Her robes were more costly, and her trains were longer, than those

worn by any of the royal princesses; and it was remembered that to

show the extreme fairness of her skin and beautiful contour of her

bust, she had all her dresses more _décolletées_, or cut lower in

front, than had ever been the custom at the court of France.

Enguerand de Monstrelet, in his "Chronicles," corroborates the

statements of Chastelain concerning her love of finery. "This fair

Agnes had been five years in the service of the queen," he writes,

"during which time she enjoyed all the pleasures of life, in wearing

rich clothes, furred robes, golden chains, and precious stones."

But what young and pretty woman, in any age of the world, has ever

been quite careless of such accessories to enhance her natural

charms? And in being somewhat _décolletée_, Agnes might perhaps only

have followed others, for the same was said of Isabella of Bavaria,

queen of Charles VI., whose love of dress was carried to a length so

fantastic, that the doors of the palace of Vincennes had to be

altered to permit her and the ladies of her suite to pass with their

lofty horned headdresses.

In some burst of temper, Agnes has been accused of having so

arrogantly disregarded the feelings of the queen, that she was struck

on the mouth by the son of the latter, the dauphin, afterwards the

cruel, subtle, and savage Louis XI., in whose whole character there

was but one undeniably redeeming point--a love for his mother, with a

tender reverence for her memory.

Alain Chartier, secretary to Charles VII., and author of a history of

that king--a writer whom Pasquin compares to Seneca--extols the

"perfect purity" of Agnes and the unsullied love which she had for

her royal master; which sounds comical enough, when we know that she

bore him three daughters during the few years she held his heart in

undivided sway. De Mezerai asserts that these three daughters of

Charles were by three different ladies of the court.

Agnes died in the year 1450, as many historians have affirmed, of

poison, a common suspicion in those days, and for long after. De

Mezerai states the circumstance broadly and clearly, that when the

king was at Jumièges, fourteen miles from Rouen, where there was then

a vast and famous abbey containing no less than two thousand four

hundred monks and lay brethren, "they (_i.e._ the courtiers) poisoned

his dear Agnes de Soreau, without whom he could not live one moment."

No one was ever punished for this alleged poisoning, which scandal

hinted to have been the work of Louis the dauphin; but the mutual

ill-will they bore each other, and the old quarrel and affront, might

readily serve to fix such a stigma and suspicion on one who was so

crafty and so cruel by nature.

Her illness was violent and spasmodic, and carried her off in her

fortieth year, while she was still in the bloom of her wonderful

beauty. In her last hours she was attended by the Sieur de la

Trimouille, the lady of the seneschal of Poitou, and M. Gouffier, an

equerry of Charles VII., to all of whom she spoke eloquently and

pathetically of the littleness of human life and human vanity. "She

was very contrite," records Monstrelet, "and sincerely repented her

sins. She often remembered Mary Magdalen, who had been a great

sinner, and devoutly invoked God and the Blessed Virgin Mary to her

aid."

She distributed alms and gifts to the value of sixty thousand crowns;

she begged her confessor to give her absolution for all her sins and

wickedness, conformable to an absolution which she said had been

accorded to her at Loches; and the confessor thereupon absolved her.

After receiving the last sacraments, she called for a missal, in

which she had, with her own hand, written "the little prayer of St.

Bernard," which ends, "O Mother of the Eternal Word, adopt me as thy

child and take upon thee the care of my salvation. Do not let it be

said that I have perished, when no one ever found but grace and

salvation."

With a loud shriek she called once more "on the mercy of God and

support of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and gave up the ghost on Monday,

the 9th February, about six o'clock in the afternoon. May God have

mercy on her soul and admit it into Paradise!" adds the old

chronicler Monstrelet, who never showed her any particular favour.

Then we are told that the fair and tender body of Agnes was interred

in the abbey church of Our Lady at Loches, which had been often

enriched by her liberality. A black marble tomb was placed over it,

surmounted by an effigy the size of life, and of the purest white

marble. Two kneeling angels supported the pillow on which the head

of this recumbent statue reclined, and, in allusion to her name, a

lamb was carved at its feet.

Her heart was sent to the church of St. Philibert the Abbot, at

Jumièges, and deposited near the high altar, a circumstance to which

we may attribute the attachment of her lover Charles for that place,

where he had an apartment in the abbey fitted up for his especial

use, when he chose to come thither for meditation.

In a valley of the forest of Loches, there are still traceable the

remains of a hunting lodge, or "rendez-vous de chasse," built by

Charles VII., and where he spent many a day in the society of Agnes.

Beneath it is a cave, in which lies a prodigious treasure, according

to tradition, but watched by the usual guardian of such things in

Touraine--a fiery dragon.

It is stated that Francis I., who lived about a century after her,

believed in the gentleness and patriotism of "the Lady of Beauty," as

she was named, and, finding a picture of her, among others, he wrote

the following lines under it:--

"Gentille Agnès! plus d'honneur tu mérites,

La cause étant de France recouvrée,

Que ce que peut dans un cloître ouvrer

Close nonnain, ou bien dévote hermite."

At the period of the Revolution a band of ruffians, when desecrating

the church of Loches, broke open the tomb of Agnes Sorel; rent the

coffin asunder, and scattered her bones in the streets.

"The rancour of her own sex has long ceased to persecute the memory

of Fair Rosamund, and even of the more guilty Jane Shore," says a

clever but sneering writer; "and the most harshly virtuous of the sex

in the present day are good enough to hope that both the one and the

other have found that grace which was given to Mary Magdalen and

Rahab. Under the notion, which is the prevailing one in the present

day, that Agnes Sorel was an extremely amiable sinner, a lover of her

country and her country's glory, a set of quadrilles bearing her name

is admitted to a place on virtuous pianos; just as Nell Gwynne is at

this day introduced on the stage in decent comedies."

Charles survived her seven years, and died literally of hunger, in

his nervous dread of poison from the dauphin, and not knowing from

what hand to take his food without peril; but his days of mourning

for his lost Agnes would seem to have been few; and there is

something curiously ironical in the manner in which De Mezerai

dismisses the subject of his sorrow.

"To comfort him, Antoinette de Maignelais, Dame de Villequier, cousin

of the deceased, took her place; but she was not the sole mistress."

Others followed this Lady of Beauty in rapid succession, and the last

who was taken into the favour of the most Christian king was the

daughter of a pastry-cook!

Prior to the outrage committed at the Revolution, we have an

interesting account of the remains of Agnes Sorel, as described in a

French work, entitled "Amours et Galanteries des Rois de France," by

M. Saint-Edme.

He tells us that in 1777, Louis XVI., in compliance with reiterated

requests of the canons of Loches, consented to the removal of the

tomb of Agnes Sorel from the choir to the nave of the church, with

the express injunction that no part of the body which it contained

should be disturbed; but curiosity is often destructive of the

feelings of humanity.

Of the remains found in the tomb, nothing was in a state of

preservation but the head, and alas! for human beauty--of that little

more than the bones. On attempting to raise it, the hair remained in

the hand, together with the two maxillary bones, which, as well as

the lower jaw, were furnished with all the teeth.

The hair _crêpé_, from four or five inches in height, and from nine

to ten inches in width, formed the upper part of the head-dress of

Agnes, while on each side were two flowing curls. The hair at the

back of the head, in tresses of from eighteen to twenty inches in

length, was gathered up and fastened under the _crêpé_. The hair was

of a light brown or ash colour (_brun clair, ou cendré_). At this

point of exhumation only one tress of Agnes's hair was purloined; but

under the _régime_ of the convention the remainder of the hair was

stolen, the jaws were broken up for the extraction of her beautiful

teeth, and her remains were scattered as we have described.

THE VEILED PORTRAIT.

It has been asserted that one cannot hold intercourse with that which

is generally called the Unseen World, or behold anything

supernatural, and live; but these ideas, from my own experience, I am

inclined to doubt.

In the year subsequent to the great Bengal mutiny, I found myself at

home on sick leave. My health had been injured by service in India,

and by our sufferings consequent on the revolt; while my nervous

system had been so seriously shaken by a grape-shot wound received at

Lucknow, that it was completely changed, and I became cognisant of

many things so utterly new to me, and so bewildering, that until I

read Baron Reichenbach's work on magnetism and crystalism, I feared

that I was becoming eccentric. I was sensible of the power of a

magnet over me, though it might be three rooms distant, and twice, in

darkness which seemed perfect to others, my room became filled with

light; but the Baron holds that darkness is full of light, and that

to increase the sensitiveness of the visual organs is to render that

rare and dissipated light susceptible, with all that it may contain.

I was now compelled to acknowledge the existence of that new power in

nature which the Baron calls the Odic Light, and of many other

phenomena that are described in "Der Geist in der Natur," of

Christian Oersted--the understanding that pervades all things.

But to my story.

Nearly a year had elapsed since the mutiny. The massacres at Delhi,

Lucknow, Cawnpore, and elsewhere had been fearfully avenged by that

army of retribution which marched from Umballah, and I found myself

in London, enfeebled, enervated, and, as the saying is, "weak as a

child." The bustle of the great capital stunned and bewildered me;

thus I gladly accepted a hearty invitation which I received from

Sidney Warren, one of "ours," but latterly of the Staff Corps, to

spend a few weeks--months if I chose--at his place in Herts; a fine

old house of the Tudor times, approached from the London road by an

avenue that was a grand triumphal arch of nature's own creation, with

lofty interlacing boughs and hanging foliage.

Who, thought I, that was lord of such a place could dream of broiling

in India--of sweltering in the whitewashed barrack at Dumdum, or the

thatched cantonments of Delhi or Meerut!

My friend came hurrying forth to meet me.

"How goes it, old fellow? Welcome to my new quarters," he exclaimed.

"Well, Sidney, old man, how are you?"

Then we grasped each other's hands as only brother soldiers do.

I found Warren, whom I had not seen since the commencement of the

revolt, nearly as much changed and shattered in constitution as

myself; but I knew that he had lost those whom he loved most in the

world amid the massacre at Meerut. He received me, however, with all

the warmth of an old comrade, for we had a thousand topics in common

to con over; while the regiment, which neither of us might see

again--he certainly not, as he had sold out--would prove an endless

source of conversation.

