141 of carrots, to serve up with his boiled beef, and I said, 'Now you know me, Liezl; I am your brother, Would you just have your own brother Tonerl; don't you know me?' these people won't get it me. the kindness to go out and buy me a bunch?' And he put up his hands, and looked so pitiful, I felt as if I would do it for him with all my heart. So I asked the keeper, and he laughed, and said, 'Oh, it's all right, my man; we've sent out for the carrots;' and he went away quite satisfied. "Well, we saw many others, all as strange as this one, and then the keeper asked if we would like to see the cells where the women were. So up we went, and walked along a passage, where there were several women locked up; some groaning, some chained to the floor, miserable, thin, and senseless, and some glaring through the gratings as we passed. "My lady wanted to go into one of the cells. So the keeper said he would show us one that was always left open, for the woman who occupied it was quite harmless. She had been crossed in love, he said, and was always saying she was not mad at all, and wanted to be let out. "The door of this cell was wide open, and we could see nobody in; but, just as we were inside, a thin, wretched-looking woman glided from behind it, and caught hold of my lady's hand. "She pushed me back with a strong effort. 'Liezl ? Tonerl?' said she. What are these names? You are not the Baron von Ackerstein: why did you say you were? You are false! Ah, false man, false man!' and so she began again. "I looked round, sick at heart. There was my good 'You never told me your sister was lady in tears. here,' says she. 'Poor girl, it's very sad.' "Oh, madame!' I cried, I pray you pardon me; I did not know it myself. My heart is like to break, madame. Can you do nothing for my poor sister?' "The good lady took to crying again. She must be left here, I'm afraid,' she said; she's clearly mad.' "No, dear madame,' said Liezl, quite gently, 'I am I only want to leave this not mad, though they say so. place. They are kind to me; but it is too cold-too cold.' "And this is your brother,' said the good lady; 'do not you know him?' "My brother?' she answered, quietly; and then she drew back, and looked up in my face steadily for a long time, with her thin hands clasped before her. 'My brother?' and then she stared again, and I could see "Oh!' cried she, in a pitiful tone, 'he said he loved her face change. She had been smiling before, but it me, and I believe him still.' "Oh, Lipperl, how that voice made my heart throb! it was just the same as Liezl's. The cell was rather dark, and the face of the girl was so fearfully thin, so haggard, so wretched, that I could not tell her. But still I could not help it. I took her gently by the arm, asking my lady's leave, and drew her close to the door, where it was lighter. There, Lipperl-there were the blue eyes. It was Liezl-Liezl my sister; there was the golden hair-there-there He hid his face in his hands, and cried like a child; and, sir, would you think it? not a tear came into my eyes. I thrust my head into my hands, and felt as if my life was going. We sat in this way for many a minute, till at last Tonerl began again: "I can go on now, Lipperl," said he quietly, rubbing the tears away with the back of his hand-"I can go on now. Poor Liezl, she did not know me; but I didn't think of my lady and the keeper, who looked strangely at me. I led her down the passage where there was a window; ‘Liezl,' said I, 'don't you then I took her hands. know your brother? Don't you know Tonerl? Speak to me, Liezl !' away. "Liezl?' she repeated, slowly; 'Liezl? Who calls me Liezl? Is it you, father? Are they come down to row me across the lake? Ah, I hear them; there he is; that's he. Oh, joy, joy!' and she struggled to get 'Let me go!' she cried; 'I must go; the baroness is calling me! Ah, false man, you do not love me-no, you would not destroy a maiden's honor; false Do you love me? Ah, I know you do, man, false man! and I love you-oh, so fondly;' and so she threw herself into my arms, and looked up into my face tenderly, and grasped my elbows with her thin hands. Oh! I felt as if my whole heart was breaking-breaking, and now became serious; then slowly she asked, 'Why does he weep?' and still she stared, and I looked at her, but could not say a word. Gradually I saw the tears filling her eyes, and I heard the keeper whisper to my lady, 'That is a good sign; she is getting her memory back.' At last one large tear flowed over and rolled down, and then, stretching out her arms, she gave a long, loud shriek, and threw herself upon my breast." Here again Tonerl could bear it no longer, and burst once more into tears. 