dim, her smile ghastly; and whispers were frequent in condemnation of the Duke, for sacrificing his sister to his ambitious favourite. One night, in his never-satisfied and never-ending chase of pleasure, the Duke had flung open the palace to the motley groupes of a masqued assemblage. Not at the gayest Carnival of Venice had been seen more grotesque and fantastic mummeries. Hither came the Soldan of Babylon, begirt with all his swarthy chivalry; and words of mystic meaning, or no meaning at all, were engraven on his signet-ring, and the jewels of his turban. Here were Mahound and Termagaunt, with hands dipped in blood, and bearing on their brows the crowns of many realms; and devils danced around them, and went hither and thither to do their behests, and appeared and vanished in clouds of sulphureous flame. Here, with a long white flowing beard, and in all the pomp of unimaginable sanctity, sat Prester John; and kings knelt before him, and cast their golden circlets at the footstool of his throne. The Paladins of Charlemagne breathed high defiance against the Knights of the Table Round. Merlin uttered his mysterious prophecies, and was finally carried away in a whirlwind by his infernal father; and the mighty wizard, Virgilius, by the virtue of the great book of his Æneis, delivered the Princess of Morocco, who was enchanted by the fairy Morgana, and evermore pursued by companies of apes, mopping and mowing with fantastic gestures. Here were Sirens, who sang not in vain to seduce unwary travellers within the sphere of their fascination. Cleopatra came riding upon a crocodile, crowned with water-lilies, and bearing in her hand her golden cup of magic, and drugged her infatuated Antonius with enchanted philtres; and Cressida gave carelessly away the rosary which had been the pledge of love from her enamoured knight, Sir Troilus. She gave it to Sir Perceval the Chaste, and if she gave more, the chronicle mentions it not. At the end of the great hall sat Alexander on his gorgeous oriental throne, with his tutor, Aristotle, by his side; who, by the lessons of his wisdom, taught him to resist the charms of quivered Amazons and Indian Queens, who approached in stately cars drawn by ostriches, and crowned the conqueror of the world, the flower of Grecian chivalry, the destroyer of the magicians of the East, with garlands of their own eternal palm. But at last Aristotle himself was overcome by love, and came on all fours into the presence of his pupil, led by Cupid with a chaplet of roses, and bearing on his back the triumphant princess of Cathay. Among these grotesque masques, moved up and down a wandering Troubadour. His harp was slung behind him, but not one string had he struck during all the gaieties of the night. The silent minstrel had borne the taunts and jeers of many fair ladies; and at last, in imitation of the ancient and goodly custom of Provence, Cleopatra and Cressida, Judith and Susannah, Lucretia and Helen, and the Queen of Sheba, and many other noble and beauteous dames, formed themselves into a court of love and honour, and dispatched their true knights to bring into their presence the recreant Jongleur: but their search was vain; the Troubadour was gone. The Countess Muratone had withdrawn in sickness of heart from the scene of mirth and folly, and was slowly walking with her attendants in the gardens, beneath majestic avenues of chesnut and of ilex, inhaling the dewy fragrance of laurels and myrtles, and looking up to the stars which twinkled with Italian brilliancy in the deep clear darkness of an Italian sky. The revelry of the palace came with an indistinct murmur on the ear; but suddenly they heard among the close embowered walks the first faint notes of a long, low, melancholy tune, and then a voice, which, long unheard by Isidora, had never been forgotten, began a wild fantastic song : "I dream'd a dream, a foolish dream; it seem'd a dream of gladness; But it left me weeping bitter tears in solitude and sadness. I dream'd that I was far away, and in a lovely land, But where I was, or whence I came, I could not understand; For around me all was fresh and green, and above me all was bright. 66 Huge trees of more than earthly growth fantastic foliage spread, And showers of blossoms rich and strange rain'd odours on my head; And golden waters shone in the sun, and a merry murmur made, Or slowly welled and mournfully in the cool and mossy shade; And soft and low was the changeful breeze, and ever, as it blew, It seemed to breathe of summer fields where the sweetest spices grew. I wandered on unthinkingly in a green and quiet vale, And soft and low a broken song was floating on the gale; And still by fits some wilder notes from sunny rocks were ringing; Then died away, and left alone that melancholy singing; And there was music in the leaves, there was music in the stream, A dying murmur, a voice of tears, the music of a dream. "Then suddenly a lovely face was in the sunny air; I gazed, and thought it smiled on me, it was so passing fair: "It was no language that they spoke, and I knew not what they said; I only feel they whispered hope by the bitter drops I shed; "Then pale and dim the vision wax'd, and it melted into air; The Countess stopped and listened; at the close of the song she listened more intently, and leaned on the shoulder of one of her favourite maidens, and as the notes died away, she sank fainting in her arms. The women uttered a cry of terror and distress, and in a moment the Troubadour was among them. When he saw the Countess, he seemed strangely agitated; but immediately he raised her in his arms, and bore her towards the palace. There her attendants placed her on a couch, and every eye was eager to watch the return of life. At last she moved, she spoke, she sat up; and when Count Muratone enquired for the cavalier who had rendered her his courteous assistance, the Troubadour had again disappeared. From that night the mental struggles of Monterosa became more and more violent. No one knew the cause; but his seelusion was yet more profound, and his application yet more intense. He sought the most bewildering studies to divert his thoughts from the one object upon which they dwelt. He strove to disentangle that pure and radiant metal, which forms the basis of all matter, from the grosser particles with which it is amalgamated. He knew that, alloyed and polluted as it was, still it was the substance of elemental earth. He knew that the mingled attraction and repulsion