Sidney Warren was in his fortieth year, but looked considerably

older. His once dark hair and coal-black moustache were quite

grizzled now. The expression of his face was one of intense sadness,

as if some secret grief consumed him; while there was a weird and

far-seeing expression that led me to fear he was not fated to be long

in this world. Yet he had gone through the storm of the Indian war

without receiving even a scratch! Why was this?

Before I had spent two days with Sidney, he had shown me all the

objects of interest around the Warren and in it--the portrait

gallery, with its courtiers in high ruffs, and dames in the long

stomachers of one period and _décolletée_ dresses of another; his

collection of Indian antiquities, amassed at the plundering of Delhi;

and those which were more interesting to me, ponderous suits of mail

which had been hacked and battered in the wars of the Roses, and a

torn pennon unfurled by Warren's troop of horse, "for God and the

King," at Naseby.

But there was one object which he would neither show nor permit me to

look upon, and which seemed to make him shiver or shudder whenever it

caught his eye, and this was a picture of some kind in the library--a

room he very rarely entered. It was the size of a life-portrait, but

covered closely by a green-baize hanging. Good taste compelled me to

desist from talking to him on the subject, but I resolved to gratify

my curiosity on the first convenient occasion; so one day when he was

absent at the stable court, I drew back the hanging of this

mysterious picture.

It proved to be the full-length portrait of a very beautiful girl--a

proud and stately one, too--bordering on blooming womanhood. Her

features were clearly cut and classic; she had an olive-coloured

complexion, that seemed to tell of another land than England, yet the

type of her rare beauty was purely English. Her forehead was broad

and low; her dark eyes, that seemed to haunt and follow me, were

deeply set, with black brows well defined; her chin was rather

massive, as if indicating resolution of character, yet the soft, ripe

lips were full of sweetness; while the gorgeous coils of her dark

hair were crisp and wavy. Her attire was a green riding-habit, the

skirt of which was gathered in her left hand, while the right grasped

the bridle of her horse.

It was not a portrait of his wife, whom I remember to have been a

fair-haired little woman; so who was this mysterious lady? I cannot

describe the emotion this portrait excited within me; but I started

and let fall the curtain, with a distinct sensation of some one, or

something I could not see, being close beside me; so I hurried from

the shady library into the sunshine. Lovely though the face--I can

see it yet in all its details--it haunted me with an unpleasant

pertinacity, impossible either to analyse or portray. But I was a

creature of fancies then.

"Herein," thought I; "lurks some mystery, which may never be cleared

up to me." But in this surmise I was wrong, for one night--the night

of Sunday, the 10th May, _the first anniversary_ of the outbreak at

Meerut, after we had discussed an excellent dinner, with a bottle or

two of Moselle, and betaken us to iced brandy _pawnee_ (for so we

still loved to call it), and to the "soothing weed," on the sofas of

the smoking-room, Warren became suddenly seized by one of those

confidential fits which many men unaccountably have at such times,

and, while he unsparingly and bitterly reproached himself for the

part he had acted in it, I drew from him, little by little, the

secret story of his life.

Some ten years before those days of which I write, when in the

Guards, and deeply dipped in debt by extravagance, he had, unknown to

his family, married secretly a beautiful girl who was penniless, at

the very time his friends were seeking to retrieve his fortune by a

wealthy alliance. An exchange into the Line--"the sliding

scale"--became necessary, thus he was gazetted to our regiment in

India, at a period when his young wife was in extremely delicate

health; so much so that the idea of her voyaging round the

Cape--there were no P. and O. Liners then--was not to be thought of,

as it was expressly forbidden by the medical men; so they were to be

separated for a time; and that time of parting, so dreaded by

Constance, arrived inexorably.

The last fatal evening came--the last Sidney was to spend with her.

His strapped overlands and bullock-trunks, his sword and cap, both

cased, were already in the entrance hall; the morrow's morning would

see him off by the train for Southampton, and his place would be

vacant; and she should see his fond hazel eyes no more.

"Tears again!" said he, almost impatiently, while tenderly caressing

the dark and glossy hair of his girl-wife; "why on earth are you so

sad, Conny, about this temporary separation?"

"Would that I could be certain it is only such!" she exclaimed.

"Sad; oh, can you ask me, Sidney, darling? The presentiment of a

great sorrow to come is hanging over me."

"A presentiment, Constance! Do not indulge in this folly."

"If I did not love you dearly, Sidney, would such a painful emotion

rack my heart?"

"It is the merest superstition, darling, and you will get over it

when I am fairly away."

Her tender eyes regarded him wistfully for a moment, and then her

tears fell faster at the contemplation of the coming loneliness.

After a pause, she asked:

"Are there many passengers going out with you?"

"A few--in the cuddy," he replied carelessly.

"Do you know any of them?"

"Yes; one or two fellows on the staff."

"And the ladies?" she asked, after another pause.

"I don't know, Conny dear; what do they matter to you or me?"

"I heard incidentally that--that Miss Dashwood was going out in your

vessel."

"Indeed; I believe she will."

Constance shivered, for with the name of this finished flirt that of

her husband had been more than once linked, and his change of colour

was unseen by her as he turned to manipulate a cigar. So for four,

perhaps six months, these two would be together upon the sea.

Constance knew too well the irritable nature of her husband's temper

to say more on the subject of her secret thoughts; and deeply loth

was she that such ideas should embitter the few brief hours they were

to be together now; so a silence ensued, which, after a time, she

broke, while taking between her slender fingers a hand of Sidney, who

was leaning half moodily, half listlessly against the mantelpiece,

twisting his moustache with a somewhat mingled expression of face.

"Sidney, darling," said she entreatingly; "do forgive me if I am dull

and sad--so _triste_--this evening."

"I do forgive you, little one."

"You know, Sidney, that I would die for you!"

"Yes; but don't, Conny--for I hate scenes," said he, playfully

kissing her sweetly sad, upturned face; and the poor girl was forced

to be contented with this matter-of-fact kind of tenderness.

So the dreaded morrow came with its sad moment of parting.

To muffle the sound of the departing wheels she buried her head, with

all its wealth of dark, dishevelled hair, among the pillows of her

bed, and some weeks--weeks of the most utter loneliness, elapsed, ere

she left it, with the keen and ardent desire to recover health and

strength, to the end that she might follow her husband over the world

of waters and rejoin him; but the strength and health, so necessary

for the journey, were long of coming back to her.

She had hoped he would write her before sailing from Southampton--a

single line would have satisfied the hungry cravings of her heart;

but, as he did not do so, she supposed there was not time; yet the

transport lay three days in the docks after the troops were on board.

He would write by some passing ship, he had said, and one letter,

dated from Ascension, reached her; but its cold and careless tone

struck a mortal chill to the sensitive heart of Constance, and one or

two terms of endearment it contained were manifestly forced and

ill-expressed.

"He writes me thus," she muttered, with her hand pressed upon her

heaving bosom; "thus--and with that woman, perhaps, by his side!"

She consulted the map, and saw how far, far away on the lonely ocean

was that island speck. Months had elapsed since he had been there;

so she knew that he must be in India now, and she had the regular

mails to look to with confidence--a confidence, alas! that soon faded

away. Long, tender, and passionate was the letter she wrote in

reply; she fondly fixed the time when she proposed to leave England

and rejoin him, if he sent her the necessary remittances; but mail

after mail came in without any tidings from Sidney, and she felt all

the unspeakable misery of watching the postman for letters that

never, never came!

Yet she never ceased to write, entreating him for answers, and

assuring him of unswerving affection.

Slowly, heavily, and imperceptibly a year passed away--a whole

year--to her now a black eternity of time!

"Could Sidney be dead?" she asked herself with terror; but she knew

that his family (who were all unaware of _her_ existence) had never

been in mourning, as they must infallibly have been in the event of

such a calamity; and in her simplicity she never thought of applying

to the Horse Guards for information concerning him--more information

than she might quite have cared to learn.

Her old thoughts concerning Miss Dashwood took a strange hold of her

imagination now; a hundred "trifles light as air" came back most

gallingly to memory and took coherent and tangible shapes; but a

stray number of the "Indian Mail" informed her of the marriage of

Miss Dashwood--her _bête-noire_--to a Major Milton; and also that the

regiment to which Sidney belonged "was moving up country," a phrase

to her perplexing and vague.

Her funds were gone--her friends were few and poor. Her jewels--his

treasured presents--were first turned into cash; then the furniture

of her pretty villa, and next the villa itself with its sweet

rose-garden, had to be exchanged for humbler apartments in a meaner

street; and, ere long, Constance Warren found, that if she was to

live, it must be by her own unaided efforts; and for five years she

maintained a desperate struggle for existence--five years!

A lady going to India "wanted a young person as a governess and

companion."

To India--_to India!_ On her knees Constance prayed that her

application might prove successful; and her prayer was heard, for out

of some hundred letters--from a few which were selected--the tenor of

hers suited best the taste of the lady in question. She said nothing

of her marriage or of her apparent desertion; but as her wedding

ring, which, with a fond superstition of the heart, she never drew

from her finger, told a tale, she had to pass for a widow.

So in the fulness of time she found herself far away from England,

and duly installed with an Anglo-Indian family in one of the stately

villas of the European quarter of Calcutta--a veritable palace in the

city of palaces, overlooking the esplanade before Fort William--in

charge of one sickly, but gentle little pale-faced girl.

She had been a month there when her employer's family proposed to

visit some relatives at Meerut, where she heard that Sidney's

regiment was cantoned! To her it seemed as if the hand of Fate was

in all this. O the joy of such tidings! Some one there must be able

to unravel the horrible mystery involving his fate; for by this time

she had ascertained that his name was out of the corps; but her heart

suggested that he might have exchanged into another.

"If alive, is he worth caring for?" She often asked this of herself,

but thrust aside the idea, and pursued with joy the long journey up

country by river steamers, dawk-boats, and otherwise, on the Ganges

to Jehangeerabad, from whence they were to travel by carriages to the

place of their destination, some fifty miles distant.

On the way Constance had an addition to her charge in the person of a

little boy, who, with his _ayah_, was going to join his parents at

Meerut. This little boy was more than usually beautiful, with round

and dimpled cheeks, dark hazel eyes, curly golden hair, and a sweet

and winning smile. Something in the child's face or its expression

attracted deeply the attention of Constance, and seemed to stir some

memory in her heart. Where had she seen those eyes before?

