'My friend, it is precisely because I confess myself to be a mere worm, sinful beyond measure, that I refuse to do what you would approve of. Shall I go on pardoning? I, who have no reason to suppose that anything less than my most earnest efforts will keep me out of mortal sin myself, much less let me help out others? No, I do trespass, but I will not double that by allowing you to trespass.'

'And suppose that those villas and estates were not your late brother's to give me, and are not yours to take from me? Do not be too hasty,' urges Maffeo.

'Precisely,' is the reply. Here is a letter I have just received, in which the Pope informs me that you are believed to have murdered the daughter of my elder brother, who would have been his heir. The Pontiff urges me to take all pains to bring you to justice, and recover all that infant's inheritance to the Church. While you are gnawing your fingers, Maffeo, the police are sealing up your papers, and I have only to raise my voice in order to bring in my servants from the next room to take care of you. You had better confess everything, and not make me raise my voice. Of course, it is the old story. The wicked uncle makes himself heir to his deceased brother by having the child, who is the rightful heir, murdered; and such ruffians as you, Maffeo, become his tools. Come, did you stab my niece, or throttle her, fourteen years ago?'

'Tell so old a story, and tell it no better!' sneers Maffeo. 'When did such a tool ever work as the wicked uncle wished? The child always smiles in the ruffian's face; or rather, he is not fool enough to put himself in the uncle's power so completely. He lets the little girl live, and keeps her under a false name, ready to be brought forward whenever he finds it for his interest.'

Here the Bishop strikes Maffeo and gives him the lie, but he says coolly, 'Ah! so a father might chastise his son. I shall sleep soundly to-night at least. What a life I have led! I did not dare to make use of half of my riches. And there was Carlo of Cesina coming to me three times a-year for the annuity I promised him if he would keep the secret, and threatening to tell it all to the good bishop. Listen a moment. You are no dastardly idiot like your late brother, whom I frightened to death. You have only to keep quiet, and let me get her out of the way for you. Don't speak! The less you know about it the better. Of course I don't mean to kill her. But at Rome the Cyprians do not live more than three years, and I can easily entice her there. In fact I have begun operations already. It is only a gay little Pippa who winds silk in the mills. I saw her this very morning. Hitherto I have kept her out of harm's way, and now I will take care that she does not trouble you. I have hired some other girls to

tell her that a rich Englishman has fallen in love with her. There is a handsome fellow from that country here ready to act the part. I see that you assent-no, I don't mean that exactly-I mean that you are willing to keep quiet, until I can turn my property into ready money and cross the Alps. The little Pippa is easily entangled through her singing. Is it a bargain?'

There is a silence, which seems like consent, but it is broken by the voice of Pippa, who sings on the doorstep below:

'Overhead the tree-tops meet,

Flowers and grass spring 'neath one's feet;
There was nought above me, nought below,
My childhood had not learned to know :
For, what are the voices of birds

-Ay, and of beasts,—but words, our words,
Only so much more sweet?

The knowledge of that with my life begun.

But I had so near made out the sun,

And counted your stars, the seven and one,

Like the fingers of my hand :

Nay, I could all but understand

Wherefore through heaven the white moon ranges ;

And just when out of her soft fifty changes

No unfamiliar face might overlook me—

Suddenly God took me.'*

Pippa's uncle calls in his servants at once to gag the tempter and carry him to prison. Then he falls on his knees, saying, 'Lord, be merciful to me a sinner!'

* Ibid. p. 282.

The noise of this arrest alarms the girls, who flee in all directions, leaving Pippa to go home in safety. She wonders whether they are telling her the truth about the Englishman, and is sure that at all events she will not take their advice to dress herself more showily, and spend more money for food and wine. This might do well enough in summer, but winter is always sure to come. She has picked a double heartsease in Ottima's garden, and, as she puts it beside her own lily, she fancies that a king of the flowers might hold a girl-show, and exhibit such a girl as she has just left, after feeding her until her cheeks are twice the former size, and letting her drink rich wine until her nose is red as carmine.

She has spent the day in imagining herself, Ottima, Phene, Luigi, his mother, and the Bishop, and she wonders if she can ever come near enough to any of these people to do them any good, for she has felt no sign of this as she passed by them. Perhaps she may yet .do something for them, wind the silk which will embroider the hem of Ottima's robe, for instance. So she lies down to rest, utterly unconscious how that day her singing has shaped their future and her own, and goes to sleep, singing

'All service ranks the same with God-
With God, whose puppets, best and worst,

172

THE RETURN OF THE DRUSES.

THE

PRELIMINARY NOTE.

HE Druse religion still flourishes on Mount Lebanon and in other parts of Syria, and is believed to be secretly maintained in Egypt, where it was first taught at the beginning of the eleventh century, and during the reign of a crazy Caliph, who called himself Hakeem Biamrallah, that is, He who Judges by the Order of God. This sovereign was noted for his innovations and his zeal for moral and religious reforms. He took the severest measures to check intemperance and profligacy, and persecuted both Jews and Christians cruelly. Indeed the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was destroyed by him. In 1016, however, he came under the influence of two mystics, who were developing Islamism into a new religion, Hamza and Darazi. The latter seems to have given his name to the Druses. Hakeem was led by these teachers to give up all the observances peculiar to Mahometanism and to proclaim full toleration, not only for its various sects, but also for the Jews and Christians, since all other beliefs and worships seemed to him only pre