of its subtle nature, gave fluidity and transparency to the water which flowed around him, and the air which he inhaled. He sought its fleeting essence in earthly flame, and in the uncontaminated effluence of solar light; yet still in the hour of projection it evaded his most penetrating research. He strove to burst into the most recondite mysteries of existence, and to attain to that eternal and self-vivifying principle by which Nature remains ever reproductive and ever young; and from her pure and unchanging elements, to distil that beatific elixir, which would perpetually renovate our perpetual decay, and insinuate into our dying life the beautiful and glorious freshness of immortality. Baffled in the visionary hope of finding in matter the eternal principle of life, he gave himself for a time to the tenets of that mysterious philosophy, by which we are taught that all this varied universe is but the body of one pervading soul; that the same living energy is developed in the brightness of heaven and the fecundity of earth; that the mind of man itself is but an emanation from the One Great Mind, in whose abyss it existed from eternity, not with a particular consciousness of pleasure, but in the sympathizing enjoyment of universal felicity, and by which, when it is purified from the pollution of matter, it will be gradually resumed and absorbed. The half-suppressed, half-struggling passions of Monterosa, his love and his despair, together with the intense intellectual application by which he strove to subdue them, had already worn down his health and strength, and impaired the vigour of his mind. His days were restless, his nights sleepless, his step unequal, his voice hollow and broken, his face haggard, and his eyes unquiet, and suspicious, and ferocious. But now his fantastic and mysterious studies had so strongly possessed his imagination, that at times he was borne away by bursts of such agonizing feeling, that both his anguish and enthusiasm seemed blended with insanity. Wilder and wilder were the wanderings of his mind, and the objects of his secret pursuit waxed still more strange and fearful; and at last he sought in the knowledge of things to come, in the possession of unearthly powers, and in intercourse with unearthly beings, a refuge from present misery, and from the helplessness of suffering humanity. It was the evening of a long sultry summer day, and all the population of Padua seemed to be poured out in the shadowy walks of elm and poplar, which winded with the windings of the river. In the west there was a glowing flush in the sky; and golden and rosy clouds, mingled and interfused, reposed on the brilliancy of the sparkling azure. The tints of sunset died away, and became faint and more faint, on the vast circle of hills which swept away to the north; while on the east one continuous mass of vapour, suffused with a dull lilac colour, seemed to rest on the horizon, and to float over the distant Adriatic. The waters of the Piavego, reflecting the brightness of the sky, or chequered with the shadows of overhanging trees, flowed on in soothing silence; and among the restless leaves the cool breeze from the Alps murmured a melancholy music. The young prince Federigo was walking with Count Muratone; but instead of mingling in the crowd who, with idle hum, traversed incessantly the same narrow limits, they proceeded along the banks of the river, Federigo appearing to be deeply interested about the policy of the Venetian Senate and the armaments of the German Cæsar; and Muratone talking of the beauties of the court, and planning new festivities for the ducal palace. The 66 evening was becoming more and more dim; the stars were shining out in quick succession; when they turned suddenly from a thicket, and the emaciated figure of Monterosa passed before them. He looked at them for a moment with a suspicious and unquiet look, and then seemed to shudder and shrink away, and was hastily avoiding them; but Federigo, who had always loved him, ran to him and embraced him, and begged him at least to return to the city with himself and the Count. Monterosa joined them with evident reluctance; he scarcely opened his lips; and if he seemed to struggle to mix in their conversation, his replies were broken and wandering. "What is the reason," said Federigo, "that you never come to bear away the ring in the tilt-yard? We never see you now at any of our quaint revels, where you were wont to put all the silly women out of conceit with us. Not one of the hermits of Mount Lebanon, that you used to tell us of, could be such an utter solitary."—" You have seen me sometimes at the palace."—" Seen you?" replied Federigo, yes, I have seen you once or twice, wandering about like an evil spirit. You have pored over rolls and parchments, Agostino, till you have made yourself the ghost of what you were. All your outlandish heathen rubbish ought to be burned. I am sure that no one who meant any good would write what no Christian can understand."-" All men hold you to be a gallant and approved cavalier," said Muratone; if you are weary of our pageants and the like vanities, the Duke would be glad of your service in the wars."—" Or if you have killed Saracens and Christians enough," interrupted Federigo, "you might be a grave senator and deep politician: you would be as good a statesman as the Count himself; only for heaven's sake, Agostino, come out of your hiding place."-" I have not chosen my own course," replied Monterosa, impatiently; " I have not made myself the miserable being whom you torture with your useless reproaches."—" If you are unhappy, it is your own choice; I know not who else has made you so. What is there, Agostino, to make you miserable ?"-" Is it not enough," replied Monterosa, with vehemence," is it not enough that I am miserable? Can I controul the causes which are within me and around me? I have my destiny, as you have yours."-" And what is my destiny?" said Federigo, are you become a prophet, Agostino?"-The question of the young Prince was accidental and careless, but it caught at once the attention of Monterosa. Endless was the maze of error into which he had been led by his uncertain speculations. There was scarcely a philosophical opinion, of which he had not been at some time the disciple; and he had now embraced the doctrines of fatalism. He had embraced them even with enthusiasm; for his distempered mind had connected them with the occult sciences, by which he hoped to pene 66 |