'Well," he continued, "my lady was very kind, and had power with the great folk. She spoke to the director, and the director spoke to me, and the next day my poor sister was brought to my lady's house. But she was dying, she was literally wasted away. The cold and dark of the cell had begun it; and when she discovered me as her brother, her senses had come back to her; but the shock was too much. She was so weak she couldn't walk a step, and was carried into bed, and the doctor sent for. 66 Well, Lipperl, I sat by her three days and three nights, and all that time she fell off little by little. The doctor had particularly warned me to ask her nothing about anything that had passed before she she lost her mind; but one evening, when I saw that she must die, I couldn't keep myself from asking her if she remembered anything that had happened at the baron's. "She laid her thin hand on me-I felt it was cold and trembling-and looked up into my face quite sweetly, and said, gently, 'No Tonerl; no.' "I had no heart to press it, and a few days after I followed her body to 'God's Acre,' where she now lies. * ** * * "Well, some days after this, I was passing by a gu....smith's shop, when the sight of the rifles in the window reminded me of old times, Lipperl, when you and I used | waited to see what would come of it. "I went down to the shooting-gallery on the other side of the water, and had a shot or two, without much success, for I had never handled a pistol before. Well, there was an old fellow there shooting with a rifle, and, as he looked good-natured, I asked him to let me try it. | This brought us to talking, and I offered him some beer in return for his kindness, and we sat down and smoked together. Presently he asked me my name, and said he should like me to come and see him at his master's house. “Ah,' says he, 'I ought to know that name well, for I was once in a place where there was a country girl who had just the same name.' I tell you what," says my lady; "I won't have it. That girl must leave the house; she must be sent out of the way. Scandal will get about, and then do you think your marriage can ever come off?"-" Bah!" says he, "she's only a peasant girl." Well, I did not like to hear this; so I knocked, and took the wood in, and as I came out again, I could hear my lady say, 'Well, the girl shall go somehow or other, and I shall think about the best way of keeping her silent." The next day the poor girl kept her bed, and two or three days after that. No one but my lady and the housemaid was allowed to go to her, and the housemaid said she was wandering in her mind. And so in about a week's time she was taken off in a carriage, and somebody found out that she was gone to the madhouse.' "Well, Lipperl, I had kept my lips tight together, and my fist was clenched till the nails ran into my flesh, and when he came to this I got up; I didn't say a word; I paid for the beer, and rushed out of the place. I felt like a madman myself. I walked along with long strides across the bridge, and the first person I saw coming was "Yet it's not a common one, I fancy,' says I; the villain who had killed my sister. I remembered Where were you then?' 666 Why, at the Herr Baron von Ackerstein's' (I pricked my ears at this, Lipperl), 'and I ought to remember the girl well, for there was a row about her in the house, and, poor girl, they bullied her so, I believe she went mad; at least they said so, and sent her to the mad-house.' "Ay,' said I; 'why, what did they do to her?' I said this as calmly as I could, for I thought if he found out it was my sister, he would not tell me everything; but my blood was up, man. "Well,' he went on, 'you must know they picked her up in the country-in the mountains somewhere— and as she was a sweet, pretty girl, as fresh and smiling as a May morning-at first she was, poor thing, but she soon lost it Well, I was saying, the young baron —you see, he was a fine young man, but he hadn't much religion about him, I don't think-and I soon found out, about a week after I had been in the place, that he was courting this girl, and of course he didn't mean to marry her; it wasn't likely, he a baron, and she "No, no; but go on.' "Well, you see, she was flattered, and she took to him sadly, poor girl. I remember, sometimes, his temper was awful-he would swear at me like a dragoon; and if I said a word against him in the kitchen, she always took his part, and all that. Well, it went on like this for three or four months, and then we saw a change in the poor girl. She got pale and thin, and could not hold her head up and so; and she never seemed to speak a word to the young baron, nor he to her, but she was always asking for leave to go out, and often went without leave, and somehow the baron was always out at the same time." that my pistol was loaded, but I prayed to God, as I went, to withhold my hand. I met him face to face, and placed my hands on his shoulders. "My good fellow, what do you mean? I don't know either you or your sister. You are mad; unhand me.' "No, baron,' said I, bursting with anger, 'I am no more mad than she was, when you sent her to the madhouse and killed her.' "Bah! let me go, man,' says he. 