into the delicious mangava. This suggested to Chevalier de Claussin, an ingenious and scientific Frenchman, resident in Guiana, that the sap was largely constituted of starch. By various chemical experiments he at last succeeded in producing from it a substance wonderfully resembling ebonite, a transformation of caoutchouc, which was one of the most wonderful discoveries of Mr. Goodyear. It is doubtful, though, whether this French experiment will have much value in the practical arts. The supply of caoutchouc will probably always dominate the markets of the civilized world in relation to all those manufactures depending on the classes of gums of which we have treated.

Ο

CHAPTER II.

THER tourists come now to visit the palace, and Cecile is reduced speedily to the manners of an orthodox young lady.

In this cabinet, we are told, did Knox come in answer to the queen's summons, and here, in language ungarnished by court flattery, and ingenuous with dislike, did he defy her displeasure. Here did Rizzio play lackey to her will, and Darnley alternately cringe and bully; and here, surrounded by her four Maries, did the loveliest and most fascinating woman of her age wrestle hourly with Fate.

Out these windows did she gaze, through these doors did she pass, and one might imagine that the rush of the wind, as a window is opened to admit fresh air, is made by the sweep of her ghostly dress.

We penetrate presently beyond into the bedroom, where hang the portraits of the queen and her rival Elizabeth; and on the north side is a doorway, half concealed by tapestry, barred as the one below, and through which we see the secret stairs go winding down into a pit of black nothing

ness.

"Those bars aren't so close together; so I didn't have so much trouble in getting through."

Cecile laughs merrily in the guide's very face.

The room is desolate-bare as to floor, and full of echoes. There is dust, and plenty of it, upon the faded hangings of the bed; there are cobwebs wedding the panels overhead; there are grim shadows huddling wherever they can; and when we look for cheer at the window in the recess, it lets in only light which seems wet and gray with fog fresh from the sea.

The only bright thing is Cecile, and I know that the centenarian spiders long to drop on her fair head.

Almost joining the doorway opening out upon the secret stair is another, and through this we now pass from the royal bedchamber directly into the queen's supping-closet, a turret-room, where, crouching behind Mary and clinging to her dress, the poor Italian

begged for mercy, and from which he was hustled screaming to his death.

We stand in the little room mute with thought and sick at heart. The spiders are spinning here, too, their webs over the frames on the walls, from which the silken hangings, that became so well the queen's complexion, are dropping shred by shred.

Here Ruthven, fresh from his victim, came reeling and demanding his cup of wine, and here the candle-light shone that night upon her despairing face, and upon the table overthrown at her feet.

The guide allows us to think a while, and then awakens each by stating that the stain made by Rizzio's blood is still to be seen at the head of the staircase just outside the cabinet-door.

"These rooms are haunted, are they not?" asks Cecile, almost begging him to say yes with her face. "The driver said so."

"He only said so because he wanted a shilling for his pains," says Mrs. Hogarth, in derision. But the guide answers to Cecile's gratification that uncanny blue lights flame out from these windows at night, especially from this one in the turret-room, and that voices are heard sometimes, and the sound of fighting feet.

We have looked at the dark stain, and are now seeking the Chapel Royal. In coming down-stairs Dundas somehow has gotten ahead, or we have lagged, or perhaps both, and I am now left quite alone with the woman I love.

"Am I to do all this for you and go unrewarded?"

I look down at her steadily until she looks up. Many a girl would know at once what I mean, and many a one would go all the way through life without ever having a spark of the pure light in her eyes that shines up at me now from Cecile's.

"No, indeed. I'd do as much for you." "Would you? Then will you give me any thing I ask for if I outlive the ghosts?" "Yes-only I haven't much to give away." The answer, although I put it by to remember, hurts me, and when we come as we do now again in sight of Dundas, I feel like putting a bullet through him.

We are in the roofless nave of the chapel, with the ivy creeping up to look over on all sides -a tapestry-frame old nearly as the walls, but with patterns born anew upon it every now and then.

Dundas is inspecting a door through which we are told the conspirators, on that wild March night, ascended secretly to the presence of Darnley.

We loiter a while to tread the flat, vaultstones that cover the bones of old Scottish

I want to find out whether they really are haunted. Won't you come if I tease you long enough?”

"Yes, if you will tease until we get back safe to New York. I wouldn't miss gratifying you for the world."

