With her agitated and trembling companion, she hastened forward, and, now that the ardour of romantic impulse had subsided, beheld, with wonder, and a kind of shuddering sensation, the distance she had come in pursuit of the mysterious stranger.

Almost fearful she should discover him gliding through the gloom, or stealing forward from some one of the lonely buildings scattered through the garden, she scarcely ventured to look on either side.

The melancholy rustling of the boughs in the freshened air, the low murmurs of the breeze itself, the sudden flitting of the bat across the path, and the hoarse screams of the howlet, from its ivy-mantled haunt, did not tend to lessen this superstitious dread-a dread more painful, from being almost new to her, till the present moment.

But the instant she regained the castle, it was lost in the anxiety she felt for the promised relation of Olivia: seating herself beside her, with inward agitation, she prepared to listen to particulars, in which, from the expression that prefaced them, she had reason to believe herself deeply interested.

CHAP. XIV.

Our youth is like the dream of the hunter on the hill of heath; he sleeps in the mild beams of the sun; but he awakes amidst a storm; the red lightning flies around; and the trees shake their heads to the wind. He looks back with joy on the day of the sun, and the pleasant dreams of his rest.

OSSIAN.

"I CAN perceive by your manner," said Olivia, "that in the communication I am about making, you feel a persuasion of being more than slightly concerned; nor will you find yourself mistaken; but ere I enter upon those particulars which immediately concern you to know, 'tis necessary to touch upon others not so directly interesting." Then, after a transient pause, evidently occasioned by that emotion which the retrospect of sorrow awakens, she thus proceeded:

"The gloomy shades of night were descending fast, when in journeying across the Pyrenees, a young knight and his squire found themselves bewildered in the difficult and dangerous passes of these mountains; deep woods rendered impenetrable to the eye by the darkness of the hour, spread around them; and their awful shudderings, as the breezes swept through them, mingled with the howlings of distant wolves, and the angry noise of dashing torrents, rendered still more unpleasant the sensation produced by the circumstance.

"Irresolute how to act, whether to remain station

ary till morning, or by advancing run the risk of encountering perhaps more certain danger, they had nearly checked their horses, when suddenly a long streaming beam of light came trembling through the gloom; hailing it as their polar star, they directly advanced in the direction in which it came; and after penetrating a little way through the trees, found themselves before the gates of an ancient edifice, rising high above them-gates which were instantly thrown open, on their request for admission; and while the attendant was committed to the care of the domestics, the knight was conducted to the hall, where the noble owners of the castle, together with their son, a youth nearly the age of the knight himself, were seated at supper.

"Their reception of him was at once polite and hospitable, such as in a few minutes to make him feel himself perfectly at home; and the gratitude it inspired was still further increased, by a pressing invitation to remain where he was, till entirely recovered from the fatigue he gave them to understand he had lately gone through, an invitation which his immediate prepossession in their favour, or rather the wish it excited for an opportunity of cultivating their friendship, induced him to accept.

All around him wore an appearance of magnificence, but a magnificence too evidently on the decline, not rather to chill than exalt the feelings. The rich tapestry with which the walls were hung, wore the faded hue of neglect and time; the portraits of the ancient chieftains of the family seemed ready to fall from their once burnished frames; the velvet coverings of the couches were moth-eaten; the ornaments of the fretted roof decayed; the attendants, though numerous, were indifferently clad; and all, in short, appeared indicative of one of these mourn

ful revolutions in the fortunes of the house, from which none are exempt.

"Led, by the sympathetic feeling the persuasion of this excited, to observe still more attentively his entertainers, Sir Lorenzo, so this young knight was named, soon fancied he perceived strong indications of unhappiness in their looks and manner, evident proofs of their not being in possession of that felicity, which, as far as he could judge, they appeared eminently deserving of.

"At length the hour for retiring arrived, and with a mind oppressed with melancholy sensations, he was conducted to the chamber prepared for him, and there left to his repose; but this was by no means as perfect as from his fatigue might have been expected; the impression made on his mind, by the events of the day, affected him while sleeping; and, at an early hour, he gladly abandoned his restless couch, for the enjoyment of the morning air, the contemplation of the various beauties that attend the opening dawn.

"The clouds breaking from the mountains, drawing their misty veil from the face of nature, and revealing her in blushes, presented a sight to his enchanted eye, which, accompanied as it was by the warblings of early birds, the faint and nearly indistinct tinklings of distant sheep-bells, and the responsive lowings of cattle from the deep vallies scattered among these mountains, elevated him to rapture.

"Impatient to enjoy at large the charms of the hour, he descended to the court of the castle, whence he had a perfect view of the building, which the hour at which he had gained admission to it prevented his then having; and by the morning beam that played upon its rude old battlements, and with transitory splendour lighted up its antique windows, perceived that it was only at a distance it could appear formi

dable, the dilapidations of time being every where preceptible.

"But from the contemplation of its mouldering grandeur he was quickly called by the surrounding scenery, which, as the sun ascended, displayed every moment new beauties. Here his beams streaming through the divisions in the mountains, showed their due perspective, and chequered the intervals between them with gold-there the light falling strong behind the castle, brought distant objects to view, through the sheltered walls of its remote towers.

"Wrapt in the feelings it inspired-feelings he involuntarily contrasted with the languid ones produced by the dull and unvarying pleasures of magnificence, Sir Lorenzo wandered onward, almost unconsciously, till he came, to a green platform, midway a steep and hollow path, winding to the bottom of the acclivity on which the castle stood, and immediately before the mouth of a cave, overgrown with ivy and fern, intermingled with myrtles, jessamine, and other luxuriant and odoriferous shrubs, and where the humming of the mountain bee met his delighted ear, luxuriating in the wild sweets that overspread the cliffs, and which here shooting to an immense height, were rendered still more picturesque by the goats that browzed upon them, and here and there, leaning down the steep abyss, seemed to hang in air.

"Here spread on either side the dusky forests of intermingled beech, pine, and chesnut, whose savage wildness, and fearful gloom, had appeared so terrific to his imagination the preceding night; nor could he wonder at the effect their brown horrors had then had upon it, since even now they were appalling.

"He was about examining the cave, when the sight of a lady, in an attitude of devotion, at a rude altar nearly opposite the entrance, checked him from