And yet, not so; Rather to spread abroad harmonious thoughts, Scarce warms the blood, the light, the love of grace. Or ships had foundered; or the bittern built Why, even now, The coast is dark and drear. And yet how freely Pause awhile: And those ancestral lands that spread so rich, Are crushed by ponderous debts. The impoverished heir, Banished abroad because his thoughts were free, And his hand open, earns his bitter meal The leaden dungeons and the midnight rack. By courage, skill, and strength resistless,-whence He gains his title of The Iron Hand.' Loved by his comrades, but at home forgot By all,-friends, kindred; save that one bright maid There the lady dwells; In yon barred mansion, by her guardian's care Over the waters, in the starlight clear, All 's still; all 's soft. Yet look, what tremulous light What more!-What more! Oh, why need we pursue Calm in its holy depths their future lies, Yet, if you will know all-they loved and died; And slept, at last, pale lovers, side by side; So ends the tale. There stares from off their stone Showeth how the Lady Ermengarde earned for herself that ill title. There are few midwinter nights seemingly so long or so dreary as the one fragrant hour between a July moon-set and day-dawn was felt to be by one lonely watcher in the beleaguered Tower of Adlersberg, the aged and pious Cistercian, Father Cyril. It was no light fear that could cause the good monk to quail and tremble with apprehension, through that fairest and freshest of summer hours, when the dew, a natural rosary, hangs impearled upon the tree of the forest and the herb of the field, calling sinful souls to prayer and praise. No light or vain imaginings could so perturb his spirit; for he had been accus tomed to sharp penances, being a man by nature of rebellious passions; one who, as folk have told even certain of the aged brethren of St. Basil, his own convent, had in his time undergone fierce and frequent struggles with the evil one, loth to quit his hold uron so strong a heart: but what he thought, or what he felt, or what he feared, during that weary space when the sand passed once through the hour glass as he knelt before the window looking out beyond the grim battlements of the tower, repeating again and again, with his lips, the Ave to which no effort could bend his mind-the desperate fear of that hour was sorer to abide than fast or vigil, hair-cloth or scourge, or the far harder conflict with the foe within, the worldly desires and revengeful promptings which had darkened the days of his hot youth. "No sound of succor yet!" muttered he; "and scarce the faintest streak of day in the east! Oh,, Holy Mother! bring on the dawn ere I perish of expectation! Conrad! Oswald! Methinks I hear a stir beneath the walls among our besiegers. They keep true watch; while our varlets-Conrad! I say; Oswald! Theodore! They heed me not, worn out, poor knaves, with the assault of yester-eve. An' Albert were here, he would have heard me! Oh, if this coming day bring not the landgrave to our aid, then, blessed Virgin! I dare not think of what will follow. Look down upon us, Mary, full of grace! Save this innocent maiden from the false Baron, who, partly to possess himself of her broad lands, partly to avenge her refusal of his proffered hand, hath set himself down before her castle, with mercenaries from far lands, bowmen from the Cantons, lancers from the Rhine-the swarthy sons of the South and the fair haired Dane have joined the league-and swears shame to knighthood!—that ere the siege be raised the Lady Ermengarde shall sue to him, ay, on her bended knee, to plight the troth she spurned so haughtily, while he That noise again! It is too surely the trampling of feet, the clattering of armor, the bursting-Hark! What sound is that? Of a surety the great gates be creaking on their hinges. The foe will be upon us ere I can warn the noble maiden, or gather her defenders around her." And, snatching up a huge sword, Father Cyril departed on his double errand of seeking the Lady Ermengarde and collecting the over-worn vassals and domestics, who, under the command of the seneschal, had hitherto held the besiegers at bay, expecting every day the relief which now seemed hopeless. Trembling with age, and his own impatient spirit chafing at the wrong he lacked power to redress, the monk tottered through a long stone ha'l which pierced the castle from east to west, when he was stayed by a sight piteous to look upon.