'You bother me with your humbug about mad women and prostitutes.' "My hand was in my bosom in a moment, and before he could breathe to say another word the pistol was at his heart. I fired, and he fell dead." “Sir,” said the headsman at this point of his narration, "I was a young man when this happened, and you can imagine better than I can tell you the effect it made upon me. But whatever I have felt since about it, I did not give myself time to think. I only felt convinced that Tonerl was as innocent of the crime of murder (as we are accustomed to think of it) as a baby, whose mother dies after giving it birth; and I could only picture the shame of his being punished like a common cut-throat, and tried to plan some means for his escape. But, when I spoke to him of escaping, he obstinately refused, and begged me to think no more of it." "You are offering me the very thing I care most to be quit of-life. It can never be anything but a burden to me now. I know I am a murderer; I know there is blood on these hands that can never be washed out in this world; pray God it may in the next. It is an awful sin, and I should only be like Cain, wandering about, outcast among my fellow creatures." But I was not so much persuaded of this, as I was that, when the judges had heard the whole story, they could never condemn him to death. In fact, I was so certain of this, that I never once remembered that I was the executioner who would have to do the deed. But when at last that did come into my head, I swore to myself that I would die before I undertook the office. Well, sir, the baron had been a great friend of the Electress, and for this reason the trial was carried on in private, that the people might not call out against the family and the nobles in general. And, besides this, I was refused admittance to Tonerl after the second time. I could not, therefore, find out how it was going with bim, until I myself was called up as a witness. I swore to having recognized the body of the baron, and when I was asked what I knew about the prisoner, I told them all that I remembered before I had left the Schlier-See. I was then going on to tell them the story I had heard from Tonerl himself, but they stopped me, and said, that all he had said to me in the cell had been taken down at the time. I was astonished, but pleased, to hear this, for I felt sure it would go in his favor. Well, about ten days after, just when I thought I should hear that Tonerl was acquitted, the governor of the prison sent for me. “Headsman,” says he, "I told you some time ago to keep your hand in, in case of an execution. You have done so, I suppose?” "No, sir," I replied, "I have not. This man, sir, is my oldest friend, and I could no more execute him, than I could my own father. Besides, he is sure to be let off." when I was just beginning to snatch a sleep (for I had lain awake all night, cursing my ill luck, and thinking of to-morrow's breakfast); but, though he told me that I was no more concerned in the matter than the sword I used, that it was my right arm that beheaded the man, and not me, and that it was the duty of every proper man to do the law's bidding; whatever he might think of it, his logic was no stronger proof than my own hunger and cold, and I told him plainly that I would not do it. Well, the jailer and a couple more came at last, and I prayed him to let me have some food; but, when he asked me if I had made up my mind to the deed, and I told him "no," he said I must wait for my breakfast till I had; and taking me under the arms, pushed me along the passage out of the prison, and into a cab. Two soldiers got in after me, and fixed their bayonets. My old master's sword, which they had brought from my lodging, was shoved in after us, and away we drove outside the town, to the Theresien-Wiese. There was a good crowd on the meadow; for, while I had been locked up, the news that an execution was to come off had got about in the town, and it was such a rarity, that all the folk went out that could hear of it; though this was just what the justices wanted to prevent, and the reason they had hurried the business so. But a scaffold had been run up in the night, and this had given the people notice. When we got near to the scaffold, the mounted gens d'armes, who formed a circle round it, opened to let us pass and we next passed through a company of soldiers, that formed the inner ring. As we did so, amid all the noise and murmur of the crowd, I could hear a clanking sound. They were knocking the fetters from Tonerl's feet. Cold and fasting as I was, this sound roused me to a kind of indignation. I tried to jump out of the cab, but "Perfectly true; and as you are the only executioner one of the soldiers pulled me back, and reminded me in Munich, you will have to do it." that his bayonet was fixed, and he had orders to use it, "He was sentenced to death yesterday." "Is it true?" cried I; and I wrung my hands in agony. "That will I never, sir," I exclaimed. "I throw up the if need was. So I allowed him to lead me quietly out. situation on the spot." "It is too late, my good man. You have been receiving the king's pay, and must