"It is hateful of you to laugh at me. You're afraid, if you won't do it when I beg so."

"Yes, I'm afraid. Ask Schuyler." "I would if I thought he'd say yes." "No matter whether you ask me or not, I will do it for you, just to show, of course, that I am not afraid." "Really?" Really."

"You will come here in the night-time," she says, under her breath, for Dundas has thrown his thumb toward the guide, warning her that he ought not to hear, "and stay here in the dark and listen and keep your eyes open?"

"Yes, if you won't consent to my going to sleep when the ghosts do."

Mrs. Hogarth is a little ahead with the guide, in search of the apocryphal blood. stain in the floor, and, just as we are quitting the desolate, ghostly rooms, Cecile turns to have another look at them.

trodden upon that the dates are nearly all illegible, and we place ourselves-Cecile and I-by chance upon the very spot where, at daybreak, Mary, attired as if prophetically in mourning, wedded Darnley.

When I tell this to Cecile she starts away from the spot to stare at it from afar, as though a masked headsman stood there, poising a burnished axe upon his shoulder.

After studying for a while the shattered peers, the fleur-de-lis tracery, the double row of arcades, we wander out through the doorway of the old chapel to examine the fountain in front of the palace, and the old dial.

As we enter the carriage, Cecile turns to look once more at the windows from which Mary Stuart used to gaze out upon the wild world of those days.

"If I were a man," she says, throwing herself back on her seat quite exhausted with thought, "I should just want to live here where she did, and spend my life in thinking of her."

"Well, I don't know. My hair might be modest, and change color at it."

"Don't you believe in ghosts?"
"No-I really don't."

"Wouldn't you believe if you saw one?" "No, I can safely say that, as I shall never be tried."

"Don't be so sure."

can tick, under the aged stone balcony of Murray House, which also overhangs the street, and where the foes of Montrose stood, long ago, mocking him as he passed.

We do the castle thoroughly, enjoy the view once more, and return, as it were, to the side issues of the old city-to the different localities of interest that we have hitherto been so eager to slight.

In the Grass-Market an uncanny old crone, for a shilling, sings one or two weird Gaelic songs of the bride being dragged by her phantom lover to the ship that was never built by mortal hands; of the battle so red with blood, which drove the girl of Tantallon crazy, to haunt the ruins of the castle of the Douglases to this day.

Now a Highlander in a bonnet and tartan skirls on his pipes for Cecile a love-strain that touches her, for her eyes grow big and dark, and she leans forward to listen, with parted lips, when suddenly instead comes the plaintive coranach of a clan bearing their chief, rolled in a plaidie, to his grave.

When we return to the hotel for a late luncheon, we find Dundas's friends the Hagues already arrived, and I begin now to understand Cecile's allusion to the tribe of Ephraim. Besides mater and pater familias are two daughters and one son, while later in the evening this party is augmented by the arrival of another son and his comrade, who have been coming through the Trosachs on foot to meet them here.

Evidently, Cecile is influenced by jealousy of one of the daughters in her willful depreciation of these people, for, as far as I can see, they are fairly refined, and intelligent, and objectionable in no positive way. Annie Hague, whom Dundas sits by at table, is neither plain nor pretty, but good-humored to a tiresome extent; and Cecile, in having nothing to be jealous of, displays her woman nature in taking extra trouble on that account to be so.

At dinner, which we partake of at adjoining tables, each one has some different experience in traveling to relate; and when it comes Cecile's turn, she gives a minute and graphic description of her favorite Holyrood.

This brings us, of course, to the subject of ghosts again, and I am not permitted long to imagine that Cecile has in the least forgotten my rash promise to dare them for her sake. When she remembers, and taxes me with it, although I declare myself ready to stand the trial, I suggest that it may yet be an impossible thing for me to do, as, of course, after nightfall, no one would be permitted by the authorities to enter the pal

-ace.

thereat, I am fearful and jealous all at once, lest he is trying to step in and crowd me out from my voluntary position in the matter.

My suspicions as to his jealousy of me are strengthened when morning comes; he seems to avoid asking me to stroll out with him before the ladies are ready for the sightseeing, and starts off with one of the Hagues instead.

When he returns, however, he has walked off his spleen, and relapses into his usual spirit of camaraderie.

It comes out before long that he has been interviewing, at Cecile's request, our guide of yesterday, and has succeeded, by offering him a large bribe, in winning him over to her

cause.

