"I WISH I knew how I could ever repay you, Pippo, for all your kindness to me," said Gerald, as he sat, one fine evening, with the old man at the door; "but when I tell you that I am as poor and as friendless in the world as on that same night when Signor Gabriel found me beside the Lake

"Not a whit poorer, or more alone in the world than the rest of us," said Pippo, good-naturedly. "We have all a rough journey before us in life, and the least we can do is to help one another."

The youth grasped the old man's hand and pressed it to his heart.

"Besides," continued Pippo, "all your gratitude is owing to Signor Gabriel himself. Any little comforts you have had here have been of his procuring. He it was fetched that doctor from Bolseno, and his own hands carried the little jar of honey from St. Stephano.

"What a kind heart he has," cried Gerald, eagerly.

"Well," said Pippo, with a dry, odd smile, "that's not exactly what people say of him; not but he can do a kind thing too, just as he can do any thing." "Is he so clever then?" asked Gerald, curiously.

Is he not!" exclaimed Pippo"where has he not travelled-what has he not seen! And then the books he has written-scores of them, they tell me

VOL. LI.-NO. CCCIV.

he's always writing still-whole nights through; after which, instead of going to his bed, like any one else, he is off for a plunge in the lake there, tho' I've told him over and over, that the water that kills fish can never be healthy for a human!"

"What a strange nature it must be. And what brings him here?"

"That's his secret, and it would be mine too, if I knew it ; for, I promise you, he's not one its over safe to talk about."

"Where does he come from?" "He's French, and that's all I can tell you.'

"It can't be for the 'chasse' he comes here," said Gerald, musingly. There's no game in these mountains. It can scarcely be for seclusion, for he's always rambling away to some village or town near. It's now more than a week since we have seen him. I wish I could make out who or what he is!"

"Would you so," cried a deep voice, as a large, heavy hand fell upon his shoulder; "and what would the knowledge benefit you, boy?" Gerald looked up, and there stood Gabriel. He was dressed in a loose peasant's frock, and seemed by his mien as if come off a long day's march.

"Go in, Pippo, and make me a good salad. Grill me that old hen yonder, and I'll give you share of a flask of

25*

Orvieto that was in the bishop's cellar last night."

He threw off his knapsack as he spoke, and removing his hat, wiped his heated forehead, and then turning to the youth at his side, he said-"So, boy, I am a sort of mystery to you, it seems-mayhap, others share in that same sentiment—at least I have heard as much. But whence this curiosity on your part? You were a stranger to me, and you are so still. What can it signify to either of us what has gone before-ere we met and knew each other. Life is not a river running in one bed, but a series of streams that follow fifty channels-some pure and limpid-some, perchance, turbid and foul enough. What you have been gives no guarantee to what you may be-remember that!"

He spoke with a tone of sternness that made his words sound like reproof, and the youth held down his head abashed and ashamed.

"Don't suppose I am angry with you," continued the other, but in the self same tone as before; nor that I regard this curious desire of yours as ingratitude. You owe me nothing, or next to nothing, and you're a rare instance of such in life, if within the next ten years the wish will not occur to you at least twenty times, that I had left you to die beside the dark shores of Bolseno!"

"I can well believe it may be so," said Gerald, with a sigh.

"Not that this is my own philosophy," said the other, in a voice of powerful meaning. I soon made the discovery that life was not a garden, but a hunting ground, and that the wolves had the best of it! "Ay, boy," cried he, with a kind of savage exultation"there's the experience of one, whose boast it is to know something of his fellows!"

Gerald was silent, and for some time Gabriel, also, did not speak. At last, looking steadfastly at the youth, he said: "I have been up to Rome these last three days. My errand there was to learn something about you." "About me," said Gerald, blushing deeply.

"Yes. It was a whim (I am the slave of such caprices)-seized me to learn how you came amongst the Jesuit brothers, and why you left them." "I thought I had told you why, myself," said the youth, proudly.

"So you had; but I am one of those who can only build on the foundation their own hands have laid, and so I went myself to learn your history. "And has the journey rewarded your exertions ?" said the boy, half mockingly.