do your duty." "Never to that man; never," I repeated. The governor walked to the door, and locked it. "I give you ten minutes to think about it," said he. "It is of no use, sir, for my mind is made up." Well, he sat down to his books again, without another word, and I passed the time in thinking of the misery of my poor friend. "Well?" said he, when the time was over. The governor came up to me. Executioner," said he, “you will do your duty ?" "Ay, sir," said I; "but I will never behead my own friend." "The soldiers," he replied, quietly, "have orders to force you." The priest now came up again, but seeing that I had scarcely any chance of escape, I raised my voice, and talked as loud as I could, hoping, as a last chance, that the crowd would take my part. And so they would have done, for a disturbance was already being raised, "I say, sir, that if you dragged me to the scaffold, I if the soldiers had not hurried me on to the foot of the would not do it." "Well, we will see about that ;" and so saying, he called in the jailer, and ordered me to be locked up, and no food given me, till I had consented to do it. scaffold. Here, in the midst of jailers and gens d'armes, stood Tonerl, my old bosom friend, so changed, I did not know him at first. His face was as white as my mother's cap, and thin, and sunk, and wretched-looking; and his long brown hair. had been all cut away, and his neck bared for the blow. I passed as bad a night as a rat in the ice. A cell green with damp, an empty stomach, and an angry keeper; and for all that, I swore I would never be the Oh! when I saw him there, I felt more determined man to murder my oldest friend in cold blood (for so than ever. My blood boiled up, sir, and I called out, I took it), just for the pay and name of the king's exe-"Tonerl, don't believe it of me. They are forcing me cutioner. They sent the priest to me in the morning, to it, but they shall shoot me first." Well, sir, they had told him all about it, and I heard | faces below seemed to whirl round and round, and the him say, "Let me go and persuade him." He came up between two gendarmes, while the soldiers laid their hands on my shoulders. noise came like a storm-wind in the mountains. Then all of a sudden there was a dead silence, and Tonerl threw his arms round my neck :-" You will tell all to my father-all to our friends-to the dear old village! Don't let my name be cursed there, Lipperl. Tell them the honour of their village maidens is worth my blood. And now, Lipperl, I am ready; let the blow be a firm one. Oh, God! have mercy on my soul." For a moment I staggered, unable to lift the sword. "Lipperl," he cried, before I could speak, "they have told me all about it, and though I never thought it would be like this, I am glad of it. Look ye, Lipperl, I had rather you did it than any one else. I know your hand was always steady at the rifle, and you won't let it shake, to do a last service for an old friend." "Tonerl," said I, sadly, "they may shoot us both, for He turned his back to me, I raised it, I struck. I saw I won't, I cannot do it." him quiver. I saw blood spurt up; I felt it on my | face. Sir, as I sit here, there was scarcely a dry eye round us, when Tonerl said to me, "Lipperl, you've been a brother to me all my life. You know all about it, Lipperl, and you know, too, that I've no wish to live, even if it were possible to do so. It must be done, boy. If you don't do it, some one else must, and I had rather your hand sent me out of the world, as it has many a time helped to keep me in it, than another's." Well, sir, I heard a great noise in the crowd; I saw them lead him up the ladder; I felt the sword thrust into my hands, and the soldiers dragged me up after him. The next moment Tonerl was kneeling before the priest, and receiving the absolution and the sacrament. My head was swimming, and the great crowd of upturned "Strike again!" I heard him cry. I struck again, and again I saw the blood spurt. Again I saw him quiver, and my head whirled round. Oh, it was fearful pain to me, and I felt that the crowd was shuddering in horror, and I heard a low faint murmur in that awful silence. "Lipperl," I heard him say, "you see three heads. Strike at the middle one." I looked up, and I saw three heads. Once more I struck, and the middle head rolled from the body. I fell back upon the scaffold, and the other two heads remained before my closed eyes. There-there-I see them now! THE UNOWNED PICTURE. THE great painter, Rubens, during his stay at Madrid, "Dead!" exclaimed Rubens, "he is dead. And did in the year 1628, made many excursións into the neigh-he die unknown; was there no one after he was gone boring parts, and the following tale is related of him to give to the world a name which should have been during one of these excursions. There was, in the environs of the city, a convent inhabited by one of the most austere and rigid orders of monks into this Rubens entered and observed, much to his surprise, in the choir of the chapel which was