She drew the boy caressingly towards her, and when kissing his fair

and open forehead, her eyes fell involuntarily on a ring that secured

his necktie, a mere blue riband. It was of gold, and on it were

graven the initials C. and S. with a lover's knot between. These

were those of herself and her husband, and the ring was one she had

seen him wear daily. Constance trembled in every limb; she felt a

deadly paleness overspread her face, and the room in which she sat

swam round her; but on recovering her self-possession, she said:

"Child, let me look at this ring."

The wondering boy placed in her hand the trinket, which she had not

the slightest doubt of having seen years before in London.

"Who gave you this, my child?" she asked.

"My papa."

"Your papa!--what is your name?"

"Sidney."

"What else?" she asked, impetuously.

"Sidney Warren Milton."

"Thank God! But how came you to be named so? There is some mystery

in this--a mystery that must soon be solved now. Where were you

born, dear little Sidney?"

"In Calcutta."

"What is your age, child?"

"Next year, I shall be seven years old."

"Seven--how strange it is that you have the name you bear!"

"It is my papa's," said the boy, with a little proud irritability of

manner.

"Where did your papa live before he came to Calcutta?"

"I don't know--in many places--soldiers always do."

"He is a soldier?"

"My papa is Major Milton, and lives in the cantonments at Meerut."

"A little time, and I shall know all," replied poor Constance,

caressing the boy with great tenderness.

On arriving at Meerut, however, she found herself ill--faint and

feverish--so that for days she was confined to her bed, where she lay

wakeful by night, watching the red fire-flies flashing about the

green jalousies, and full of strange, wild dreams by day. She had

but one keen and burning desire--to see Major Milton, and to learn

from his lips the fate of her husband. On the evening of the fifth

day--the evening of the 10th of May--she was lying on her pillow,

watching the red sunshine fading on the ruined mosques, and Abu's

stately tomb, when just as the sunset gun pealed over the

cantonments, the _ayah_ brought her a card, inscribed, "Major

Milton--Staff Corps."

"Desire the Major to come to me!" said Constance, in a broken voice,

and terribly convulsed emotion; for now she was on the eve of knowing

all.

"Here to the _mehm sahib's_ bedside?" asked the astonished _ayah_.

"Here instantly--go--go!"

Endued with new strength, as the woman withdrew, she sprang from her

bed, put on her slippers, threw round her an ample cashmere dressing

robe, and seated herself in a bamboo chair, trembling in every fibre.

In a mirror opposite she could see that her face was as white as

snow. The door was opened.

"Major Milton," said a voice that made her tremble, and attired in

undress uniform, pith-helmet in hand, her husband, looking scarcely a

day older, stood gazing at her in utter bewilderment. He gave one

convulsive start, and then stood rooted to the spot; but no

expression or glance of tenderness escaped him. His whole aspect

bore the impress of terror.

Years had elapsed as a dream, and they were again face to face, those

two, whom no man might put asunder. Softness, sorrow, and reproach

faded from the face of Constance. Her broad, low forehead became

stern; her deep-set, dark eyes sparkled perilously, her full lips

became set, and her chin seemed to express more than ever, resolution.

"Oh, Constance--Constance," he faltered; "I know not what to say!"

"It may well be so, Sidney" (and at the utterance of his name her

lips quivered). "So _you_ are Major Milton, and the supposed husband

of Miss Dashwood?"

There was a long pause, after which she said:

"I ask not the cause of your most cruel desertion, but whence this

name of Milton?"

"A property was left me--and--but, of course, you have long since

ceased to love me, Constance?"

"_You_ actually dare to take an upbraiding tone to me!" she

exclaimed, her dark eyes flashing fire. Then looking upward

appealingly, she wailed, "Oh, my God! my God! and _this_ is the man

for whom, during these bitter years, I have been eating my own heart!"

"Pardon me, Constance; you may now learn that there is no gauge to

measure the treachery of which the human heart in its weakness is

capable. Yet there has been a worm in mine that has never died."

She wrung her hands, and then said, with something of her old

softness of manner:

"You surely loved me once, Sidney?"

"I did." He drew nearer, but she recoiled from him.

"Then whence this cruel change?"

"Does not some one write, that we love, and think we love truly, and

yet find another to whom one will cling as if it required these two

hearts to make a perfect whole?"

"Most accursed sophistry! But if you have no pity, have you not

fear?"

"I have great fear," said he, in a broken voice; "thus, Constance, by

the love you once bore me, I beseech you to have pity, not on me, but

on my little boy, and his poor mother--preserve their happiness----"

"And sacrifice my own?" said she, in a hollow voice.

"Spare, and do not expose me--my commission--my position here----"

"Neither shall be lost through me," she replied, in a voice that grew

more and more weak; "but leave me--leave me--the air is

suffocating--the light has left my eyes. Farewell, Sidney--kiss your

child, for my sake."

He drew near to take her hand, but she repulsed him with a wild

gesture of despair, and throwing up her arms, fell back in her seat,

with a gurgle in her throat, her head on one side, and her jaw fallen.

"Dead--quite dead!" was his first exclamation, and with his terror

was blended a certain selfish emotion of satisfaction and relief at

his escape. The blood again flowed freely in his veins, and he was

roused by the cantonment _ghurries_ clanging the hour of nine.

"Help--help!" cried he; but no help came, and as he hurried away, the

sudden din of musket-shots, of shrieks and yells, announced that the

great revolt had begun at Meerut, and that the expected massacre of

the Europeans had commenced. In that butchery, those he loved most

on earth perished, and midnight saw him, wifeless and childless,

lurking in misery and alone in a mango tope, on the road to Kurnaul.

* * * *

While listening to the narrative of my friend Sidney, whom I had

always known as Warren, rather than Milton, the clock on the

mantelpiece struck nine, and he said, in a broken voice:

"It was at this very hour, twelve months ago, that my boy and his

mother were murdered by the 3rd Cavalry, at the moment that Constance

was dying!"

As he spoke, a strange white light suddenly filled one end of the

smoking-room, and amid it there came gradually, but distinctly to

view, two figures, one was a little boy with golden hair, the other a

woman whose left arm was around him--a beautiful woman, with

clearly-cut features, masses of dark hair curling over a low, broad

forehead, lips full and handsome, with a massive chin and classic

throat--the woman of the veiled picture, line for line, but to all

appearance living and breathing, with a beautiful smile in her eyes,

and wearing, not the riding-habit, but a floating crape-like white

garment, impossible to describe. There was a strange, weird

brightness in her face--the transfigured brightness of great joy and

greater love.

"Constance--Constance and my child!" cried Sidney, in a voice that

rose to a shriek; and like a dissolving view, the light, and all we

looked on with eyes transfixed, faded away!

I was aware of an excess of sensitiveness, and that my heart was

beating with painful rapidity. I did not become insensible, but some

time elapsed before I became aware that lights were in the room, and

that several servants, whom my friend's cry had summoned in haste and

alarm, were endeavouring to rouse him to consciousness from a fit

that had seized him; but from that fit he never recovered. His heavy

stertorous breathing gradually grew less and less, and ere a doctor

came, he had ceased to respire.

His death--sudden as hers on that eventful night, but a retributive

one--was declared to be apoplexy; but I knew otherwise. Since then,

though the effect of the grape-shot wound on my nervous system has

quite passed away, I feel myself compelled to agree with the

hackneyed remark of Hamlet, that "there are more things in heaven and

earth, than are dreamt of in our philosophy."

A LEGEND OF THE OLD 55TH;

OR, THE REGIMENT OF FLANDERS.

For the truth of the following remarkable story, which is much more

fact than fiction, we must refer the reader to the quarto "History of

the Mauritius," privately printed in London in 1801, from the papers

of the late Governor thereof, under Louis XVI., Baron Grant, Maréchal

of France, and edited by his son, Charles Grant, "Vicomte de Vaux sur

Seule, Normandie," who knew well the family of the hero, and of his

father, M. de Grenville, with whom he had become intimate at the

house of another Scoto-French gentleman (whom he styles M. Grant

d'Anelle, then in the Isle of France), and of whom he writes thus,

page 219:--

"This gentleman (M. de Grenville, of an ancient family in Normandy)

is an old officer who has served with honour both in France and

India; and may, with truth, be represented as superior to the

generality of mankind, from his understanding, his knowledge, and the

qualities of his character. He is distinguished here, by the title

of the Philosopher, and he deserves it. In the early part of his

life, the vivacity of his temper, heightened by the military spirit

of the period, engaged him in frequent affairs of honour; and the

last having taken place with a nobleman in the service of the Court,

in the Garden of Versailles, and under the very windows of the king's

apartment, it threatened the most serious consequences. But M. de

Maupou, then in high office, to whom he was related, procured him a

commission in India, where he served with distinction.

"If it were consistent with the objects of this work, it would be a

delightful circumstance to dwell on the virtues and extraordinary

qualities of this family. I must, however, confine myself to one, M.

de Grenville de Forval, the second son of M. de Grenville.

"Some events relative to him are so connected with the manners of

these islands, and are so remarkable (and romantic) in themselves,

that they will at the same time heighten the interest, as well as add

to the information of this work (_i.e._ the History of the Mauritius).

"In these islands there is not a single example of a deformed or

crooked shape, which must arise from the natural and unrestrained

mode of education which prevails there. To these advantages, Forval

united a martial air, blended with a slight appearance of severity,

and an approved courage, to the most noble and generous sentiments

that are to be found in the human heart."

But to quote the gossipping old Baron at greater length, would be

only to anticipate the legend to which we refer.

At the time when the Comte de Malartic was first appointed

commander-in-chief and governor-general for the most Christian king

of the Isles of France and Bourbon, and over all the French

establishments eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, there was stationed

in the Mauritius (as we now name the Isle of France) a battalion of

the old French Regiment de Flandre, then numbered as the 77th of the

monarchy, and afterwards as the 55th regiment of the line, under

Napoleon III.--the same corps in which the father of Victor Hugo,

author of "Notre Dame" and "Les Misérables," served with honour as a

captain.

Among the officers who came with a detachment from France to join

this famous regiment were the Chevalier René d'Esterre and Captain

Forval de Grenville, the representative of one of the oldest families

in Normandy, the same stock from whence spring the English Dukes of

Buckingham and Chandos.