"He says the only way for you to do is to go to the palace as late in the afternoon as the rules for visiting allow, and remain behind when the gates are closed. You can quit the palace the next morning when he comes with the keys."

"That isn't much to go through with to see a ghost," Cecile coaxes.

"No indeed. But it is a great deal to undergo and be disappointed. Now, if you would only promise me just one ghost-one would do I couldn't demur."

"Well, I can't do that, you know-not exactly-but I will promise, perhaps, to make it worth your while;" and Dundas frowns at her suddenly, for she is looking up at me so coquettishly and slyly that my thoughts revert unwillingly to the scene of yesterday, when I pleaded so against going unrewarded.

The serene light has quite gone out of her eyes indeed.

"She is trifling," is my sober secondthought; but I never know what becomes of my intoxicated first one.

"You'd better put off going until to-morrow night," says Dundas; we have so much to do and see to-day."

Dundas, ever since his return, has been very devoted to Cecile, following her about when she is not following him, and talking with her in affectionate undertones, until I am tingling to my fingers' ends with a nervous desire to make a fool of myself in some way.

"Put it off altogether," I say, in a temper that I am fighting hard not to show. "I But Cecile is never at a loss for expedi- think I will back out after all."

⚫ents.

"Rob will find out some way," she says, and then the Hague sisters join in their entreaties until they spoil the whole thing.

Later I see Dundas propitiate her by abandoning Miss Hague for a time, and, putting her hand through his arm, walk with her up and down the corridor. I see Cecile grow flushed, and excitedly answer something he is saying. I begin to grow sick Iwith the idea that she loves him with her whole heart, after all, since he can turn her so with a touch or a word.

I rejoice in the chance to do something for her that he is too lazy and indifferent to do, and, although in one way I rebel somewhat against the effect of my own impetuosity of the morning, yet now, as I see them together, he dawning out from one of his taciturn moods, and she feverish with delight

"Oh, no, no!" cries Cecile, in a sort of enthusiastic terror, while Dundas bites his lip suddenly and turns his back, a movement so suggestive of a reciprocity in my own feelings of jealous restlessness that I am twinged all over with a species of satanic delight. "Oh, do not disappoint me, Mr. Schuyler! Nobody would do it for me but you-not even Rob."

And I am quite peaceful again in the thought of being able to please her, and in having startled Dundas anew into the conviction that he has somebody in me to fear and defy.

All day long Cecile keeps up her coaxing, alternately demure and mischievous, now exciting, now allaying my suspicions that she is making game of me to win Dundas back from his devotion to Miss Hague.

As for Dundas, he seems to avoid, since!

my sudden outbreak and her tender treatment of it, all intercourse with either Cecile or me, and acts as though he had begun in real earnest to understand the situation, and was trying to pique Cecile by showing of what very little moment he considered it.

Only once or twice after we have returned from our sight-seeing for the day I find the two haunting corners, probably effecting a reconciliation, and disappearing like shadows at my unexpected approach.

I hate them quickly at this, and myself unmitigatedly, when I reflect that I am being used as a decoy, one for the other; and I hasten to resent in the next breath my own suspicion by adding color to Dundas's possible one in a wholesale devotion to Cecile.

In the mean time there is a great deal of frolicking in the party since the Hagues have joined, and Cecile is in her element. She orders the Hague men, just fresh from college, about as though they were born vassals to her, and the young ladies ape her manners and costumes with a minuteness that is positively ridiculous. As we become better acquainted with each other, practical jokes become a rage; and Cecile, whose inventive genius is a new revelation to me, devises all sorts of tricks, and executes them with the skill and assurance of a prestidigitator.

The second day after the arrival of the Hagues the entire party spend in driving out of town among the environs of green trees and greener grass that are kept so continually sea-christened by the fogs that roll in almost hourly from the Firth.

As we start off, Cecile, who is as usual all aglow with restrained excitement, says to me: "We are going to keep you quiet to-day by taking you to see the cows and sheep on the hill-sides; so that, if you do see a ghost tonight, it won't be one of an excited imagination."

"The only way for me to get out of the scrape is by hiring a boy to play in the cellar of Holyrood to-day with a match and some pine-shavings."

"Oh, no!" cries Miss Hague, "you must not do that, for we haven't seen Holyrood yet, and we've been saving it for the very last, so as to have an excuse to take and leave you there. You wouldn't be cruel enough to disappoint us all now, and the ghost, too?"