A sudden start, and a look of almost savage ferocity on Gabriel's features made Gerald tremble for his own rashness; and then, with a measured voice, he repeated the boy's words—

"The journey has rewarded my exertions."

"May I venture to ask what you have discovered?" said Gerald, timidly.

"I went to satisfy my own curiosity, not yours, boy. What I have learned may suffice for the one, and not for the other. Here comes Pippo with pleasanter tidings than all this gossip," said he, rising, and entering the house.

"Won't you come in and have a bit of supper with us, Gerald?" asked Pippo, kindly.

"No, I cannot eat," said the boy, as he wiped the tears from his eyes. "Come and taste a glass of the generous Orvieto, however."

"No, Pippo; I could not swallow it," said he, in a half-choking voice.

"Ah!" muttered the old man, with a sigh, "Signor Gabriel's talk rarely makes one relish the meal they wait for," and with bent down head he reentered the hut.

The feeling Gerald had long experienced towards Gabriel was one of fear, almost verging upon terror. There was about the man's look, his voice, his manner, something that portended danger. Do what he would, the boy never could make his sense of gratitude rise superior to his fear. He tried, over and over again, to think of him only as one who had saved his life, and to whom he owed all the present comforts he enjoyed; but above these thoughts there triumphed a terrible dread of the man, and a strange mysterious belief that he possessed a sort of control over his destiny.

"If it were indeed so," muttered he to himself, "and that his shadow were to be over me through life, I'd curse the day he carried me from the shore of the Lago-Oscuro!" Night was rapidly closing in, and the dreary landscape was every moment growing sadder and drearier. As the sun sank beneath the hills the heavy exhalations

began to well up from the damp earth, till a bluish haze of vapour rested over the plains and even partly up the mountain side. An odour, oppressive and sickening, accompanied this mist, which embarrassed the respiration, and made the senses dull and weary; and yet there sat Gerald, drinking in these noxious influences, careless of his fate and half triumphing in his own indifference as to life. A drowsy stupor was rapidly gaining on him, when he felt his arm violently shaken, and looking up saw Gabriel at his side. In a gruff, rude voice he chided him for his imprudence, and told him to go in.

"Isn't my life, at least, my own?" said Gerald, boldly.

"That is it not," said the other. "Your priestly teachers might have told you that you hold it in trust for him who gave it. I, and men like me, would say that each of us here has his allotted task to do in life; and that he is but a coward, or as bad as a coward, who skulks his share of it. Go in, I say, boy."

Gerald obeyed without a word; and now a slavish sense of fear came over him, and he felt that this man swayed and controlled him as he pleased.

"There, Gerald, drink that," said Gabriel, filling him out a goblet of red wine. “That's the liquor inspires the pious sentiments of the Bishop of Orvieto. From that generous grape-juice spring his Christian charities and his heavenly precepts. Let us see what miracles it can work upon two such sinful mortals as you and me. Well done, boy; drain off another," and he refilled his glass as he spoke.

Old Pippo had retired and left them alone together. The moon was slowly rising beyond the lake, and threw a long yellow stream upon the floor, the only light in the chamber where they sat, thus giving a sort of solemnity to a moment when each felt too deeply sunk in his own thoughts for much conversation.

"Do you remark how that streak of moonlight seems to separate us, Gerald," said Gabriel. "A superstitious mind would find food for speculation there, and trace some mysterious meaning-perhaps a warning-from it. Are you superstitious?"

"I can scarcely say I am not," said the boy, diffidently.

"None of us are," said the other, boldly. "If we affect to despise spirits

we are just as eager slaves of our own presentiments. What we dignify by the name of reason is just as often a mere prompting of instinct. It amuses us to believe that we steer the bark of our destiny; but the truth comes upon us at last, that the tiller was lashed when the voyage began." After a long silence on both sides, Gabriel said, "I have told you, Gerald, that I made a journey to Rome on your account. I have been to the Jesuit College; conversed with the superior; saw your cell, your torn school-books, your little table carved over with your pen-knife; and, by a date scratched on a windowpane, was led to discover where you had passed the evening of the fifth of January."