Forval was a gay and handsome man, and in the prime of life. Baron

Grant, the Vicomte de Vaux, in his history of the island, records as

stated, that he had a martial air, with a slight appearance of

severity, and that he was a man of the most approved courage. He was

always attired in the height of fashion when not in uniform; but he

generally preferred the latter, as the costume of the Regiment de

Flandre was very handsome, and became his dark complexion well, being

white, faced with light blue, and laced with gold.

Whether in uniform or out of it, he was never known to be without his

sword, in the use of which he excelled, and with which he had fought

many a duel, sometimes about the powdered and jewelled ladies of the

court, and quite as often about ballet-girls and actresses--all were

the same to Forval de Grenville.

His reckless career in France was, however, brought suddenly to a

close by a flirtation with a _chanoinesse_--the famous Comtesse de

V----, which by its scandal and extravagance drove him to seek

shelter in the distant Isle of France from the rage of the noble

families of Segonzac, Sainte-Croix, and Cressi, with whom she was

allied.

His affair with the high-born countess might have had a perilous

end--the Bastille St. Antoine, perhaps--but for his acceptance of

foreign service, and the aid given him by his friend, René d'Esterre,

who, as he had pursued a similar career of folly and extravagance,

had a fellow-feeling for him, and we all know that a fellow-feeling

makes us wondrous kind.

The monotonous pleasures of the island soon palled upon the _blasé_

Forval and his friend, and they sighed for the gaieties of Paris, or

rather to be anywhere but where they were.

"Morbleu!" exclaimed Forval, as he and D'Esterre sat over their wine

one evening at an open window in a _café_ of Port Louis, after being

long silent, and gazing dreamily on the sea, whose waves were

rippling in gold and purple against the rocks and bastions of the

little Isle aux Tonneliers, which lies before the harbour, and while

the red rays of the sun, now sinking in the Indian Sea, lingered on

the rocky and fantastic Tête de Peter Bott. "Morbleu, chevalier! but

this atrocious Isle of France does grow irksome."

"Yet it is the land of Paul and that sweet little Virginia, for

another such as whom we have sought over all the isle."

"And have sought in vain. Diable, yes! Such miracles--such

sphinxes--exist only in the pages of Bernardin St. Pierre and such

like fellows."

"Perhaps so," sighed D'Esterre, as he emptied his glass. "However, I

am sick unto death of this island and its utter monotony. Paris----"

"Ah, dear, dear Paris! when shall we see it again?"

"When our debts are paid, perhaps."

"Don't speak of impossibilities, please. How strange to think that

the tide of life flows there--that the great world rolls on all the

same as when we mounted guard at the Louvre, and not content with

that, sighed to be on duty at Versailles or the dear little Trianon."

"You always preferred the latter," said D'Esterre. "The Comtesse de

V----, that dazzling little creature, was always about the queen."

"Don't speak of her now, when all those thousand miles of bridgeless

sea are rolling between us," exclaimed Forval, with knitted brows.

"That hulking fellow, Baron Zurlerben, of the Gardes Suisses, will no

doubt be on her staff now. She could never exist without an affair

of the heart. Well, I am at one with you--sick indeed of duty here."

"The comtesse was devoted to the chevaliers of the army," said René

d'Esterre, musingly.

"All the girls in Paris favoured us immensely."

"All the girls in France, you mean," said the chevalier, complacently.

"How comes it to pass, René? Is it the handsome uniform or the risk

we run in war that gives us such an advantage over the mere

bourgeoisie?"

"I don't know what it is; but the interest is very pleasant, and I

trust it will never cease. So 'Vive le Regiment de Flandre! Vive la

ligne!'" cried René, draining a bumper of wine.

"Stop! A thought strikes me," said Forval. "Suppose that for a

little temporary excitement one of us should get married?"

"Agreed," cried D'Esterre. "Here is a golden louis; we shall toss up

for who is to marry the first pretty Creole girl we meet. The losing

man shall dance at the other's wedding."

"What if the pretty girl refuse?"

"Refuse one of the Regiment de Flandre! My dear fellow, such an

outrage on good taste is not to be anticipated. She shall be married

after a month's engagement."

"Ah, likely enough. People do strange things in the Indian isles."

"Is it a low state of finances?"

"No, a high state of the thermometer. A month may see us ordered off

to Pondicherry; but you must be the victim, chevalier. I have an

affianced in France."

"And I have three! Parbleu!"

"Well, to kill time, we have nothing for it but to volunteer for the

next slave-hunting expedition to the Isle Dauphine. What say you,

chevalier--will you go?"

"Think of the distance--by sea, too!"

"Something less than five hundred miles."

"And the feeding----"

"Will not be up to the Parisian mark; but; then, we shall have some

excitement."

"A little fighting?" said René.

"Yes; and I had better be shot with honour than shoot myself."

"Very well, I shall go with you. Let the war support the war. We

shall feed ourselves at the bayonet's point among the Madagasees."

So in this spirit, when the time came, did M. Forval de Grenville and

his friend René d'Esterre set out for Madagascar, or, as the French

then named it, the Isle Dauphine.

A scarcity of slaves for manual labour in the Isles of France and

Bourbon rendered such predatory expeditions to Madagascar and the

coast of Africa necessary. Vessels were generally equipped for the

purpose by the Comte de Malartic and wealthy merchants, and certain

detachments of troops were sent with them to favour and enforce the

object of the voyage; and with two hundred men of the Regiment de

Flandre, Forval and D'Esterre, having volunteered for the first

slaving expedition, sailed in two vessels for Madagascar in the month

of May, which is the finest and most healthy season for operations in

the island.

The vessels, with the troops on board, ran along the eastern coast,

and on disembarking, a camp was formed on the small rocky isle of

Sainte Marie, called Ibrahim by the natives. There they found the

remains of a _chaloupe_, or sloop, which had been constructed out of

the shattered hull of the ship _Utile_ (which had been wrecked there

some forty years before), but had never been launched. Her crew

being only French negroes, no attempt was ever made to succour or to

save them, so they all perished miserably of hunger, and their

whitened bones, bleached by the sun, lay all over the little rocky

isle when Forval and his comrades landed. These remains he had

collected and interred, while despatching messengers to Adrian Baba,

the king of the island, to acquaint his sable majesty of the errand

on which he had come, offering him for every man and woman in full

health, and between the ages of thirteen and forty years, two

muskets, fifteen hundred leaden bullets, and the same number of

flints.

"Corbœuf!" said the Chevalier D'Esterre, "I hope we shall not be

detained long on this rock of Sainte Marie. I am all curiosity to

see the wonders of Madagascar. Does not La Croix tell us that the

woods abound with snow-white apes having black tails, and that there

is a kind of creature in the cane-brakes as large as a heifer, with a

round head, a man's face, and hands and feet like a monkey?"

"La Croix was an ass to record such rubbish, and you are exceedingly

simple to believe it," replied Forval, laughing at his friend's

credulity.

King Adrian, who had been at war with some of his African neighbours,

had, or pretended to have, plenty of prisoners in his hands, and sent

to M. Forval most friendly replies, together with presents.

In a short time Adrian Baba arrived in person, and crossed the little

strait which separated the Isle of St. Marie from the mainland in a

gaily painted pirogua, accompanied by much barbaric pomp, and was

received by the little party of French troops with all the honours

they could present to European royalty, and with keen and covetous

eyes he surveyed their handsome white uniforms and gold epaulettes,

their fine muskets, swords, chests of arms, and so forth, for which

the slaves were to be bartered, and he was heard to say to a prince

of the second class who accompanied him:

"Why may I not keep my people, and make lawful spoil of all these

things? The Isle of Ibrahim is mine, and what do these Frenchmen do

here?"

His voice was soft and his manner persuasive, and he easily persuaded

Forval and D'Esterre to cross from the island, and encamp a portion

of their troops--of whose discipline and resolute aspect he had a

wholesome dread--on the mainland, and to leave the rest on the isle,

or send them on board the ships at their anchorage; but Forval warily

preferred the former plan, and left them in their tents at the first

encampment under a lieutenant.

With a hundred infantry he pitched his tents in a pleasant spot about

a mile from the sea. Adrian, who yet hoped to have even the two

ships, if their crews could be massacred, loaded Forval and his

friend with presents and attentions, and showing them a vast herd of

cattle, asked them, in the pride of his heart, if the King of France

was as great a king as he.

To this the polite Frenchmen, who both knew the Polynesian language

of the Madagasees, made a courteous but dubious reply, which caused

the eyes of the half-savage monarch to sparkle with satisfaction.

Charmed by the friendly bearing and character of the king and his

people, and lulled into a sense of trustful security, on the third

day, after forming a little camp for half his force on the mainland,

Forval de Grenville doffed his uniform, and clad in a light white

hunting suit, took his gun, and followed by a favourite dog, set

forth into the adjacent forest in search of game, attended by a negro

boy, who carried his bag.

At last he reached a place where the forest became more open and the

ground more rocky. Overcome by the heat of the day, the young French

officer hailed with pleasure a little tarn, or pool, which lay at the

base of some rocks, and was completely surrounded by lofty trees.

Forval lay down on the sward, half hidden by the giant leaves of the

wild gourds that grew there. He lay long, sunk in a reverie, till a

very strange and startling sight aroused him; and he sprang to his

feet and peered through the bushes.

A girl was in the act of disrobing for the purpose of bathing in the

pool, and already she was seated on its bank ere Captain de Grenville

could speak. In fact, he knew not what to say or do, and so, wholly

hidden among the great green leaves, he looked on in breathless

wonder, for that she was a Madagasee was evident; but then her skin,

though brown, was fair for a native of that sunny isle.

She was in the full bloom, the first blush, of budding womanhood, and

the fire of love, as yet unkindled, was doubtless hidden in her heart.

So thought the French officer as he stood there among the leaves.

The form of the young girl was perfection. Her eyes were large and

black, and her hair rolled in silky masses over her smooth brown

shoulders.

Advancing to the edge of the pool, she put in one tiny foot and

tapered ankle. The water seemed to strike her with a chill, for she

drew back, and seemed all unconscious that a human eye was upon her.

"Here is an adventure," muttered Forval. "Could I but catch such a

slave as this, old Monsieur le Comte de Malartic, governor of the

Isle of France, and so forth, should not have her from me even for a

pile of golden louis as high as the Tête de Peter Bott itself. Ah,

could I but catch her now! But how am I to set about it? The finest

girl in Paris is but a cub when compared with her."