"Don't worry, Helena. Mr. Schuyler hasn't the slightest intention of doing so. He is as good as his word."

"Yes, too good to be true," I answer, in a state of mental parallax; for, although I would thoroughly enjoy disappointing Miss Hague, on the other hand every thing Cecile says is so like the tick of a clock that, whatever language it may possess for others, I can suit my imagination to it with a precision of meaning that insures my deference and eagerness to be accommodating.

I continue in this sing-song condition of good-nature all day, for it seems to me that I have every thing my own way, and that out of sheer sympathy with my happiness the sun lags in rolling up-hill, and the fog even is considerate, and does not once display its wet blanket.

We drive from out the shadow of the city's

high, black roofs into the country-side, where we find the grass so tender and vividly green that one is nearly provoked into tasting it; and its smooth surface, rounding everywhere, is only broken at long distances by a show of sterile soil that is kept prickly with furze, and as a fine cover for game, and where we see the tenderer shoots browsed upon by the wandering sheep and cattle.

We drive to Craigmillar Castle, and over these feudal ruins Cecile is ecstasied; for here she again finds traces of Mary Stuart in its embattled walls and square, high keep, that the driven queen so loved to take shelter in. The ivy is wandering all over the old stones that peep out, hoary and grim with story, from between the light, soothing touches of leaves to drop their sands of time, as it were, gravely one by one down into the moat dried in a flowering hollow at their feet.

As we have brought luncheon with us, we picnic on the slope of the castle, from which we may see the low country stretching, crisp with tender, moist verdure, toward the sombre smoke of the city.

In the valley just below a loch lies still in a wicker work of willow and chestnut trees; the flying hair of the willows shimmering alternately green and white in the breeze over the rushes on the shore, and the swans, never tired of kissing their own wraiths, floating just under in the gray, chill water.

It is late in the afternoon when we bestir ourselves for a return to the city.

"All ho for Holyrood!" cries Cecile."Now, Mr. Schuyler, you have rested so long that you won't need to rest to-night, and you must promise not to let the ghost have any rest either."

"Am I not to be allowed to return to the hotel first?" I inquire, with solicitude. "Really, you do not mean to dump me in that forsaken old palace dinnerless. If you should do such a thing, your conscience would make you more uneasy than the ghosts will me to-night."

"No, indeed. There is some luncheon left in the basket, and you shall have that. Don't make up a wry face, for it isn't all cake, by a good deal. There's a game-pie for you, and you really can't find fault with that. If we let you go to the hotel for dinner, you couldn't get into the palace at all."

"Well, then, I'll give Dundas the gamepie, and I'll go home to dinner with you."

"You are only talking for effect. I am going to take you straight to Holyrood and leave you behind."

"Leave me behind!" I echo, lugubriously. "Indeed, my shadow is the only thing I ever leave behind under such circumstances, for it can live without dining."

"Well, we won't talk about it," says Cecile, just as she might coax a child to have a tooth pulled; "we'll just go and see how it is, and then if at the last moment you are really frightened, why, you needn't stay- that's all."

The tone of her voice is suddenly become so conservative with age and experience, that I feel it might be proper for her to add to its effect by patting me encouragingly on the head.

To favor the possibility, I duck it toward her, whereupon she laughs aloud, and Dundas turns to look the other way, with the same stoical expression that he has been cultivating for the last forty-eight hours.

I am enjoying this day thoroughly in having made two men more miserable than they would have been had the force of circumstance left me entirely out of the census returns in my native country some twenty-eight years ago.

Foster is the other man, the comrade of the younger Hague in his walk through the Trosachs to join the family here; and I am so delighted to find one clinging to a lower round of the ladder than I that, perhaps in order to establish a precedent for future use, I begin to regard Dundas's claim upon Cecile's favor more impartially, and to tread my own ground well over before precipitating

matters.

It is a glorious drive back to Holyrood from the castle, with Cecile lying opposite against the cushions, her cheeks throbbing color anew with every breath, and a mischievous light kept hidden by the half-dropped eyelids.

Back from the ivied walls of Craigmillar; past the gardens that make the air drunk with the sweet smell of fruit-blossoms, to the music of drumming-bees, the whistling of myriad birds, as if there were one for every leaf, and the singing of the insects all astir.