— The Lady Ermengarde, worn by the watching and misery of this cruel and obstinate siege, (when was ever maiden beset so rudely for her broad lands and her strong towers?) had been seized by slumber; she, that coy and stately maiden, even in the open gallery chamber, where men-at-arms might be each instant passing to and fro. She had fallen into a rude chair, and was now as fast asleep as though the sister angels, Love and Peace, kept watch beside her pillow. Dolefully wan was her cheek, as if the pale maiden roses had been washed white with bitter tears, and her long yellow hair, all unbraided, hung | round her like a veil. Her rich garments were disordered and stained. None who had seen her then would have called her by the name she had borne to her present undoing, the Proud Ladye of Adlersberg. None would have believed that such a title could have belonged to one so gentle and so sad! All the sadder seemed her sleep for the faint smile that lingered round her lips. Few were in the castle save untrained lackeys and rude grooms, sorry protectors, even had their numbers evened those of their assailants; while, without the walls, pressed onward that audacious Baron and his riotous soldiery, resolute to storm the castle and bear away the heir: and yet there she sat in her loveliness, drooping and pallid as a lily broken down by a summer shower; but with such a look of peace and love as if her cheek were resting upon her mother's bosom. Father Cyril bent over that fair form. He could not pass her without a prayer; and the tears would fall from his aged eyes upon her slender hands, unconscious as she was of his presence or his sympathy. But the prayer and the tears were stayed by surprise; as, in spite of the close-coming peril every passing instant making it clearer that the foe was astir beneath, the monk could not chocs but start and bless himself as he bethought him of the wardness of woman's will, while he gazed upon a quaintly ashioned oaken cross nestled in the white bosom, which, if csart gossips said truth, had disdained to wear a carkanet o ruby stones proffered by the hand of a king's son. Now, there belonged to the small oaken cross the old tale of love repaid by scorn, of 'gh-born beauty looking disdainfully at lowly faith, of patient service and insolent rebuke, which makes one of the darkest and thorniest pathways of the tangled labyrinth called Ife. And sure tale is it, and sad as true: The cabin looks across the valley to the castle, and says, We both contain human hearts; and the castle-Ah, well-a-day for woman's haughtiness, said I not that she was called the Proud Ladye of Adlersberg? Albert with the raven locks was the son of the Ladye's falconer: almost he might have been called her foster brother, since, an orphan from her earliest days, his mother was the Ladye Ermengarde's nurse. Nevertheless the boy was so much older than the fair girl as to bestow upon him the privilege of enacting the part of her protector, in the sports of their childish days. His father, old Heinrich, was, as I have said, the falconer of Adlersburg; what place the youth Albert filled were hard to tell. By his good leave, none but himself should have served his fair mistress. He alone tended her favorite hawks. The tassel gentil from Norway, that the Emperor rode fifty leagues to see strike down her quarry, was of Albert's training; Albert held her greyhound in his silken leash; none save Albert taught her jennet his paces, or held her bridle rein. The very pinks and gilliflowers that grew in a nook beside the north bastionalack, the hoofs of the war-horse hath trampled it low!—were of Albert's tending. He brought her a dapple fawn, whose dam had been killed by some Robin Hood of the Black Forest; and even while echoing her maledictions on the heartless churl who had orphaned her spotted favorite, he climbed the topmost bough of a stately beech to steal for her the golden couplets of the turtle dove-emblems too true of his despairing passion! In early youth, almost in boyhood, he had twice, so said the bower-women, saved his fair mistress's life: once in the chase, when the boar stood fiercely at bay, and Albert came between the furious animal and the Ladye Ermengarde, and stretched the fierce and dangerous quarry dead at her feet; and again, when Autumn rains had swollen the Summer brook to a torrent, and her palfrey, borne along by the strong current, lost his footing, and