"And did you go there also?" asked Gerald, eagerly.

66

Ay, boy. I gave an afternoon to the Altieri and the cafè in front of it."

"You saw the Count, then?"

"No, I have not seen him," said Gabriel, drily. "He was away from Rome, at a villa, I believe; but I have learned that, indignant at your flight from the Cardinal's villa, he absolves himself of all further interest in you."

"Have you seen Fra Luke?" asked the boy, who now talked as if the other had known every incident of his life.

"No; he too was away. In fact, Gerald, there was little to learn, and I came back very nearly as I went. I only know that you are about as much alone in the world as myself. We are meet companions. You said, a while ago, you were curious to know who and what I was. You shall hear. I am of a good Provençal family, originally derived from Italy. We are counts, from a date before the Medici; so much for blood. As to fortune, my grandfather was rich, and my own father enjoyed a reasonable fortune. I was, however, brought up to believe all men my brothers; all interested alike in serving and aiding each other: helping in the cause of that excellent thing we are pleased to call HUMANITY; and as a creed firmly believing thatbating a chance yielding to temptation, a little backsliding now and then on the score of an evil passion-men and women were wonderfully good, and were on the road to be better. We were most ingenious in our devices

to build up this belief. My father wrote books and delivered lectures to prove it. He did more. He squandered all his patrimony in support of his theory, and he trained me up to be-what I am." And the last words were uttered in a voice of intense solemnity.

"I am not going to give you a story of my life," said he, after some time; "I mean only to let you hear its moral. Till I was eighteen I was taught to believe that men were honest, truthful, brave and affectionate; and that women were pure-hearted, gentle, forgiving, and trustful. Before I was nineteen I knew men to be scoundrels; it took me about a year more to think worse of the others. Then began my real life. I ceased to be a dupe and felt a man. I am a quick learner, and I acquired their vices rapidly, all but one, that is still my stumbling-block -hypocrisy. All that I have done," said he, in half soliloquy, "might have passed harmlessly had I known but how to shroud it. Slander, theft, and seduction must not walk naked in this well-dressed world; but, with fine clothes on, they make very good company. I was curious to see if other lands were the same slaves of conventionalities, and I travelled. I went to Holland and to England; I found both as bad, nay worse, than France. If I obtained a momentary success in life I was certain to be robbed of it by some allegation foreign to the question. My book was clever; but I had deserted my wife. My treatise was admirable; but I had seduced the daughter of my protector. My views were just, right-minded, and true; but I had robbed my father. Thus, with a subtlety the stupidest possess, they were able to detract from my genius by charging it with the defects of my character, as if it behoved one to pay the debts of the other. I went on insisting that it was my opinions alone were before the world; they as steadily persisted in dragging myself there. At last they have had their will, and I wish them joy of the victory." There was a savage triumph in his eyes as he spoke this that made Gerald tremble while he looked at him. "If you care for my story, boy," resumed he, "old Pippo there will give it to you for a flask of Monte Pulciano. He'll tell you of all my cruelties in my first campaign in Corsica; how I

won my wife by first blasting her reputation; how I left her; how I was imprisoned and fined; and how escaped from both by a seduction. If he forget the name, you may remind him of Sophie De Mounier. They beheaded me in effigy for this at Dole. But why go on with vulgar incidents which have happened to so many. It is the moral of it all I would impress, boy, which is this take nothing from the world but solid gifts. Laugh at its praises, and drink deep of its indulgences! Those born great are able to do this by prerogative; you and I may succeed to it by skill. Remember, too, that my theory is a wide, a most Catholic one; and to follow it you need assume no special discipline, but be priest, soldier, statesman, scholar, just as you will. I have been all these in turn, and may be so again; but whether I wear a cassock or a cuirass my knowledge of men will guide me to but one mode of dealing with them."

"There is nothing in what you have told me of your life to make me revere your principles," said Gerald, with a courageous boldness.