The distant hills are purple with heather and flushed gold on their tops, and the smoke of the heath-fires goes up unfolding like white wings, and is lost.

In the distance the battlemented towers of Holyrood come rearing up into sight, and from here they look wet and black with yesterday's fog and to-day's desolation.

We are a little in advance of the remainder of the party, who are following in carriages, and I am glad, for now I can be almost alone with Cecile in the old palace for just one little while.

Our guide of the other day, according to orders received from Dundas, I suppose, is on the lookout for us, and seems as innocent and uninterested as men usually do when they have been bribed to the extent of rea

son.

As we enter the court-yard, Dundas lounges off with him to one side as though only to inspect the pediment on the east side, upon which are sculptured the royal arms of Britain, and I am left to escort Mrs. Hogarth and Cecile up-stairs.

When we reach the top of the stairs we only give one peep into the picture-gallery, and then Mrs. Hogarth, who really looks pale and fatigued, and therefore never so handsome to my eyes, sinks upon a chair and increases her comeliness by declaring that she can go not a step farther.

So, as this chair upon which she reposes happens to be on the landing, just outside the audience-chamber to Darnley's suite, Cecile and I are permitted to wander on alone into the dusty square of uncarpeted room.

As we enter there is a scare of echoes, that the old tapestry smothers a little, and it sounds exactly as though the ghosts of dead

and-gone courtiers were scampering away at our approach, and hitting the floor and their heels with their dangling rapiers at every step in their flight. When we stop by the window, the clang stops too, and then, a little after, there is a duller clatter from outside as the carriages left behind drive up to the entrance and are brought to a turn.

Queen Mary's picture hangs on the wall, just over Cecile's bright head, as I stand with my heart in my eyes looking down upon her, and for a background she has a bit of old tapestry, that sets her forth like a flower with the dew fresh upon it, the stitches and colors are so old, and dingy, and motheaten.

Upon the tapestry are embroidered little Cupids that toss grapes down from the vines, to other Cupids playing upon the ground; and as these snatch the grapes to suck them, they do not become more drunk than do I, draining thirstily all the joy out of this moment alone with the woman who stands here within reach of my arms.

She is fretting with color, and her hands clasp nervously one over the other. She is half-turning aside from me, as though eager to run away and no longer possessing the power; she parts her lips that grow pale now, but not to speak. Only a breath since she was laughing and defying me, and acting like a child that can never grow old. And now my eyes are aging ber, and the silence is calling her by the name of woman-and she is facing for the first time a fright that is only terrible in its sudden sweetness.

I forget Dundas. I step, almost without being aware, forward to touch and make it real to her. I begin to say something that is almost inarticulate, when I am startled back by the sound of feet upon the landing running this way, and the voice of Miss Hague crying, "Oh, where is Cecile? I really must tell her quick, or I shall die!"

When the voice is followed in by the owner of it, we are far apart-Cecile staring vacantly at an old shaky screen, and I examining another bit of tapestry on the other side of the room.

All about us the echoes, sympathizing with my state of mind, go screaming back at the high-pitched staccato temper of Miss Hague's voice.

"Cecile-oh, I've the greatest joke to tell you! What do you think? Mr. Foster has been imagining all along that you are engaged to Mr. Dundas, and he wouldn't believe me in the carriage when I told him the truth. Mamma and sister had to assure him over and over again that you were not."

The hanging of tapestry that I have been so rudely shocked into examining has trees upon it, and in long perspective a street which goes wandering away, with people crossing and recrossing as though trying to be on both sides at one and the same time.

My vision becomes suddenly irresponsible and dazed into a state of ceaseless multiplication. The figures on the tapestry are included in this abbreviated process in which they repeat themselves in a truly uncertain and bewildering result.

"It is a ridiculous mistake, and one that I am quite tired of," I hear Cecile's voice

"And have you made the same mistake? Oh, you could not; you are not so stupid as Mr. Foster!"

"Yes, I am, in one way, and all about you. You don't mean to tell me that Dundas is is your half-brother. If you do "-I catch my breath, for her face is crimson, and mine all aglow-" what a donkey I've been !"

The whole pack of them are upon us now, and we are separated in the crowd, so I take the first opportunity to get rid of this singing in my head by slipping down-stairs and out into the fresh air.