otherwise humbly and meanly adorned, a picture which evinced superior talent. The subject of this picture was the Death of a Monk. Every shade, every touch, spoke of the high soul and sublime genius of the painter; and Rubens, delighted, called his pupils, some of whom usually accompanied him on his expeditions, and showed him the picture. All joined with him in the loudest expressions of admiration. "But who can be the author of this chef d'œuvre ?" exclaimed Van Dyke, Ruben's favorite pupil. "A name has evidently been written beneath the painting, but some one has carefully effaced it," replied Van Thulden. immortal-a name before which even mine might bow? And, notwithstanding," added the great artist, with a noble pride, "notwithstanding, my father, I am Paul Rubens!" At this name the pale face of the prior lighted up with an unwonted brightness. His eyes sparkled, and the fixed and eager look which he turned on Rubens, spoke of somewhat more than curiosity; but this excitement only lasted for an instant. The monk's eyes were again cast on the ground, and his hands, which he had raised to heaven in the moment of enthusiasm, he once more crossed upon his breast, and repeated "The painter is no longer in the world." "But his name, my father, his name, that I may tell it to his country, and that he may receive, though late, the glory which is justly due to him.” And Rubens, Van Dyke, Jacques Jordaens, and Van Thulden, his pupils, one might almost say his rivals, Rubens craved an interview with the prior of the surrounded the prior, and earnestly entreated him to convent, and at the old monk's approach, eagerly in-name the unknown artist. The monk trembled. A quired the name of the artist whose work so excited cold perspiration trickled from his forehead down his his admiration. wrinkled cheek, and his lips contracted almost convul"The painter is no longer in the world," replied the sively, as though eager to reveal a mystery, of the secret monk. of which he alone was master. "His name! his name!" repeated Rubens. monk made a solemn gesture with his hand. I "Listen!" said he, "you have misunderstood me. told you that the author of this picture was no longer in the world; but I did not mean to say that he was actually dead." The had not hard struggles against such a resolution? Do you not feel that he must experience bitter deceptions, and cruel disappointments, before he was brought to acknowledge that all here is but vanity?" said he, striking his breast. "Leave him then to die peacefully in that asylum which he has at length found from the world and its deceptions. On the other hand, your efforts, I am convinced, would be of no avail; it is a temptation, I feel assured he would resist," added he, crossing himself, "for God will not withdraw his help. God, who in his mercy deigned to call him, will not now chase him from his presence." "He is living!" exclaimed simultaneously Rubens and his pupils. "Oh, tell us then his name, that we may become acquainted with so sublime a genius!" "He has long since renounced the world,” replied the prior, calmly; "he has entered the cloister, he is a monk." "But, my father, it is immortality which he renounces!" "A monk, my father, a monk!" cried Rubens." "Oh! tell me in what convent; for he must leave it. When God marks a man with the seal of genius, that man has "My son, immortality is nothing in presence of no right to bury himself in solitude. God has intrust- | eternity!" and the prior, pulling his hood over his face ed to him a sublime mission; it is his duty to accom- and slightly bowing, quitted the chapel, thus leaving plish it. Tell me, then, the name of the cloister where Rubens no time to press his solicitations further. he is hidden. I will bring him forth, and show him the glory that awaits him. If he refuse me, I will obtain an order from our Holy Father, the Pope, for him to return to the world, and resume his pencil. The Pope loves me, my father; the Pope would grant my request." The celebrated Fleming retired from the convent with his brilliant cortege of pupils, and all retired to Madrid silently musing on what had transpired. The prior sought his cell, and throwing himself upon his kness on the straw mat which was his only couch, he prayed long and fervently; then, gathering together his pencils, his colors, and an easel which was lying on the floor of his dormitory, he threw them all into the river which flowed beneath the window. He gazed for "I can neither tell you his name, nor that of the convent to which he has retired," replied the monk in a resolute tone. "The Pope will command you to do so," cried some time with a melancholy smile upon the water Rubens, exasperated. "Listen to me," said the prior, "for heaven's sake, listen! Do you believe that this man, before giving up the world, before bidding adieu to fortune and glory, which bore them away from his sight. When they had entirely disappeared he returned once more to kneel on his straw mat, before his wooden crucifix, to pray. |