The unknown beauty was still trembling on the brink when one of those

monster bats peculiar to those woods, blinded by the rays of light,

flew against her. On this she uttered a cry of terror, and sprang,

half-robed as she was, into the pool, where she swam about like a

Naiad of classic antiquity, her beautiful head and shoulders rising

above the silver ripples that seemed to kiss her as she shot from

side to side in the cool, deep pool.

Forval remained in doubt what to do. The wonderful beauty of the

girl had inspired him with a desire to know more of her--to capture

her, in fact. But, then, he was far away from his little camp, and

she might have friends or armed attendants near, for by her dress and

ornaments--particularly a necklace of great pearls--her rank seemed

to be high in the land, and he might pay a terrible penalty for even

seeing, without molesting her.

Loth to retire, lest he should lose her, and afraid to advance lest

he should alarm or offend her; he lurked among the leaves, feeling,

with a blush upon his cheek, that he was committing an offence

against propriety even in that savage land, for though a _roué_, and

a wild one too, Forval de Grenville was, withal, a gentleman.

He longed for the sudden arrival of some wild beast, from which he

might defend or save her with his gun, even with his life, but longed

in vain, as there are no such animals in the Isle of Madagascar.

He turned to search for the slave boy who bore his game bag. The

latter lay there, but its sooty bearer was gone. He had disappeared,

concealed himself, or fled, and even this circumstance was calculated

to inspire Forval with alarm. He felt if his hunting-knife was loose

in its sheath, and looked to the flints and priming of his gun, into

each barrel of which he now slipped a ball, so that he might be ready

for any emergency.

By the time he had done this quietly and slowly in his hiding place,

the girl had quitted the pool, and rapidly and completely attired

herself in the simple but graceful costume then worn by a Madagasee

lady--a long and loose robe of brilliantly coloured silk, without

sleeves--and she was in the act of shaking out the water from the

heavy masses of her shining black hair, when our adventurous

Frenchman, fearful of losing her, suddenly started from his lair

among the leaves and gourds, and advanced towards her, praying in

very choice words that she would linger for one moment and speak with

him, as he had lost his way in the forest.

But, instead of according him any reply, with her cheeks paled by

terror and her large eyes dilated, she turned and fled with the speed

of an antelope.

Obeying his first impulse, and undeterred by danger, Forval dashed

after her in pursuit; but, strong and active though he was, she

proved too swift of foot for him. Carried away by her fears, or

aided by the activity natural to a savage race, she clambered over

the cliffs of rock crystal, where he dared not follow her, and when

he reached the other side by a detour round the pool she had

vanished, and not a trace of her was to be found.

Forval was intensely perplexed and provoked that he had not attempted

her capture while in the pool. Then he repelled the idea, by

considering that such an act would have been unbecoming a French

gentleman.

"Bah!" thought he, after all; "she is only a little Madagasee, and I

may get her as a slave for a few old muskets. I must speak to Sa

Majesté le Roi--to King Adrian about it on the first opportunity."

Neglecting his soldiers on one hand, and the purchase of slaves on

the other, for three entire consecutive days did Forval haunt the

vicinity of the sequestered pool; but the beautiful Naiad came there

no more.

On a stated day the king was to hand over to Forval and D'Esterre

five hundred male and female slaves, in exchange for one thousand old

regimental muskets and the requisite proportion of flints and

ammunition.

"If I can but get the girl from him, whoever she is, I'll give him a

couple of ship cannon."

"And all our empty champagne bottles," added D'Esterre; "but you may

have some difficulty in describing her."

"Nay, her beauty and extreme fairness of skin--fairness at least amid

this dusky people--as well as a string of enormous pearls of great

purity which she wears round her neck, must make her known; and they

are pearls to which those of Monseigneur de Rohan's famous necklace

were but a joke."

Forval was all excitement when he went for presentation to the king,

in his capital of Antanarivo, which contained some twenty thousand

inhabitants then, but many more now; the houses of which are of wood,

covered with plantain leaves, and entirely surrounded by a

fortification of palisades.

Here Adrian Baba could easily have cut off his unsuspecting visitor;

but the Chevalier René d'Esterre remained in camp with the small band

of troops, and Forval was accompanied only by two faithful sergeants,

armed with their swords, and a double brace of loaded pistols under

their coats.

Adrian Baba received him very graciously in a chamber, the furniture

of which consisted chiefly of some seamen's chests and other _débris_

of an occasional wreck or piracy, and mats of red and yellow straw,

which served as seats or beds, as occasion required, and around him

were his sub-princes, the lords of villages and districts, learned

men, guards, and slaves, all arrayed in their best robes, with

swords, darts, and feathers and beads in great plenty; others with

shield, knife, and war club, and all looking most unpleasantly

numerous, savage, and warlike.

But what was the astonishment of Captain de Grenville on beholding by

the side of the king, clothed in a long robe of fine silk, striped

alternately with scarlet and yellow, the Naiad of the lonely pool,

with her brown but yet beautiful arms bare to the shoulder, and

adorned only by strings of snowy pearls, like those which were woven

in her dark hair--pearls outshone by her own teeth.

Perceiving that the eyes of the French officer were fixed on her with

wonder and admiration, old Adrian Baba said, in the language of his

country:

"My daughter, Ranavolana."

"She is beautiful enough to be the daughter of--of perfection," said

the French officer, bowing low, and kissing her hand, while he half

knelt before her--a courtesy, a bearing of adoration which astonished

the girl, and provoked the sneering smiles of those who looked on.

"But how wonderfully white for a Madagasee--the daughter of this old

King of the Cannibal Islands," thought he. "Here is a discovery! I

don't believe he will give her up even for a dozen of old ship guns,

and all D'Esterre's empty bottles into the bargain. Were they full,

we might have a better chance of success."

The soft dark eyes of the young princess regarded the handsome

Frenchman, as he thought shrewdly, with a strange and sorrowful

interest, and it was evident that, as he was now in the uniform of

the Regiment de Flandre, she did not recognize him, and he afterwards

learned that the extreme fairness of her skin was to be accounted for

by the circumstance that her mother had been the daughter of a

notorious English pirate, who bore the extremely prosaic name of Tom

Simcolls, and who for a time had made himself the petty king of a

portion of the isle, till Adrian Baba overthrew him in battle, and

made spoil of all he possessed, including a favourite daughter, who

became the mother of Ranavolana.

Adrian's treacherous plans with regard to the French were not yet

completed, so it was arranged that on the following day Forval was to

come with a hundred infantry to receive over the slaves for

embarkation.

That night, in the tent of Forval, he and the Chevalier D'Esterre

lingered long over their wine, and their hopes that a European war

might bring their regiment home, till, weary and sleepy, and

considerably overpowered by wine, René d'Esterre retired to his own

quarters.

Forval remained in his tent, stretched upon a couch, feeling far from

sleepy--very wide awake, indeed--and gazing through the open

triangular door of his canvas habitation on the dark blue waters of

the strait that lay between the mainland and the Isle of Sainte Marie.

His mind was dwelling on the singular beauty of Ranavolana, the girl

whom he had seen by the side of Adrian, and closing his eyes, as if

to concentrate his thoughts, he drew in glowing fancy again and again

the vision he had seen of her in the forest pool.

Suddenly there was a sound as of rustling silk, a soft hand touched

his shoulder lightly and timidly, he looked up, and Ranavolana, the

island princess, stood before him, and alone.

She must have glided unseen past his sentinels; but then he thought

not of that. Though large and sparkling, her eyes were pensive, and

wonderfully beautiful in expression, in form of lid and length of

lash, "especially for a savage," as Forval thought; and in his time

he had seen some of the brightest eyes in Paris and Versailles droop

beneath the saucy and loving glances of his own.

"I disturb your sleep," said she, timidly drawing back a pace, as

Forval sprang from his camp bed.

"Do you think I would have slept, mademoiselle, had I expected you?"

"Not with the tidings I have for you," she replied, gravely.

"Tidings of what?"

"Death."

"Death?"

"A cruel one, too."

"I do not understand all this. But we have met before."

"At my father's court to-day."

"And elsewhere?"

"Indeed!"

"Pardon me, but I had the delight of seeing you bathing in a pool in

yonder forest."

"You it was who pursued me?"

"Yes, mademoiselle, and I crave your pardon now," said he, kneeling.

She blushed painfully, and, as Forval thought, angrily.

"What have I to fear here when your father, the good old Adrian Baba,

is my friend?"

"He deceives you. My father has neither prisoners to sell nor slaves

to give you on the morrow."

"Am I mocked or snared?" asked Forval, haughtily.

"You are both."

"And I am to be killed, lady--eh?",

"You and all who are with you," said she, mournfully.

"Well, so far as I am concerned, the loss will not be great," replied

Forval, with true French _sang froid_.

"Why?"

"I have five brothers in France, all wilder fellows than I, so France

can well spare one of us."

"But is life, indeed, so valueless to you?" she asked.

"To me perhaps it is; but you could shed a light upon it, lovely

girl, and make that sunshine which at present is all gloom to Forval

de Grenville."

She did not quite understand him, save that he was paying her a

compliment, and half savage though she was, she smiled with pleasure.

A brilliant light filled her eyes, a species of dusky fire, and

casting them down, she said, in her own soft language:

"You have seen me but thrice. You cannot love me already?"

Forval was somewhat bewildered by the suddenness of this remark; but

he was too gallant a gentleman to leave her long in doubt.

"Not love you!" he exclaimed, while endeavouring to take her hands in

his; "ah, who could look upon you and not love you?"

"Would you not wish me changed--whiter, I mean?" she asked, with a

timid smile.

"Changed in what respect? Are you not as near perfection as

possible? Nay, you are perfection itself."

She laughed, and so did Forval, for he thought of what some of the

powdered and patched, painted and furbelowed dames and demoiselles at

whose feet he had knelt in the gilded salons of Paris and Versailles,

would have said, had they seen him--Captain De Grenville, of the

Regiment de Flandre--on his knees in apparent adoration of a little

Malay girl!

"But, _vive la bagatelle_!" thought he.

Starting up, he sought to kiss her; but she shrank back.

"Do you hate me?" he asked, sadly.

"No--oh no!"