When Dundas comes to seek me I am pacing up and down the roofless nave of the old chapel, with the shine from the setting sun flashing through the aged doorway upon my face as I turn, and the grass pushing up from between the vault stones like green nerves reaching out in uneasy filaments for the light, standing erect again after every tread.

"What are you doing here, Schuyler?" he says, in a restrained sort of way, which may mean one thing or another. "You mustn't try to skulk now at the last moment, for, if you do intend any venture of the kind,, I will bring up the rear with a vengeance."

"I may be dumb, but I will not be driven. Go back to where you came from, and stay there."

"Do you know that we have only ten minutes left, and at the end of that time the rest of us must be out of the palace?"

"Very well, lead on. How you are taking for granted that I will not follow!"

In all my life I have never been so near embracing one of my own sex, and in my foolish excess of desire I am so afraid that I may make a guy of myself if I do not administer a hasty snub to the situation that now I am stilting my phraseology in a way calculated to set Dundas's wits agog with conjecture as to the provocation of it.

I see him look me stealthily in the face, as though uncertain as to whether a handclasp or a blow is the chrysalis inclosed in this transparent covering of restraint, and I am not more silent than he, as I follow him through the court-yard and up the flight of storied stairs.

As we go we hear their voices ever above us, and, when we reach the second landing, where the round stain of Rizzio's blood upon the floor seems to act as a full stop to further ascent, through the doorway to the queen's cabinet we see them flitting about, irreverently awakening the echoes that do penance for naving belonged to Mary Stuart by never be ing allowed to sleep.

Cecile is not here, but I find her soon in the royal bedchamber, seated in a cavernous arm-chair, that is speechless with the glory

of having been embroidered by Mary's own industrious fingers, and which now, grotesque with age, serves as a throne for the reclining figure of my fair young girl.

I am frantic with longing to say just one word alone to her, and I hover about, ever alert to take advantage of any lapse in their seeming vigilance, for all at once they are possessed of a spirit of conspiracy, as it were, to prevent my getting near enough even to touch my hand to her chair. It is not long before I begin to hate everybody in the world but Cecile, and in the midst of their verbal clatter I become speechless and morose with imagining how different it all might be at this moment if they would only leave her here with me; how as she sits there in the dusk of her throne, like a white lily laid against black velvet, I might go to her, and, kneeling with my face upon her folded hands, tell her my story.

"You are looking dreadfully worried, Mr. Schuyler," says Miss Hague; "I do believe you are getting afraid. For shame- for shame a big man like you!"

"You know this is the room where the ghosts come," adds her younger sister, for fear that for one instant I may be left in peace; "if you don't stay here all the time, the guide says you won't see any. So, if you don't see any, we shall know that you have run."

"If you find the horns of the dilemma one too many for you, toot the extra one out the window," says Dundas, grimly smiling at me," and you will have the town about your ears in good earnest."

In the midst of it, the guide comes to say that it is high time for those who intend going to be gone, and then the luncheonbasket is brought in, and as Cecile continues seated, an unusual repose for her, and I lean up against one of the rickety bedposts, the Hague sisters spread hastily out upon a table the ruins left of our noonday meal, the gamepie having been alone left untouched. But I do not even complain at this; indeed, I am being led so meekly by the ear that, under ordinary circumstances, I would be inclined to make as much sport as possible out of it; but the idea of allowing Cecile to go away and be separated from her an entirety of twelve hours with all these thoughts unborn, yet in words strangling me, suffices to stun my appreciation of the frolic, and to make my cheeks hot and my eyes burn with an intolerable indignation at the nonsense of the whole situation.

I shall never forget how Cecile drags herself up from her dusky seat, in a tired way that I have never known her to affect before, nor how, without a word either of cheer or | farewell, she passes me by and is gone. Just as I am about to defy them all and follow af ter, the rest of them string after her one by one like an interminable flock of sheep-and I am left alone with the guide and Dundas. I awake with a start now to the knowledge that the latter has been regarding my melodramatic lounge against the bedpost, my frowning face and crossed arms, for some little time attentively.

"You really don't feel like backing out now?" he asks, soberly.

"Don't stand there asking me questions. If you'll stay to dinner it's all right; but, if you intend to go, you'd better be about it. I don't want to see any thing more of you till daylight."

"I hope the gentleman has no fire-arms about him," says the guide, anxiously, while Dundas all of a sudden looks me squarely and keenly in the face, as though not caring to question me again aloud. "He knows I'm taking a good deal of responsibility, and it would not be well to have any thing of that kind going on in case the ghosts should be out."