was carried helplessly down the stream. Oh, how Albert plunged into those deep waters! how he grasped the rein and breasted the flood, and plucked the Ladye from her sinking steed, and laid her safe, albeit trembling, upon the grassy bank! Those were happy days for poor Albert. But boyhood glided rapidly into youth, and youth again passed into manhood. And then, weary of courtship and of suitors, and, perchance, the more severe with Albert, the humblest and faithfulest of all, he who dared to love but not to woo-the severer outwardly with him and with herself, because, half conscious of some relenting softness in her inmost heart-then it was that she earned, by bitter speech and haughty bearing, the title of the Proud Ladye of Adlersberg. Curiously ready in handicrafts of divers sorts, as though the skill he had never learned were born with him, Albert was wont to beguile his lonely evenings, (for the good falconer, his father and his mother, the nurse of the Proud Layde, were dead and gone,) or to employ himself over the Chirstmas hearth, while old wives told old stories, and minstrels and troubadours chanted their virelays, with fashioning rosaries, and bowls and coffers, and such-like toys, to which the craft of the workman gives their price; and, amongst the rest of his trinketry, he had carved this humble crucifix from a fallen branch of oak, which he had one day lifted from his Ladye's path, and had even dared to convey it into her bower, wreathed round with a garland of most rare flowers, some said arranged after the manner of the Turkish Paynims, whereby buds and blossoms are made to discourse love. Well did Father Cyril remember the wrath which had flashed from the maiden's eyes, and the angry words in which she had commanded that Albert should be chased from the demesne, and the cabin where he dwelt razed to the ground; a warning, said she (and her lip curled as she spoke,) to suitors of all degrees, from the prince to the serf. Well also did he remember what was told by the bower-woman, of a pleading voice that was heard under the windows of her chamber; and that the Ladye Ermengarde had caused it to be proclaimed throughout the castle, that if that voice were again to disturb her slumbers the seneschal had it in command to loose the blood-hounds. And from that time forth nought more was said of Albert. But the Ladye waxed prouder to all wooers, and sad and fitful in hall or bowAnd now, behold, when years had passed, and Albert with the raven curls was well nigh forgotten, it was the scorned er. relic of his aspiring suit, the very oaken cross carved by his band, which in that moment of extremtiy was found to be worn secretly in the icy bosom of that cold and haughty beauty!— Brief space had Father Cyril to marvel at woman's changeful fantasy. Again the clash of armor below! again that fearful sound, as though the drawbridge were stealthily lowered, and the portcullis suddenly raised, and the great gate gently opened! "I will not waken her yet for a moment." said the good old man; and, grasping his weapon, he sallied forth to inquire what these noises might mean. PART II. Showeth wherefore the effigy of the Oaken Cross came to be cut in stone in the gallery of the castle of Adlersberg. Short time was Father Cyril thence. He won back speedily to the side of the Ladye Ermengarde (still smiling faintly in her sleep); and, made rough and hasty by the sure knowledge of instant peril, he seized her chill, pale hands, and raised her suddenly from the chair. 44 Waken, poor hope is gone. ger: maiden! Waken! All is lost; our last What is this?" responded the sad Ladye, scarcely aroused from her pleasant dreams to the sense of present dan"Gertrude! Oswald! Where be ye? Lilybell not yet saddled? We ride forth to-day." But her words ceased on a sudden, for she read in the flashing eye, the quivering lip, and the changed bearing of the old man, well nigh bestraught with fear and anger, that somewhat terrible had chanced; albeit her wildest fantasy had pictured nought so terrible as his tidings. The "They have deserted us, vassal and meanial, groom and man-at-arms. The page that served the cup in the hall, the tirewoman that decked thee for the banquet, all have forsaken us! Nay, that maketh but a portion of their treason. defences of this thy place of strength-drawbridge, portcullis, even the iron gate-have they opened to the enemy, false traitors that they be, and then withdrawn