"Do you love me then?" he asked, in a different key.

"No----"

"Parbleu! you must do either one or other."

"You did not let me finish what I was about to say--that I neither

hate nor like people until I have known them for a time; but in your

case----"

She paused.

"Ah, well--in my case?"

"I love you!" said she, looking fully and tenderly into his dark eyes.

Forval's heart leaped, for few women had ever made such an avowal to

him before; but the abruptness and strangeness of it in such a place,

and at such a time, rendered the Frenchman suspicious. He began to

fear some snare, and remembered the manner in which she had commenced

this singular conversation.

"Accept my gratitude, lovely girl," said he, laying a hand upon his

heart; "but you did not come to tell me this alone--you came to warn

me of some impending danger?"

"I did. Would you wish to sacrifice my life to save your own?"

"Heavens! I should think not!" he exclaimed.

"Well, a plot has been formed against your life, and the lives of all

who accompany you. I am full of sorrow that so handsome and kind a

white man should perish" (here the captain drew himself up and bowed

low) "and I shall tell you all, on one condition."

"Name it."

"That you will take me away with you."

"To the Isle of France?"

"Yes; and make me your wife."

Forval, still more astonished by her simplicity and trust, charmed by

her beauty and grace, and bewildered by the whole affair, forgot all

about poor Mademoiselle De Motteville and a dozen other fine ladies,

and registered a solemn and most energetic vow that he would do as

she required.

Taking her right hand between his own, he pressed it to his lips, and

thinking what a faultlessly beautiful little hand it was, he said,

"And now, lady, speak. What is this terrible plot?"

"I must have one promise from you."

"Indeed! something beyond marriage?"

"Yes," said she, beginning to weep. "For you I am about to sacrifice

my father's throne, which, as I am an only child, is my inheritance.

For you, my country, my friends, my native customs, and that liberty

which is so dear to me. My kinsmen, who would deem me dishonoured,

will detest me, and if you leave me to their vengeance I shall be

reduced to the endurance of tortures worse even than the death they

propose for you."

"Heavens! but this is a terrible prologue to our matrimonial comedy."

"Promise to grant me what I demand, swear that your soldiers will not

injure my people, and I will reveal all that is necessary for you to

know."

With growing admiration and astonishment, Forval gave another solemn

assurance.

"Well," said she, with tremulous accents, while her tears fell fast,

"the king, my father, will come here to-morrow by sunrise. He will

seem to be attended apparently by only a few; but followers to the

number of thousands, armed with poisoned arrows, lances, and

hatchets, are to be concealed in a wood close by; and at a given

signal they will rush upon and massacre all your people."

"Indeed!"

"For you is reserved a peculiar mode of death, suggested by the

learned men of the nation."

"And this flattering distinction is----"

"That you be taken to the summit of the cliff which rises in the

centre of the city, and be hurled from thence alive."

Forval grew pale with rage on hearing all this, for he knew that the

place referred to is the Tarpeian Rock of Madagascar, where the

vilest criminals are executed by being hurled headlong down a

precipice of eighty feet, at which depth his battered remains, after

being received on some scattered masses of rock, fall four hundred

feet below to the base of the hill.

"You are thus to be offered up as a solemn sacrifice to the gods of

Madagascar," she said.

"Offered up to them? Thrown down, you mean! Here's a scheme! But

the signal you speak of, what is it?"

"To-morrow, if my father breaks a white wand which he usually

carries, it seals the fate of you and all your followers."

"Is no other sign, to be given?"

"Only one more. If the king should see fit to change his mind, and

wish his people to return, he will cast his plumed cap towards them,

as if the heat or weight of it oppressed him."

Forval loaded his beautiful visitor with thanks and caresses; but as

the night had nearly passed, and the morning would soon be at hand,

no time was to be lost in preparing for the coming emergency. He

sent her on board the _Madame de Pompadour_, and the ships he ordered

to prepare for sea, to be hove short on their anchors, to have all

the cannon loaded, and the boats in readiness to embark the troops

the moment a rocket was discharged.

These he immediately got under arms, and brought from the Isle of

Sainte Marie the hundred who were there under the lieutenant. His

mind was full of deep gratitude. But for the timely revelations of

this generous and merciful girl, how terribly for him and for his

comrades must the morrow have closed!

René d'Esterre was still more astonished when he heard of the

adventures of the night; but alarm was mingled with his thoughts.

"Now, by St. Denis!" he exclaimed, "or rather by St. Lawrence, after

whom this rascally island was once named, we should broil this demon

of a king on a gridiron of ramrods, even as St. Lawrence himself was

broiled!"

"And over eggshells, as the Bollandists have it?"

"No; but over a pile of good pine faggots."

"But you forget my promises to the girl; and then, to broil one's

father-in-law--the idea is not to be thought of."

"Ah! the charming savage! Why did I not see her?" exclaimed

D'Esterre, laughing, as he loaded a pair of pistols and placed them

in his embroidered belt.

"Come, come," said Forval, with an air of mock serenity, to cover the

avowal under which he winced; "I must again remind you that the king

is to be the father-in-law of Forval de Grenville."

"Oho!" laughed D'Esterre, "Mademoiselle Rana--Rana--what's her

name?--la Princesse de l'Ile Dauphine--is not at all a marrying young

lady--quite passionless in all her proceedings, it would appear!"

"'Pon my soul, René, I'll parade you at twelve paces after this

business is over."

"No you won't. You were not to marry Mademoiselle de Motteville

until you were a colonel, and now, as a captain, you are about to

espouse---- Oh, it is too absurd," and the chevalier laughed till he

nearly shook his epaulettes off.

"The girl is lovely, and you have not seen her. But now day is

breaking. Let the men get under arms, and fall in in front of the

line of tents."

"Ah, we wanted a little excitement, and now we have it with a

vengeance."

"By the gods of the Greeks, I should think so. We are but two

hundred Frenchmen, and in yonder wood the savages muster in

thousands."

"But we belong to the Regiment de Flandre," said René, proudly, as he

took his sword and left the tent.

Forval felt his heart beat with many strange emotions, amid which

rage and alarm were not wanting, when, about sunrise, he saw the

treacherous king coming very deliberately towards the little camp,

mounted, and having borne above his head a large gilded umbrella with

a deep scarlet fringe. He wore his royal robes of flowing silk of

many colours, with his plumed cap, and in his right hand was a long

white wand--the death-signal--and he was accompanied by about a dozen

young princes, all handsomely equipped and unusually well armed.

Their countenances betrayed nothing of the deadly purpose they had in

view.

As Adrian Baba dismounted, and gave his bridle to a slave, the French

drums beat a salute and the ranks presented arms--arms that were

carefully loaded--while Forval and D'Esterre saluted with their

swords. He approached Forval, who already saw, or thought he saw,

the dark visages clustering thick as bees among the underwood of the

adjacent forest.

When within three paces of Forval, the king snapped his white wand in

two pieces.

"Thunder of heaven!" cried the Frenchman, as he seized him by the

throat, and placed a pistol at his head. "Treacherous dog, throw

your cap towards those scoundrels in the wood, or you die!"

"Shoulder arms--ready!" commanded the Chevalier D'Esterre, and

suddenly the ranks closed, and the two hundred soldiers cocked their

muskets.

"Sire, forgive my _brusquerie_; but really----" Forval paused with

suppressed rage, and fierce mockery in his eyes, as he pressed the

cold muzzle of the pistol against the head of Adrian Baba.

Terrified by the unexpected discovery and seizure, the king cast his

royal cap in the direction indicated. On this the savages in the

wood disappeared; nay, more, on a shot or two being fired, his

attendant princes took to their heels in ignominious haste, and left

him a prisoner in the hands of Forval, who resolutely kept him as a

hostage until he had the whole of his force, with all their tents and

stores, embarked; and ere night fell he found himself far out upon

the lonely seas, standing once more towards the Mauritius, with the

coast of Madagascar and the Ile aux Prunes sunk to a stripe upon the

starboard quarter, the Princess Ranavolana being the sole trophy of

the famous expedition on which the Comte De Malartic had sent him.

There was a chaplain on board, and despite all that the more wary

D'Esterre and others could say, Forval, who was a man of his word,

prepared regularly to espouse her on the following day.

"My dear Forval, are you mad? Think of your family," exclaimed his

friend, who he knew loved him well.

"What do my family think of me?" was the petulant response.

"That you are _étourdi_--nay more, a _vaurien_, perhaps."

"And they are right."

"But think of your ancestors--of Richard de Grenville, who was Lord

of Rouen and Caen in Normandy! What says La Roque of them in his

'Treatise on Nobility?'"

"I neither know nor care. I can do nothing for my ancestors, and

they nothing for me. What is done is done."

"But not that which is to do. I grant you that the girl is

beautiful, and that you might make a fortune out of her----"

"Where?" asked Forval, sharply.

"At the Théàtre des Funambules (ropedancers), in the Boulevard du

Temple."

"Sacré! but now you go too far," cried Forval, with a hand on his

sword; but he felt himself compelled to withdraw it, as his friend

was choking with laughter.

"In all your love affairs at home, I have heard you declare that you

would never be 'in love' with any one."

"Ah, but, René, this is very different. My little Malay is so

piquante."

"And you have been so long bored with ennui."

"Perhaps I shall sicken at the sight of the Peter Bott. Besides, I

have passed my word to her."

"Think of your betrothed in France," urged René, with great

seriousness; "think of Mademoiselle de Motteville, whom sedulously

you taught to love you well, and who had more wedding rings offered

her than she had pretty fingers--refusing all because she was

infatuated about you. Think of that charming Countess V----; think

of----"

"I'll think of nothing but my pledged word and my piquante little

savage, so cease, chevalier, I command you," responded Forval,

impetuously.

The chevalier shrugged his shoulders, and said:

"Well, I am safe from all such spells."

"How so?"

"I left my heart----"

"Or that which did duty for it?"

"In France behind me."

"Pity you did not leave your sagacious head there, chevalier."

"Why?"

"Both would have been spared the chance of having a bullet through

them."

"Here we may face many bullets, Forval, and yet never win the cross

or cordon of St. Louis."

"I have always had a prejudice in favour of a well-dressed wife, with

a fashionable _trousseau_--of a bride with kid gloves and well-made

boots, with a modern costume, instead of only a string of beads, and

a robe like your grandmother's sacque. But the climate here is so

different; and then fancies are prejudices--yes, in faith, mere

prejudices, and my little Malay is charming without any of our

fashionable absurdities."