Dundas motions the guide to the door, and we are left alone.

"Here is a pocket-pistol for you "-he hands me a flask-"I'll exchange with you if you are carrying any of the other kind."

But we do not exchange, for I take his and have none to give in return, and I laugh, for the first time in an hour, at his daring in having even suggested that I might consider such a precaution necessary.

I have the last word, and then I am left to listen to the rat-tatting of their boots across the floor of the outer room and down the stairs until the clang-to of the heavy door opening below into the quadrangle tells me that I am alone in the grim old palace.

I do not realize the enormity of it yet, for I am hastening to the western window to watch with a hot heart how Cecile has gotten away into her corner of the carriage, and, when she turns her face up, I feel exactly as though we were looking straight into each other's eyes.

This sensation keeps me warm some time after I have lost all trace of her, even to the last echo of the wheels, and the thick, soft silence crawls over the fire and tumult of my brain.

After a while there is a stab of sound made by footsteps upon the flags in the quadrangle below, and soon the guide, in company with two others, passes the window to cross the square and enter one of the ancient houses that opposite begin the Canongate.

NANNCHEN OF MAYENCE.

FROM THE GERMAN OF BERTHOLD AUERBACH.

H

I.

ER name is Nannchen, and I will gladly tell her story.

Nannchen is certainly not a remarkable name in Mayence; many girls bear it. But Nannchen Becker is a remarkable girl, not on account of her beauty or her well-developed, powerful figure—there are many beautiful girls in Mayence, especially in Gartenfeld, where our Nannchen lives-but she has a specially brave nature, and, above all, can laugh so that it makes one's heart swell for joy; and when she laughs her face breaks into so many mirthful hues, especially around her brown eyes, that it is a pleasure to see her. She inherits her powerful figure from her father, Becker the porter, who works in unloading the steamers that ply up and down the Rhine, and is a noticeable personage. He

a mortal enemy of cigars; he declares that cigar-smoking spoils the taste of wine-a good does far less harm.

right shoulder free to bear burdens. His figure would be much taller if he did not walk with a slight stoop, in consequence of the many loads he has carried, for whenever any thing is too difficult for others to lift, they always say, "Call Becker." He is always at hand, and, when he grasps an object, it seems as if his fingers were pincers, and woe betide him who irritates Becker to deal him a blow with his huge fist! But he is as good-natured as a child, and knows how to control himself like a man, for he is afraid of himself, of his own strength; he knows he cannot control it if it breaks loose.

The life led by the porters on the banks of the Rhine is a singular one. They often lie about for hours on bales of goods, handcarts, or even in sheds, and, as the saying goes, stand gaping about, and if a passer-by cracks a joke with them, or has any thing ridiculous in his appearance, sharp and witty speeches rain upon him from all sides. Becker rarely takes part in this sport; only when -our story took place in the year 1860-the Prussians are censured he joins in the abuse with a few powerful words; but usually he only nods his huge head, covered with thick, bushy hair. He is no friend of many words, and moreover knows that he is somewhat unskillful in the use of them. His special glory consists in having once won a wager. It was said that no one could carry a cannonball on his shoulder. Becker laid a wager that he could do it, and won the bet. But he does not like to hear of this feat, and almost deuies it, for the witnesses who were present are already dead. Becker's handcart is made of iron, and he does not need to put any mark on it; any one else would find the cart load enough without a burden.

As has already been said, the porter's life is a strange one. Nothing to do for hours at a time, and then within ten or fifteen minutes, while the steamer remains at the landing, hard labor and such hurried toil that, when the boat moves away again, one can't help wondering what has been taken in and put out. When wine is unloaded, Becker is always there, and as careful as he is strong. In spite of his powerful grasp, he handles the wine with a certain tenderness, for what are leather, and grain, and household furniture, and all the other articles sent to and fro, in comparison to wine? They are all very well, but wine alone makes the heart glad there is music in it, as they say in the country. He often drives the low, stout wagon, drawn by strong bay horses, through the city, and, as he stands on the pole, horses, wagon, and driver, suit each other as if run in one mould-all are powerful and sturdy.

