was in at the thought, felt unable to move for some time; when at last I summoned courage for the purpose, he told me his errand, and accordingly I hastened hither."

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Strange!" said Emmeline, musing, unable to assign any reason for his coming to the apartment where he had found her. Aye, strange indeed !" echoed Maud; " 'tis enough to puzzle one to think what he can be doing roaming about the Cas tle at such an hour by himself."

"I must speak to him directly," said Emmeline, changing, in consequence of hearing he was still up, her first intention of alarming the Castle.

"Oh dear, I hope not, my lady; for the passages leading to his chamber are so dismal at this hour, that I should be quite scared to venture through them, more.especially as I know the Castle has been troubled ever since that poor murdered youth was brought to it, and will doubtless continue so, till his death has been ayenged."

"Peace!" said Emmeline, involuntarily shuddering at the assertion; "I want you not to traverse them by yourself-but hark! is there not a noise in the gallery ?"

Maud retreating to the other side of the room, answered in the affirmative.

Emmeline listened for another minute, and then ventured to open the door; but could not help starting back at finding sir Roland close to it.

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'I have alarmed you, I fear," he cried ; "but I come for the purpose of relieving your apprehensions, by assuring you they are groundless, as, in the morning, when you hear the circumstance to which they were owing, you'll be convinced."

Emmeline was all amazement.-" You know it then ?” she cried.

Sir Roland nodded-" Perfectly," he replied; "but I can no more at presentgood-night; and rely on it, that whatever now appears mysterious and alarming shall be fully explained on the morrow."

The wonder of Emmeline was too strongly

strongly excited to permit her to be satisfied with this promise; but he was gone in an instant, and the indecorum of following him, to urge an immediate explanation, was too obvious to allow her to attempt it..

But repose was not to be thought of; and had she been inclined to it, the loquacity of Maud, whom the agitated state of her nerves would not permit her to dismiss, would have effectually prevented its enjoyment. At length the broken slumbers of one were renewed, and absolute fatigue weighed down the eyelids of the other, giving her a transient respite from her sorrows.

CHAP. VII.

What may this mean,

That thou, dear corse,

Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,

Making night hideous, and us fools of nature,

So horribly to shake our dispositions,

With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?

SHAKESPEARE.

On retiring for the night to his chamber, sir Roland was thrown into no little agitation by finding a folded paper on his table superscribed to him, requiring him to return to the hall as soon as he had ascertained the Castle being at rest, for the purpose of learning something concerning the person he deplored.

All anxiety, he impatiently waited until

this was done, from a hope that the information he was promised might be a means of furnishing him with a clue to trace the perfidious Sebergham.

But though he could not possibly conjecture who he was to receive it from, he was too thoroughly convinced, by various circumstances, it was not from Emmeline, not to feel as greatly chagrined as surprised on finding her in the hall on his descending to it.

To allow himself to be seen must be to reveal the motive that had brought him. thither. Accordingly, to avoid this, he glided behind some armour, inferring from the instructions he had received that he was enjoined to secrecy.

For some minutes he remained uncertain whether or not he had been seen; at length, convinced he had, from the precipitate manner in which Emmeline retreated from the hall, the idea of the terror she must be in, from the partial discovery she had made, occasioned a degree of uneasiness

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