"Because I have told you how I fell, and not how I was tempted; because I have stooped to say of myself that which none dare say to my face; because whatever I have been to the world it was that same world fashioned me to. What would it avail me that I made out a case of undeserving hardships and injustice, proved myself an injured, martyred saint; would your wondering sympathy heal any, the least of those wounds that fester here, boy? Every man's course in life is but one sling of the pendulum. I have vowed that with mine I shall cleave the dense mob and scatter the vile multitude. As to you," said he, suddenly turning his glaring eyes upon the youth, "you are free to leave this to-morrow. I'll take care that you are safely restored to those you came from, if you like it. If you prefer you may remain here for a month or two; by that time I shall return.”

"Are you going, then, from this?" asked Gerald.

"Yes. I am on my trial at Aix, for cruelty and desertion of my wife. They have spread a report that I have no intention to appear; that having fled France, I mean never to return to Ere the week's over they shall

it.

learn their mistake. I shall be there before them; and, if instances from the uses of court and courtiers are admissible, show, that when they prove me guilty, they must be ready to include Versailles in the next prosecution. Watch this case, boy; I'll send you the newspapers daily. Watch it closely, and you'll see that the file is at work noiselessly now, but still at work on those old fetters that have bound mankind so long. But first say if you desire to stay here."

Gerald held down his head and muttered a half audible "Yes."

"To-night, then, I will jot down the names of certain books you ought to read. I shall leave you many others too, and take your choice amongst them. Read and think, and, if you are able, write too: I care not on what theme so the thoughts be your own." Gerald wished to thank him; but even gratitude could not surmount the dread he felt for him. Gabriel saw the struggle that was engaged in the boy's heart, and smiling half sadly said "To our next meeting, lad.'

IF Gerald breathed more freely the next morning, on hearing that Signor Gabriel had departed, it is, perhaps, no great wonder. The Tana was not a very agreeable "sejour." Dreariness within doors and without a poverty unredeemed by that graceful content which so often sheds its influence over humble fortune-a wearisome round of life-these were the characteristics of a spot, which in a manner was associated in his mind with all the sufferings of a sick bed. Yet, no sooner had he learned that Gabriel was gone, than he felt as if a load were removed from his heart, and that even by the shores of that gloomy lake, or on the sides of those barren hills, he might now indulge his own teeming fancies and live in a world of his own thoughts.

It was no common terror that possessed him-his studies as a child had stored his memory with many a dreadful story of satanic temptation. One, in particular, he remembered well, of St. Francis, who, accompanied by a chance traveller, had made a journey of several days; but whenever the saint, passing some holy shrine or sacred spot, would kneel to pray, the most terrible blasphemies would issue from his lips, instead of prayer; for his fellowtraveller, was the evil one himself. What if Gabriel had some horrible mission of this kind. There was enough in his look, his manner, and his converse to warrant the belief. He half laughed when the thought first crossed his mind, but it came up again and again-gaining strength and consis

tency at each recurrence; nor was the melancholy desolation of the scene itself ill suited to aid the dreary conjecture. Though Gabriel had confided to him the key of his chamber, where all his books were kept, Gerald passed days before he could summon resolution to enter it. A vague terror-a dread to which he could not give shape or form-arrested his steps, and he would turn away from the door, and creep noiselessly down the stairs, as though afraid of confessing, even to himself, what his errand had been.

At last, ashamed of yielding to this childish fear, he took a moment when old Pippo and his niece were at work in the garden, to explore the long dreaded chamber. The room was very different from what he had anticipated, and presented a degree of comfort singularly in contrast to the rest of the Tana. Maps and book-shelves, covered the walls, with here and there prints, mostly portraits of celebrated actresses. A large table was littered with letters and papers, left just as he had quitted the spot. Great piles of manuscript, too, showed what laborious hours had been spent there, while books of reference were strewn about, the pages marked by pencil notes and interlineations. All indicated a life of study and labour. One trait alone gave another and different impression, it was a long rapier that hung over the fire-place, around whose blade, at about a foot from the point was tied a small bow of sky-blue ribbon. As, curious to divine the meaning of this, Gerald examined the wea