"So, courage, Forval, my friend you may one day be king of the Isle

Dauphine, this infernal Madagascar, on which those perfidious and

grasping English have had their eyes for some time past."

M. l'Abbé, the chaplain, had some scruples about wedding a Christian

gentleman like Forval to a believer in Rahillimaza, Ramahavely, and

Co.; but they were overcome, and he was formally married to

Ranavolana, the Captain of the _Pompadour_ transport officiating in

place of Adrian Baba, and he landed with her as his wife, to the

astonishment of all the people in the Isle of France, the sole trophy

of his great slaving expedition.

Not long after this her father, the treacherous Adrian Baba, died.

The people of Madagascar, who are ardently attached to the blood of

their native kings, sought her out, and the government of the island

was offered to her and her husband by ambassadors in the name of the

people.

"The king is dead! Long live the king!" cried the volatile and

reckless René D'Esterre on parade that morning.

"Long live Forval, the king of the Isle Dauphine! Long live the

Regiment de Flandre!" cried the entire battalion.

"Forval," said Ranavolana, "you had the generosity to marry me in

opposition to the wishes of your friends and the prejudices of your

religion and your country when I had nothing to offer you but my

humble person, and those charms which, whatever they might have been

considered in my native country, fell far short of the women of

France; but I have now my inheritance, and, Forval, it is yours."

So Captain de Grenville became King of Madagascar, and those who wish

to see the documentary details of his story will find them in the

"History of the Isle of France," by Charles Grant, Vicomte de Vaux,

and it was their granddaughter, Queen Ranavolana, whose outrages on

the English residents and French missionaries--all suggested by her

lover, a renegade Frenchman, in the name of the false gods--that

caused a British armament to destroy, by shot and shell, her

principal town in the year 1845, and it is a singular circumstance

that the name of her renegade lover was D'Esterre, the grandson of

Forval's friend and comrade.

The Chevalier René returned to France and married Mademoiselle de

Motteville, whose engagement had been a conditional one, and their

descendant it was who, for complicity in the affairs of 1848, had to

fly from France, and found a stormy home in the Isle of Madagascar.

THE FATAL VOYAGE OF THE 'LAURA;'

OR, THE STORY OF JACK MILMAN.

It was in the midsummer of this year that my friend Milman, of the

Household Brigade, invited me to accompany him on a trip in his new

steam yacht, the _Laura_, along the shores of the Baltic.

She was a well-formed, smart--indeed, elegant--little vessel, the

_Laura_, a good sea-going boat, as well as a safe coaster.

We were five of a party. Little Tom Tucker, fresh from Oxford; his

chum, Harry Winton, ditto; Morton Parker, of the late Bengal Army,

home on two years' leave--great on the subjects of niggers, hog and

tiger hunting, chutney, and curry--Jack, and myself; and a merry

party of thoughtless addlepates we were.

We had "done" the entire Baltic, and the Gulfs of Finland and

Bothnia, and had come to the conclusion that the said Baltic was all

very slow, stupid, and that there was "nothing in it," though we had

seen Cronstadt; the Malta of that sea, with all its batteries and

countless cannon, had flirted with the fair-haired girls of the Rue

de Goths and Amalien Gade at Copenhagen, drunk lager beer at Dantzig,

steamed past Elsinore, and actually, with our four six-pounders, had

exchanged salutes with a Danish man-o'-war in the Cattegat, as poor

King Christian IX. has been an ill-used man; and then we stood down

the Skager Rack for old England.

My friend Jack, or Long Milman, as we called him, for he was above

six feet, was the _beau ideal_ of a fine young Englishman. "A trump,

a brick," and so forth, Jack was termed by all who knew him; but he

was a finished gentleman and a thorough good fellow, a prime bat and

bowler, always had the stroke oar at Oxford, and was a good

rifle-shot.

All the girls envied her who waltzed with Jack. He was a king of

every pic-nic, and always shone in amateur theatricals, disdaining

such tame characters as John Mildmay, and choosing such as Sir

Affable Hawk, in which (privately) it was Jack's weakness to think

that he quite equalled Mr. Charles Mathews.

As the very antipodes of his home costume and Guards' uniform, on

this voyage Jack wore a round blue jacket, with anchor buttons, a

straw hat, with a blue ribbon (changed occasionally for a

sou'-wester), and a black handkerchief knotted loosely round his

neck. In London Jack wore the best fitting gloves that Houbigant

could produce; but now he disdained any such coverings for his

digits, which were as dark as salt water, tar, and exposure could

make them, for Jack was every inch a man, and could tally on to a

rope with the best seaman on board.

"By Jove, if _Laura_ could only see me with these paws!" he would

sometimes say; and then we laughed, for we knew who _Laura_ was, and

rather envied Jack's ascendency in that quarter.

The yacht was under steam, with her fore and aft, fore and mainsails

set, as we sat at dinner, on the day we quitted the Skager Rack, and

the summer weather was soft and balmy.

Jack proposed that, instead of standing through the North Sea for the

coast of England, we should steam westward, and visit some of the

Scottish Isles before returning.

"Impossible," said Harry Winton.

"And wherefore impossible, thou man of objections?"

"I'm due in London by the end of the month."

"So am I," said Jack; "but we'll manage it in time. Pass the

bottles. Consider the magnificent scenery we shall see."

"Pshaw--scenery! It is, as some one writes, but a weak invention of

artists and innkeepers."

"'Oh, blessed are they that sneer!'" exclaimed Jack, brandishing his

cigar case; "'for they shall never make fools of themselves.' An

addition to the list of beatitudes well becoming the spirit of the

present day. Try another glass of that glorious old port--it's 1820

vintage--and see how my project looks then. Buttons, wine for Mr.

Winton."

"I certainly have a curiosity to see some of those islands, where no

one ever goes to, and no one ever comes from," said Morton Parker.

"Mere curiosity," replied Harry, while sipping his wine; "but beware

of it. It was their wives' thirst for unwise knowledge which wrecked

alike the peace of Father Adam and of Bluebeard."

Winton's opposition was soon laughed down. Jack Milman consulted his

skipper, and the yacht's head was at once trimmed west and by north.

"We shall only be a fortnight or so longer absent," said Parker; "no

heart will break in that time."

"Laura will be sure to think I am lost," said Jack, in a low voice to

me.

"It may excite her."

"No difficult matter, by Jove?" replied Jack, laughing; for Laura

Hammond was a girl who was fond of all excitement--made up her book

on the Oaks and Derby, and had herself photographed on horseback, on

skates, at archery meetings, in fancy dresses, and all manner of

ways, as we well knew, by the albums with which Jack's cabin was

plentifully strewn.

On the second day after this, while at luncheon, we heard the cry of

"Land ahead!" and saw a stern and rocky coast rising slowly from a

dark grey and rather bleak and stormy sea.

It was the Scaw of Lambness, the most northern point of the Shetland

Isles, towering up amid foam, with mist resting on its scalp, and the

wild seabirds whirling round it.

"Deuced glad we are drawing near home, anyway," said Jack, as he tied

his sou'-wester on, and levelled his telescope at this shore of most

uninviting aspect.

"Ugh!" said little Tom Tucker, who hailed from, the region of

Bayswater. "Heavens, Jack, do you call this home?"

"Well, Tom, it is the first instalment of it. We are four hundred

miles from the Tweed, as a bird flies."

"So that beastly chart below tells me."

"Seven hundred and fifty, at least, from Bayswater, Tom," I added,

laughing.

"And we have polished off the most of our wines," said Jack.

"Buttons gave us the last bottle of that tidy Bordeaux yesterday, and

to-day he has opened our last case of Cliquot, so we shan't stay

hereabout long, I promise you, Tom."

By nightfall we had run through the Sound of Yell, amid little sandy

holms and mossy rocks, where the eider-duck and grey gull seemed the

only inhabitants, and where whales appeared spouting at times, and

the young sillocks were in swarms. We came to anchor in a quiet and

sheltered little voe (as the inlets are there named), and then we

discovered from a fisherman who came on board that we were off

Northmaven, part of the mainland of Shetland, one of the most

northern and primitive of the almost countless isles of Scotland,

forty-four leagues west of Bergen, in Norway, and forty-seven north

of the coast of Buchan.

Night was setting in when the "native," "the Sawney Bean," as some of

us termed him, was brought down to the cabin for our inspection, and

his own delectation in the matter of grog.

Magnus Kolbainson--for so this northern named himself--was a rough

and weather-beaten old stump of a Shetlander, in his seventieth year;

but hardy, hale, and active as a southron of half his age, with a

clear, bright grey eye, and a face which, though a mass of wrinkles,

was still ruddy and fresh.

He removed a black fur cap from his white, silvery hairs, and glanced

round the little cabin with much of wonder in his face, for he was

quite unused to luxury, and had spent all the years of a long life

amid storms and shipwrecks, in pursuit of the whale and the walrus.

He drank horn after horn of stiff boatswain's grog, and his

conversation--in a strange dialect, and at times

unintelligible--consisted of weird tales of wrecks upon the rocks of

Eaglesbay and Gunister, or of whales stranded by hundreds in the

shallow voes of Burra, Quayfirth, and Gluss; of the terrors of the

Holes of Scraada; of witches' spells; of spirits haunting holms and

dunes, and Pict-houses; of names, places, and things that seemed and

sounded strange and barbarous to us; and yet this queer old man was a

loyal subject of Queen Victoria, and a Briton like ourselves, though

he knew as much about steam or electricity as Noah or Tubal Cain

might have known. Hence we questioned and surveyed him with wonder

and speculation.

From subsequent circumstances I am thus particular in describing old

Magnus Kolbainson.

When he rose to go ashore in his little punt, the summer moon was

shining brightly, and we could see all the rocky indentations of that

most picturesque coast with great clearness. As he crossed the deck,

he suddenly started, and after an exclamation expressive of surprise

and alarm, asked:

"When was that man drowned?"

"Who?--where?--what man?" asked Jack Milman.

"He there!"

"Where?"

"Lying by the capstan, with a white handkerchief over his face," said

Magnus, gravely and earnestly.

"Stuff! my good fellow," said Milman. "There is no man lying there.