their own base persons by the eastern postern. We two be lost: Alas, that I should live to see thee in such strait, and have no power to aid or rescue! We two be alone in the castle." The Ladye Ermengarde bore a high heart, and refrained from womanish lamentations, from shrieks and tears. She clasped the crucifix to her bosom, no longer caring whether it were hidden or no. "May the blessed Virgin look down upon us!" was all that she said. Then, after a pause, and, in a firmer voice, she added "Was this treachery, father, or fear?" their only child, have been sacred to Ermengarde of Adlersberg. And those bloodhounds, remember you not them? and how for a whole night they tracked as they might have tracked a murderer or a thief-one whose only crime lay in your beauty? And will you not remember, when this dark hour hath passed, that it was he, the despised, the trampled on, the outcast, who returned to share your peril, to die at your feet? For, as God is my witness, I look to leave my corse upon these stones; too happy so to die, loveliest and most beloved! Forgive me these my ungenerous reproaches! Thrice blessed to die for thee!" mengarde? Fain would she have made reply, fain by words How fared it now, think you, with the Proud Ladye Eror tears have done honor to such exceeding constancy and nobleness; but she could not speak. She could only point with her finger to the crucifix upon her bosom. Well might the youth, Albert, start to see his own poor love-token so richly graced; but no time was this for discourse or dalliance. The heavy tread of armed men echoed through the castle, sounding to that poor maiden like her death-knell; the soldiery were crowding, and, standing a little aside, drew while her bold champion bent his gaze on the stair up which a long breath and manfully grasped the sword in his hand. dye, half dead betwixt love and shame and fear. Speak to him for me, Father Cyril!" murmured the la"Wilt thou let him die?" And she uplifted her voice, so as to be distinctly heard by him to whom she spoke. "I entreat thee, kind Albert, for the love of heaven; I ad- crucifix as Ermengarde held it in her hand, and then grasping mail-clad men, mingled with hoarse voices and clang of chamber, as men who bring with them a sure welcome; but, Cheerily the warrior had advanced toward the gallery as the foremost passed the arched portal, the ringing blow of a sword was followed by a low groan, and the clang of armor, as one fell dead across the threshold. Then arose a fierce cry. are rescued!" "A mixture perchance of both, fair daughter. The seneschal I have misdoubted long. He, hoary traitor, hath sold himself body and soul for vile lucre; and cowardice and base terror seconding the false knave's persuasions, have corrupted to bar the way of the Landgrave? Look up, bright ladye, you Hew him down! Cleave him to the waist! Whoso dareth the rest. Oh that I could meet that Judas! old though I be""Nay, nay, kind father, grasp not thy sword! We have more need of thy rosary. The noise thickens about us, clashing of armor, and trampling of steeds; sounds such as tell of strife and struggle. Seek not to drag me hence, Father Cyril. The courts must be filled with the rude soldiery. I will rest here and abide my enemy. Pray for us both, and let not thy voice falter. Saidst thou that all had forsaken me? That of the many who filled my halls and owned my rule none remained to defend his poor mistress ?" "Not so!" replied a voice from the threshold, as a young man stood there with a sword ready drawn in his hand. "You have yet left you one defender, Ladye of Adlersberg, beside the good father and the holy saints; and thy foes shall bestride his dead body before a hair of your fair head shall be touched." "Whoso spoke these words?" cried the Lady Ermengarde, greatly troubled, staying herself against Father Cyril, to hinder her from falling; he, also, the good father, was strangely moved; for the speech sounded to both like a voice from the grave, and they perceived that the speaker was none other than the falconer's son, Albert of the raven locks. The young man remained on the threshold, looking away while he spoke. "Remember you not, Ladye of Adlersberg, that I warned you that this day might come? Remember you not that I besought you in the day of your bitter scorn to take heed how you trampled upon the true heart that never would betray or forsake you in sorrow or in peril? Remember you not the firebrand