He laughs and nods, and the laugh and nod of this giant of labor produce a strange impression when one is told that he has never drunk a drop of water in his whole life. For it is true. And has not the son of the Rhine a right to drink only wine if he can get it? He believes the Rhenish proverb, "Water is not good in the shoes, and much worse in the stomach." However, Becker is

At noon but eleven o'clock is called noon, because the men must eat before a steamer comes up the river at half-past eleven-at noon Becker always receives his dinner from Nannchen, but she rarely brings it herself, usually sending a younger girl. When Nannchen comes herself she must be ready with answers on all sides, for she is rallied by older and younger companions of her father. That is the way with the Rhinelanders, they are always joking. Nannchen understands how to pay every one in his own coin; and her father, who, meantime, is eating and drinking-he really eats very little, drinking is the main thing-nods while eating, and when he drinks makes a sign to her to keep quiet, lest he should laugh and swallow the wine the wrong way.

But one bright summer morning an odd thing happened. The green water of the Rhine flowed quietly by, glittering and flashing in the sunlight, and beyond rose the Taunus Mountains like lofty petrified waves.

Nannchen stood beside her father, who was sitting on his cart, eating his favorite dish a fat piece of beef with horse-radish sauce-when Wendel, a comrade and distant relative of Becker, said:

"Is it true that you want to change the proverb ? "

Becker made no reply in words, but raised his head, and his inquiring expression asked, "What do you mean?"

"The usual saying is, 'Our daughters are going to put on the Haube'"* (cap); “but you mean to have yours put on the Pickelhaube " (helmet).

Suddenly three locomotives shrieked at once the one on the Taunus line, the one going to Darmstadt, and the one on the way to Worms. It was impossible to hear in the din.

Nannchen turned away and gazed at the Rhine, and Becker, who was just about putting a large piece of meat in his mouth, pushed it back into the dish, nudged Nannchen, handed her the plate, and wiped his lips.

"Didn't you understand?" asked Wendel, when the shrill whistles had died away. "Of course we understand you," replied Nannchen; "but, take care, the Pickelhaube pricks."

"Go home now, Nannchen," said Becker, and, picking up a sack which he used to carry coal, laid it on the cart, and put his head

"Putting on the cap" signifies to marry; there is no English synonym for the play upon words.

upon it. He did not need to answer his cousin; he wanted no assistance, he would settle the matter himself.

Nannchen went away, and her father did. not turn to gaze after her.

Becker sighed, and looked at his hands. He had raised them yesterday to strike his daughter, but was glad he had not done so, and secretly vowed he never would; but it was a bad business; and yet Nannchen was kind to bring the dinner herself to-day when there was so much ironing to be done. She evidently saw it was foolish and impossible: she had always been a good child, and would remain so. The matter was settled.

If he had seen two pair of eyes, and heard a few words exchanged a short distance from the cathedral, between a soldier on guard and Nannchen, he might have thought differently. The soldier-a tall, fair man, with thick, wavy, light hair-said to Nannchen as she passed:

"How do matters stand, sweetheart?"

"So surely as you keep your oath of service I will keep my promise," replied Nannchen, quickly, scarcely looking up, and passed

on.

On the bank of the Rhine her father was thinking of what had occurred the day be-fore.

Weeks ago Nicola had told him that Nannchen had a Prussian lover. Becker laughed at it. "Perhaps he is in love with her: That will do no harm, she is clever and sensible-it'll take a very different sort of man to turn her head."

But an incident had happened the evening before. When he came home, Nannchen was not in-she was in the great drying-place. He followed, and who stood there helping her take in the clothes? Who lifted the great basket on one side while she held the other? A Prussian!

How the man looked he really did not know-he only saw the Prussian uniform. He went up to the pair and shouted-he really did not mean to speak so loud, but he could not help it:

"We want no assistance. The Prussian can go; and you, Nannchen, walk before me."

He took the heavy basket in both hands. and carried it into the house as if it were a knitting-bag. Once he looked back the Prussian put on his helmet and buckled his sword, then went away in the opposite direction.

On entering the house Becker asked: "What sort of buffoonery were you carrying on there?"

"I don't know."

"What was that Prussian doing here?" "His name is Becker, too Wilhelm Becker." "I don't care what his name is: I'll have nothing to do with the Prussians." "Nor I either-except Wilhelm." "Indeed?"

There was a long pause. Nannchen brought her father's supper; he did not eat it, but filled a pipe and sat down on the bench before the house.

Nannchen went to and fro giving orders. about the washing. The girls in the large