It is a shadow you've seen--or has our grog been too strong for you,

old boy?"

The old man, with fear and wonder in his face and manner, approached

the spot he had indicated, and passed his hands over the planks, and

then across his eyes.

"Strange!" said he; "I thought I saw a man lying there, dead and

cold, wet and dripping. It must have been the shadow of a bird or a

cloud--perhaps a spirit--between us and the moon."

"The poor old fogey is screwed," said Jack, as we carefully assisted

him into his little punt, and, with honest anxiety, watched until we

saw him safe ashore, and proceeding in the pale moonshine up the

steep rocks, to where a red light shone in the window of his hut.

The skipper was ordered to get the yacht close in shore, and

alongside the rocks, in the morning, so that we might land as easily

and as often as we pleased, as we had resolved to pic-nic on the

island.

The morning proved a lovely one. Breakfast over, Buttons packed a

hamper to take ashore, while Jack produced from his armoury guns of

all kinds, double and single-barrelled, muzzle and breech-loaders, as

we meant to make a great slaughter among the gulls, cormorants,

seals, and whatever else came within range of our fire.

"Buttons, my boy, give us plenty of the Cliquot," said Jack to his

steward. "Chuck in the old Melton pie for Mr. Tucker--chutney for

Captain Parker; he'll die without it--Bengal chutney."

We all landed with our guns and game-bags, and, under the guidance of

old Magnus Kolbainson, made our way along the slopes of Mons Ronaldi,

which is said to be the highest hill in all those isles, being nearly

four thousand feet in altitude; and to Londoners--we travelled

Londoners, as we rather flattered ourselves we were--the scene we

witnessed was certainly novel, exciting, and terrible.

We shot a few seabirds, but they were scarcely worth picking up; and

we scared great herds of the wild ponies, and made them scamper to

and fro.

With many a strange tale of the rude and antique tower that crowns

the mountain, and of the chain of watch-houses or Pictish dunes that

guard the coast, our quaint old cicerone beguiled the way, all

unsuspicious of how we "chaffed, and trotted him out," though

puffing, blowing, and perspiring sorely, for the heat of the weather

was great, and the mountain paths were steep, rugged, and tortuous,

and seldom trodden by aught but sheep, rabbits, and wild ponies.

At last we reached the western side of the peninsula, where the

cliffs are stupendous in height, and seem to have been rent and torn

by billows, earthquakes, and volcanic throes, into strange and

fearful shapes.

In these cliffs are the perpendicular caverns known as the Holes of

Scraada.

These are two immense natural perforations, distant from the

sea-cliffs two hundred and fifty feet inland, sinking down

collaterally like two deep pits, separated only by a bridge-like mass

of grass-covered rock, under which the sea communicates by a

cavernous tunnel, where the waves, surging with the whole force of

the Atlantic, boil, suck, gurgle, and thunder, with the most

appalling sound.

Little Tommy Tucker shrank back, and could by no means be persuaded

to approach, and, though stigmatised by Jack as "a muff," candidly

wished himself at Bayswater, or anywhere else. Even Morton Parker,

who had seen more of the world than any of us, and had peeped into

the Bloody Well of Cawnpore, felt timid, while plucky Harry Winton

declared it "doocid good, and the best got up thing of the kind he

had ever seen."

"So well got up, indeed, old fellow, that I mean to make a sketch of

it for Laura Hammond's album," said Jack Milman, producing his

sketch-book, and seating himself in a secluded spot, unpleasantly

near the verge, though.

"What the dickens, Jack," said Tucker, ruefully; "you don't mean to

say that you are about to bother and make a sketch of this place?"

"And why not, by my halidame, by'r lady, or anything else?"

"It will occupy the whole afternoon, and it is past two now. I'm a

lineal descendant of that Mr. Thomas Tucker who sang for his supper,

and I'm dying for something to eat."

"And I for something to drink," chorused we all.

"Well," said Jack; "till I've made my sketch for Laura Hammond, I

won't budge--that's flat! You know where Buttons has opened the

hampers and spread out the grub. Walk slowly back, and I'll rejoin

you, Keep a bottle of the sparkling in a cool runnel for me--I won't

be twenty minutes behind you. Now be off, those who are hungry.

Meantime, I'll have a quiet weed, and sketch this truly infernal

hole!"

"All right," said Tommy; "but if you are late, Jack, I hope you won't

give us the trouble of coming up this awful road after you; for

really it's rather hard upon a fellow in his thirties, and on the

confines of fogeydom."

"Never fear! I may see something else to sketch. Away! I'll be on

board the _Laura_, dead or alive, by four o'clock--dead or alive!

Look after that old Sawney Kolbainson--supply his little wants, and

now, _au revoir_!"

Shrugging his shoulders as if he wished to be rid of us, Jack

commenced his sketch, and as we descended, we saw him contemplating

it from time to time complacently, with his head on one side, and a

cigar between the fingers of his left hand.

Pure hunger and an intense thirst, conduced by exercise, heat, and

the keen breeze from the sea, made us enjoy the luncheon of cold

fowl, Russian tongue, and other condiments provided for us by

Buttons, who had spread a snow-white cloth on the grassy sward, and

in a runnel that gurgled close by he had the most acceptable of all

viands, the Cliquot, sunk among the pebbles for coolness.

We were all very merry, and uncorked bottle after bottle of

champagne; and great was the astonishment of old Magnus Kolbainson,

after imbibing such a beverage as he had never seen or heard of

before, and to his throat it was new and strange as the ambrosia of

the gods.

Inspired thereby, however, he told us a long, weird story of the

stone ship we saw, and how it was the craft of a pirate, on whom a

spell or curse had fallen; and then he sang us a strange and uncouth

song, which sounded exactly like a Norse ballad.

"Four o'clock," said Tucker, looking suddenly at his watch.

"And yet no appearance of Jack," said I, starting up.

"He spoke of twenty minutes. His sketch has taken longer."

"Less, I should say. There is Jack half a mile off, and making his

way straight for the yacht!"

"Without us," cried Parker.

"Without lunch, too. Strange. I hope we hav'n't offended him in any

way," suggested Tucker.

"Should be sorry if so. Milman's the best fellow in the world.

Hallo! Jack--Jack Milman!"

But Jack walked steadily on by the rugged and descending road, which

led to the voe where the yacht lay. Leaving Buttons and two of the

crew to pack the _débris_ of the luncheon, we picked up our guns, and

a few of those birds which we proposed to have stuffed in London as

souvenirs of our sojourn in Ultima Thule, and hurried after Milman,

who had now disappeared in a conie, or hollow. We had evidently

gained on him though, for when he reappeared we were much nearer him.

"He's in a devil of a hurry, surely," said Parker. "Thinks, perhaps,

we've polished off the Cliquot, and wants some of that '41 Lafitte,

or brandy and seltzer."

We shouted singly and together; but received no answer.

Jack's conduct was unaccountable, and we began to fear that something

untoward had happened. Jack had neither his gun, straw hat, nor

shot-belt; the back of his jacket was rent open, and his right arm

seemed to dangle helplessly by his side.

Thoroughly alarmed by these indications, we ran on to overtake him,

but were not quick enough. He reached the steamer before us, and,

unnoticed, apparently, by the crew, stepped from the rocks upon the

gangway, crossed the deck, and, after lingering for a moment, as if

looking at the sky, descended into the cabin.

We soon followed, and dived below; but Jack was nowhere to be seen.

We searched all the state-cabins, and every locker and bunk, without

finding a trace of him.

"He's hiding somewhere," said I. "Come along, Jack; show yourself.

Are you ill, old fellow, or only up to some of your usual larks?"

There was no reply, and after a minute search we became painfully

certain of the fact that Jack Milman was not on board at all!

We questioned the crew on deck. All denied having seen him, and the

skipper, who had been seated all the time in the cabin, had seen no

one enter, heard no one come down. What mystery was this?

All our weariness vanished now; and, with emotions of alarm,

astonishment, and anxiety difficult to describe, we retraced our

steps towards the western side of Northmaven, just as the sun was

verging towards the Atlantic, expecting to meet Jack returning; but

no trace of him was seen till we reached the brink of the Black Holes

of Scraada, where the sea boiled through its subterraneous caverns,

in surf and foam, with the dreadful sound I have described.

By the edge of the rocks, we found a double barrelled gun, a

half-smoked cigar, and a pencil lying. Lower down lay a sketch-book

open, with its leaves fluttering in the wind; the grass of the bridge

or middle rock was torn and rent, as if someone had fallen there, and

clung thereto; and lower down, alas! a hundred feet or more, was the

body of poor Jack Milman, appearing and disappearing momentarily, as

it was tossed upward or sucked down, a drowned, sodden, and battered

corpse, the sport of the furious waves, in that appalling hole.

Bewildered and in silent horror, we stood for a time looking at it,

and in each other's blanched faces. Old Magnus Kolbainson alone took

off his fur cap, and said:

"The Lord receive his soul! Mind ye o' his parting words, that at

four o'clock he would be on board, _dead or alive_, and he hath kept

his word!"

We knew not what to think of all this, and sat by the margin of the

dreadful place, utterly crushed.

Not so old Magnus. Aided by his sons and grandsons, all hardy

Islemen, who now came to our assistance, he was slung by a rope down

into that watery profundity. He fastened a line to the body; it was

drawn reverently upward, and laid on the grassy slope. Then we found

that the face and hands had been sorely bruised by the rocks, and

that his right arm was broken in three places, just as it had

appeared in that of the figure we had followed on board the steamer.

Poor Jack had kept his promise; but at the moment we were questioning

the skipper, he had been for three hours a drowned corpse.

Slowly and sadly we bore him down from that frightful place to the

_Laura_. When we brought him on board, the ghostly moon was shining

clearly; and that a complete fulfilment of the strange foreshadowing

of his fate might not be wanting, it chanced that we laid him down by

the capstan, and spread a handkerchief over his pallid face; and as

we did so, the last night's vision of Magnus Kolbainson rushed

vividly and painfully on the memory of us all.

Poor Jack Milman, the king of good fellows, lay there!

After such an adventure as this, it may well be conceived that the

next morning found us running, as fast as steam, and wind could take

us, on our homeward path, towards the Orkneys and the mainland of

Scotland.

THE END.

BRADBURY, AGNEW, & CO., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.