that laid waste the cottage of your father's ancient and faithful servant, of your own foster mother? They were dead, but not the less should their dwelling, the dwelling of portal; she throweth herself between her champion and his She heareth the voice, that proud ladye; she flieth to the foes; she clingeth round his neck; she careth for nought but Albert, as the blood from a wound in his arm welled forth upsaved by the Landgrave's band from her rude assailants, who on her white raiment. Little heeded Albert that wound; for, saw themselves enforced to flee in the very instant of that caitiff seneschal's treachery, the Ladye of Adlersberg cast away for the falconer's son; bestowed upon him, that poor Albert, her pride, and, amidst tears and blushes, proclaimed her love her hand and her rich domains; and caused the oaken cross, wreathed round with its garland of rare flowers, to be carved in stone on the keystone of every arch in the great gallery of Adlersberg. THE KING'S PAGE. BY MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. If thou be he, then art thou prisoner.' Shakspere. There have been prisons of more pretension, as witness the cells of the Inquisition, and places of exile of grander name, the frozen deserts of Siberia for instance, or the sweltering swamps of Surinam; but for a chill, barren, heart-breaking monotony a weary, dreary dragging on of life, when all that renders life bearable is taken away, commend me to a Prussian fortress during the reign of that literary coxcomb, small poet, eminent soldier, sad despot, but tolerably amusing, and by fits tolerably well natured personage, Frederick, misnamed the Great. To be sure the inmates, if it be true that the misfortunes of others convey some consolation in calamity, had the wretched comfort of knowing that from the whole country, flat, dull, and ugly enough at the best, being little better than a camp, or a battle plain, the towns and cities, huge barracks, and every citizen, from the tottering great grandfather to the infant in the cradle a soldier, past, present, or future, responsible for the slightest infringement of an all but impracticable military code, there was not an individual in the kingdom who might not be in an instant imprisoned like themselves. But without venturing to dispute the general truth of Rochefoucault's celebrated maxim, it may be doubted whether the captive, pacing for the millionth time the stone floor of his dungeon, and vainly trying to divine the fanlt for which he was incarcerated, could derive much pleasure from reflecting that half his friends and kinsmen might at some future day be in equal jeopardy. Next in discomfort to the prisoners within those dismal cells were the jailers, who kept ward without, and who, cooped up between the walls of the fortress, were, as compared to those whom they guarded, pretty much as birds in an aviary compared with the same order of feather bipeds in a cage. At Spandau, the commandant, Major Kleinwitz, an invalid soldier, found so much difficulty in obtaining assistants for Hans Klaus, who had the dungeons in charge, that he thought himself lucky in gaining the service of a pretty youth, who called himself Wilhelm Steinfort, an orphan, who having recently lost an only brother, cared, he said, nothing for the world without the walls, and showed great zeal in assisting Klaus, who, lame from the consequences of an old wound, found much difficulty in passing up and down the steep stone stairs, while carrying their scanty meals to the miserable inmates of the cells. Two or three, distinguished by triple padlocks, each boasting its different key-keys whose intricacy and convolutions seemed dim forebodings of the wonders of Bramah—were reserved by Klaus for his own especial attendance. One should think that Wilhelm was enough of the poor captives; but these prisoners seemed to excite his curiosity not a little. One morning, taking advantage of a fit of good humor on the part of his master, and of his master's lady and mistress, Madame Klaus, he prevailed upon him to allow each of the poor wretches a solitary walk in a small yard, closed in on every side by the steep walls of the fortress, and scarcely even at noon-tide admitting one glimpse of the blessed sun; and as they emerged, pale and haggard, into the light of day, he brushed the tears from his eyes, and gazed upon their wasted forms and wan complexions, with the eagerness with which a mother