soldier!"

"No," softly replied Augustina ; " but I know that

he, in converse with my mother, did tarry late, and in the armory."

"And how didst thou know that?" enquired, curiously Antoinette. "I doubt thy mother's page, Sir Orville Faulkner, hath, of late, assumed a liberty of speech he never dared avail him in thy great father's time. Beware of him, my Augustina: I do not like his flattering looks,-far less, his flattering tongue."

""Twas not my mother's page that informed me that Sir Walter De Ruthen was with her in the armory," rejoined Augustina; "it was the holy father, Benvolio; and much he feared that my mother would be surprised by treachery, while in council with St. Julian's page, and bade the guards to be alert and vigilant, in case such danger should be apprehended: but I did not hear of any. Although they were long in conference, they parted in peace and amity. I wonder much what Sir Walter said of St. Julian that made my mother so start, Antoinette; for, when I went to ask her blessing, as is my wonted custom, ere I retire to my chamber for the night, I found her pale and motionless-her eyes upraised to heaven, and humid with a tear! My mother doth not often shed tears, Antoinette she wept not at my great father's death! no, nor my dear brother slain !"

"Nor would she weep had she ten thousand sons and gallant husbands slain!" responded Antoinette. "Some other grief than loss of them has stirred her complexion, and made her heaving bosom swell with sighs. Yet, it is strange she should so have parted with Sir Walter, and denied the succour he implored for St. Julian. Something, I wot, has passed between them

that hath a reference to the state. Thy noble father and the Emperor Josephus were in bonds of amity till the Austrian army planted thorns between them, and the feudal wars broke out against him, and then he denounced vengeance on all those who had opposed his great authority, and murmured at his laws. And all but the then young St. Julian were dismissed from their offices of state in the court of Vienna; he alone gained the favour, and won the affections of the mighty emperor; and, but that he refused the hand of the Princess Geraldine, he had swayed the emperor still."

"How! Antoinette," uttered the daughter of Albino, in a yet more faultering accent; " and was this the cause that St. Julian was dimissed the service of the emperor? You much surprise me by the intelligence; yet delight, and fill my soul with rapture at the confirmation of St. Julian's love for his Augustina!"

"Which you would repay with eternal banishment, and eternnl misery!" echoed Antoinette. "Thou wouldst consecrate, to the cold convent's gloom, and the cloistered cells, those smiling beauties, and those youthful charms, which to Julian only should belong. Augustina, as thou valuest life-and what isfar dearer than life itself, thy truth, thy honour-take not the holy vow! Enter not the convent of Mariette Mouline ! from which, thou canst never more be free. Thy young bosom shut out from all earthly enjoyments-all social and endearing ties-all kind and tender interests-and all the residue of thy future days present one dreary blank! Lost to thyself, and to St. Julian,-irrevocably lost for ever!"

CHAPTER III.

"There's a bower of Roses by Bendemeer's stream,
And the nightingale sings round it all the day long;
In the time of my childhood 'twas like a sweet dream,
To sit in the roses and hear the bird's song.
That bower and its music, I never forget,
But oft, when alone, in the bloom of the year,

I think, is the nightingale singing there yet?

Are the roses still bright by the calm Bendemeer?"

MOORE.

"IN pity, Antoinette, do not fright me with such foreboding terrors, and appalling fears," softly, yet mournfully replied the beauteous Augustina. "I will not take the holy vows my mother so entreats me, for all the riches that Bohemia boasts, since still St. Julian loves me with a zeal so fervent. But, how-how shall I avoid the pressing solicitation of my mother, and the stern and angry lectures of the holy father, Benvolio? To-morrow, when I shall attend the holy father, he will expect, nay positively demand, my final answer to his pious exhortations; and when, in the presence of my lady mother, he will more boldly assert the privileges of his holy functions, and the high authority with which she has, since the death of my noble father, so greatly invested him. Say then, my Antoinette, when trembling before my mother, and she