would seek for a missing child. Apparently Wilhelm's search had been in vain. One prisoner among those most carefully guarded, and one alone, had not shared an indulgence too dangerous for repetition. Wilhelm, as soon as he ascertained the fact, hastened to the triply locked door."Max!" and the exclamation of surprise and joy with which that earnest whisper was acknowledged and reciprocated told at a word that the search was at an end. For three weary days-days which, although really of the shortest in January, seemed long as those of June-the triply barred door, with its panels of oak and studs of iron, remained betwixt them, a tantalizing and inexorable barrier. At last, chance, always the good friend of those who watch to avail themselves of the opportunities which she presents, took the guise of a north-east wind, which affected Hans's wounded leg with as many aches and twinges as Prospero inflicted upon Caliban, and visited the wife of his bosom, Madame Klaus, with such a fit of rheumatic gout, most aristocratic of diseases, as would have done honor to a baroness of sixteen quarters. Hans Klaus could not have walked across the court to have exchange the warder's keys for a field-marshal's baton; and Dame Gertrude could not have undone the easiest of the three padlocks to have been made first lady of the key to the empress. So they were forced to delegate the office of bread and water carrier to the young boy Wilhelm. "Max!" "Agatha!" And the twin brother and sister, for such they were, lay bathed in tears of mingled joy and sorrow in each other's arms. "How came you here?" asked Agatha, when their emotion had in part subsided, "You, Max von Lindorff, the King's Page, the favorite, trusted and beloved almost like a son!what can have been your offence? How came you here?" "I can as little guess the cause of this imprisonment as you, sweet sister! I had served the King with wine the night before, as he sate at supper with M. de Voltaire and other gay and witty Frenchmen, himself gayest of all. The next morning Adolf Von Rosenthal-Agatha, I cannot see your blushes, but this trembling hands tells of feeling which he would be right glad to hear! Adolf avowed his love, and craved my intercession; and I was in the act, after one or two attempts, of sealing a letter to you, when the officer on guard, Count Waldema. entered my apartment, put me under arrest, and whirled me off here to Spandau without a moment's pause. As little as yourself can I guess the cause. And now let me ask of you the same question. How came you hither, sister mine?" Agatha hesitated, and the little hand which had before betrayed her consciousness again trembled, as the brother pressed it in his: "The Baron Von Rosenthal-" she faltered; and her brother filled up the pause. "Adolf! ay, doubtless, he ascertained my destination from Count Waldemar, and then communicated the intelligence to you. No truer friend than Adolf Von Rosenthal! and yet I would not be sure that my calamity was altogether unwelcome, since it procured him admission to his lady love. But now, dearest, away! Dally here no longer! leave the dungeon and the fortress! lay aside your disguise" "Instantly, dear Max," interrupted she, laughing, and beginning to divest herself of cap and doublet, and to replace them by her brother's habiliments: "Instantly! we have not a moment to lose. It was for this that I came; I shall remain in the cell, and you must pass for me, as, aided by the dark wintry weather, and our remarkable resemblance of figure, voice, and face, and these, my boyish garments, you well may do. Walk boldly into Dame Gertrude's apartments, and proffer to fetch from her gossip, Claudine, the miller's wife, the decoction of herbs, strange as the compound of a witch's cauldron, which she wants for her rheumatism. Once clear of the walls of Spandau, make straight toward the frontier, and all will go well. No remonstrance, no hesitation, no delay. This purse, too; take this purse! I shall be safe, I tell you; and when we shall have found out your crime, there will be some chance of procuring a pardon. All will be right, provided you be manageable! Away with you, Max!" And, in spite of contention and remonstrance, the brother was forced away, and the sister remained in his place, under a mixture of feelings that found vent first in hysterical laughter, then in hysterical sobs, and settled down at last into a trembling silence, a breathless pause of suspense and expectation, during which she seemed to hear her own heart beat, as she stood in the gloom and darkness. Gradually, however, she became aware of sounds-the clang of gate and drawbridge, the clattering of arms and trampling of horses, which, piercing as they did through the massive walls of the inner court, indicated no common confusion in the fortress; so that when Klaus, accompanied by a corporal's guard, made his appearance in the doorway, she was, to a certain degree, prepared for the discovery of her scheme and the recapture of the prisoner. The jailer, however, appeared still in a state of mystification. "I knew that I should find Master Max safe in his apartment," muttered Hans Klaus, with considerable exultation. "My birds seldom get out of their cages. Come along, can't you?” cried he, in a sharp voice, to the corporal, as he swung along upon his crutches, with an activity wholly belying the incapacity of motion of which I spoke a few sentences back, that extraordinary and preternatural activity belonging to a lame man, when the one motive the key of the clock has been found, and the machinery has been fairly set in motion. "Get on, I tell you," cried the jailer to the corporal; “I knew that I should find him. A prisoner escape from Spandau, indeed! That seems likely!" Agatha had seen and heard enough to take her measures. Max has been met and stopped, and brought back, thought she, and we are to be confronted. Now Heaven send him a good gift of impudence, and surely that is a commodity in which a court page can hardly be defective, and we shall baffle them yet. So thinking, she followed Klaus to the guard-room, fully prepared to find that her brother had been arrested, but a little disconcerted to see seated in an arm chair at the head of the table, the identical adust stiff soldier-looking personage, with his cocked hat, jack-boots, and shabby uniform, known to his loving subjects as Frederick the Great. "Here, an' please your Majesty," said Klaus, pointing with his crutch to the youth in his page's dress, whom he poked forward as he spoke, "here is my prisoner, Maximilian Von Lindorf. The other poor boy is, as I said before, a lad called Wilhelm Steinfort, whom I and my old dame, waxing somewhat stiff, have hired to scrub down the courts, cut wood, and carry water. He was only going some quarter of a league for decoction of"— "Bah" interrupted the King. "We did not come here to inquire into thy wife's rheumatism. Why truly, Rosenthal, I think there be two of them. Come hither, master page." Both youths advanced to the table. "I called Maximilian Von Lindorff only," added Frederick. "Which of ye answers to that name? “I de,” replied two voices, equally musical, to the right and left. "Indeed! Who was your father?" "Ernest Von Lindorff, a Lieutenant-General in your Majes ty's service;" answered the two voices in duett. "What is your age?" "Seventeen the twentieth of last July;" said both. "Which of ye is the real prisoner ?" "I am," replied the two. "Wilhelm! Wilhelm! The boy is crazy;" interposed the jailer. "Hold your peace, Master Klaus," said the King quickly; "according to their own confession, here was one prisoner upon the point of escaping." "I am the prisoner," reiterated both. Which of ye hath a sister, the Frauline Agatha ?” "I have!" "Let me finish my sentence," quoth his Majesty. "Don't be in such haste, young Sirs, you are coming to your sentence fast enough. And you, Master Jailer, let me see no more winking and nodding, and sign-making to the young boy whom thou call'st Wilhelm, but who answers to the name of Max. Canst not thou let him go to the gallows his own way? Take care of thy own neck, Master Klaus, which may be in jeopardy here for playing fast and loose with thy prisoners. Hearken, young Sirs," pursued his Majesty, resuming the examination. "Which of ye hath a sister, the Frauline Agatha?" here he paused a moment, and both were preparing to answer, "I have;" the words were forming on each rosy mouth; when he continued deliberately-" who is in love with my aide-de-camp bere, the Baron Rosenthal ?" The reply, which, as I have said, hung trembling on either tongue, was suddenly cut short as the one face covered with blushes, after a shy stolen glance at the fellow culprit's half amused, half sympathizing countenance, seemed sinking to the ground with shame; whilst Rosenthal, provoked, astonished, and confused, looked almost as guilty as the prisoners. The King went on with his questions. "You have such a sister, then, as the young lady who is in love with the Baron? -eh? Did you speak, my Lord?" said Frederick, interrupting himself as Rosenthal, vexed at heart for the vexation of his blushing lady love, uttered an impatient quirk behind the royal chair. "Hum! I thought you wished to suggest some inquiry, Monsieur le Baron. You did not, you say? Well! then you have such a sister as this Frauline Agatha, the enamorata of the Baron here? And this leads us to the crime, for crime it is," continued Frederick, with a degree of seriousness which communicated a corresponding degree of apprehension to all who heard him. "Do you know any thing of this bit of paper?" asked he, sternly, producing from his pocket a scrap of writing, of which the top and the bottom and one corner seemed to be torn off. “Would you believe, gentlemen?" continued the Majesty of Prussia, turning rapidly from Major Kleinwitz to Baron Rosenthal; "would you think it possible that the son of a brave soldier like Lindorff, who died in my arms, on the field of battle-that his son, brought up in my household, treated as a child of my own, should write of me in terms like these? in terms amounting to treason," added he, waxing warmer as he described the guilt of the culprit. "Which of ye owns this scroll? Let none own it lightly, for it will be found to contain no slight matter. Read it, Kleinwitz. I picked it up myself under the boy's window at Potsdam. I know the writing well, having afore now employed the ingrate as my amanuensis. Read." He fixed his eyes on the culprits, who listened with surprise and alarm as Kleinwitz read. Thus ran the scroll: "So much for Rosenthal's petition, sweet sister, which I pray you to answer favorably. You cannot do otherwise, for I know that you have long loved him. For other matters we go on much as usuel. The tyrant ""Here said Kleinwitz, 66 some words are missing,-'got drubbed most famously last night by '" And here some more, Sire," continued Kleinwitz compasnately, "this scrawl is imperfect.' ** Go on!" was the stern command. "May this country soon be rid of him." "That meaning is plain enough, Major Kleinwitz. Is it not?" said the Monarch, coldly. "There is no riddle there. The treason is plain and simple, and so shall be the doom." "Suffer me to complete the sentence," said one of the culprits, producing from the page's dress a morsel of paper which exactly fitted the scrawl in question. "Sister!" cried Max in great perplexity, tugging at her sleeve-the sleeve of his own doublet upon Agatha's arm; "Sister, for Heaven's sake! better die!" "Better live, Max!" returned his sister, smiling. “I know what I'm about, and the truth shall out, the truth, and the whole truth, Max! Read, Major Kleinwitz. No, not that nonsense at the beginning," added she, with the renewal of the shamefacedness which did so much injustice to her page's attire. "No need to read that nonsense! Begin there" And the good natured commandant read: "We get on much as usual. The tyrant of [literature, Voltaire, got drubbed last night most famously by [our good old FritzBe it ominous, and the country soon rid of him [for ever." "Pardon, Sire, the impertinent expression! It was a boy's flippancy, repented as soon as written, torn away, and, as I believed, destroyed. Pardon that impertinence, and, above all, forgive her whose only fault was a too deep love of her twin brother. Pardon, Sire, I beseech thee." "Did old Fritz give Voltaire a sound drubbing, Max, in the match of wit we played the other night? Good faith, I believe "And thou wilt be glad to be he did!" chuckled the King. quit of him! Well, if that be the worst treason we meet with, the fortress of Spandau may go empty. Here is one fair prisonbreaker though," added he, drawing Agatha gently toward him, "and the best way to dispose of her will be to give her her choice of warders, Hans Klaus or Baron Rosenthal." ON A PORTRAIT OF LADY HUGH CAMPBELL. "Throw back the barriers!-Marshal, see Ring our defiance out:- This hand a charger rein, That still in light unrival'd flies By the sweet evening of those eyes, And morning of that brow! Who, Bright one! in the combat's wheel, Fling forth our challenge wide- Had, haply, been the guise But, wo for Beauty and for Bard, And Surrey's falchion gleam'd! We drink deep faith from yonder face, Of chivalry are gone, the grace And gladness still are ours. |