One jerk, and there a lady lay,

A lady wondrous fair;

But the rose of her lip had faded away,

And her cheek was as white and as cold as clay,

And torn was her raven hair.

"Aha!" said the Fisher, in merry guise,

"Her gallant was hooked before;"

And the Abbot heaved some piteous sighs,
For oft he had blessed those deep blue eyes,
The eyes of Mistress Shore!

There was turning of keys and creaking of locks,
As he took forth a bait from his iron box.
Many the cunning sportsman tried,

Many he flung with a frown aside;

A minstrel's harp, and a miser's chest,
A hermit's cowl, and a baron's crest,
Jewels of luster, robes of price,
Tomes of heresy, loaded dice,

And golden cups of the brightest wine

That ever was pressed from the Burgundy vine.

There was a perfume of sulphur and niter,

As he came at last to a bishop's miter!

From top to toe the Abbot shook,
As the Fisherman armed his golden hook,
And awfully were his features wrought
By some dark dream or wakened thought.
Look how the fearful felon gazes

On the scaffold his country's vengeance raises,
When the lips are cracked and the jaws are dry
With the thirst which only in death shall die:

Mark the mariner's frenzied frown,

As the swirling wherry settles down,

When peril has numbed the sense and will,

Though the hand and the foot may struggle still:
Wilder far was the Abbot's glance,

Deeper far was the Abbot's trance:

Fixed as a monument, still as air,

He bent no knee, and he breathed no prayer;
But he signed — he knew not why or how

The sign of the Cross on his clammy brow.

There was turning of keys and creaking of locks,
As he stalked away with his iron box.

"Oho! Oho!

The cock doth crow;

It is time for the Fisher to rise and go.

Fair luck to the Abbot, fair luck to the shrine!

He hath gnawed in twain my choicest line;

Let him swim to the north, let him swim to the south, The Abbot will carry my hook in his mouth!"

The Abbot had preached for many years.

With as clear articulation

As ever was heard in the House of Peers
Against Emancipation;

His words had made battalions quake,
Had roused the zeal of martyrs,
Had kept the Court an hour awake,
And the King himself three quarters:

But ever since that hour, 'tis said,
He stammered and he stuttered,

As if an ax went through his head.
With every word he uttered.

He stuttered o'er blessing, he stuttered o'er ban,
He stuttered, drunk or dry;

And none but he and the Fisherman

Could tell the reason why!

ROMANCE OF A POOR YOUNG MAN.1

BY OCTAVE FEUILLET.

[OCTAVE FEUILLET: A French novelist; born at St. Lô, August 11, 1821; died in Paris, December 28, 1890. He was educated at the College of Louis-le-Grand in Paris, and at the age of twenty-four began to write, his first marked success being the novel "Le Cheveu Blanc," produced in 1853. He was made an officer of the Legion of Honor, and in 1862 succeeded Scribe as a member of the French Academy. His published works include: "The Great Old Man " (1845); "Polichinelle " (1846); "The Redemption" (1849); "Vieillesse de Richelieu," a play (1848); "The Romance of a Poor Young Man" (1858), afterward dramatized; "The History of Sibylla" (1862); "Monsieur de Camors" (1867); "Julie de Trécour" (1872) ; “ A Marriage in High Life" (1875); "Le Journal d'une Femme" (1878); "L'Histoire d'une Parisienne," "La Veuve," and "La Morte "; besides many successful plays.]

THE next day - that is, yesterday- I set out on horseback early in the morning, to oversee the felling of some timber in the neighborhood. I was returning toward four o'clock, in the direction of the château, when, at a sharp turn of the road, I found myself face to face with Mlle. Marguerite. She was alone. I bowed, and was about to pass, but she stopped her horse.

"A beautiful autumn day, monsieur," said she.

"Yes, mademoiselle. You are going to ride?"

"As you see, I am using my last moments of independence, and even abusing them, for I feel a little troubled by my solitude. But Alain was wanted down there-my poor Mervyn is lame. You do not wish to replace him by chance?"

"With pleasure. Where are you going?"

"Why, I had the idea of pushing my ride as far as the Tower of Elven." She pointed with the end of her riding whip to a dark summit which rose within sight of the road. "I think," she added, "that you have never made this pilgrimage.

"It is true. It has often tempted me, but I have put it off till now, I hardly know why."

66

Well, it is easily found; but it is already late, and we must make a little haste, if you please."

I turned my horse's head, and we set out at a gallop.
As we rode, I sought to explain to myself this unexpected

1 Published by permission of L. C. Page and Company.

whim, which I could not but think premeditated. I concluded that time and reflection had weakened in Mlle. Marguerite's mind the first impression made by the calumnies which had been poured into her ear. She had apparently ended by doubting Mlle. Helouin's veracity, and contrived to offer me, by chance, under a disguised form, a kind of reparation which might possibly be due me.

In the midst of the thoughts that besieged me, I attached slight importance to the particular end we proposed to ourselves in this strange ride. I had often heard this Tower of Elven spoken of as one of the most interesting ruins of the country, and I had never traveled over either of the two roads which lead from Rennes, or from Jocelyn, toward the sea, without contemplating with an eager eye that uncertain mass which one sees towering upward in the middle of distant heaths like an enormous stone bank; but time and occasion had been wanting to me.

A little distance beyond Elven we took a crossroad, which led us up a barren hill; we saw from its summit, although at some distance from us, the feudal ruin overlooking a wooded height in front of us. The heath where we were descended sharply toward marshy meadows, surrounded with thick young woods. We descended the slope and were soon in the woods. There we took a narrow road, the rough, unbroken pavement of which resounded loudly under our horses' feet. I had ceased for some time to see the Tower of Elven, the locality of which I could not even conjecture, when it rose out of the foliage a few steps before us with the suddenness of an apparition. This tower is not decayed; it has preserved its original height, which exceeds a hundred feet, and the regular layers of granite, which compose this magnificent octagonal structure, give it the aspect of a formidable block, cut yesterday by the purest chisel. Nothing more imposing, more proud and somber, can be imagined than this old donjon, impervious to the effects of time, and alone in these thick woods. The trees have grown close to its walls, and their tops reach to the openings for the lower windows. This growth of vegetation conceals the base of the edifice, and increases its appearance of fantastic mystery. In this solitude, surrounded by forests, and with this mass of extraordinary architecture in front of us, it was impossible not to think of enchanted castles where beautiful princesses sleep a hundred years.

"Up to this time," said Mlle. Marguerite, to whom I tried to communicate this idea, "I have seen no more than what we now see; but if you wish to wake the princess, we can enter. As far as I know, there may be in the neighborhood a shepherd or shepherdess who is furnished with a key. Let us fasten our horses and seek for them-you for the shepherd, and I for the shepherdess."

The horses were accordingly fastened in a little inclosure near the ruin, and we separated for a moment to search around the castle. But we had the vexation to meet neither shepherd nor shepherdess. Our desire to see the interior naturally increased with all the force of attraction which forbidden fruit has for us, and we crossed a bridge thrown over the moat, at a venture. To our great satisfaction, the massive door of the donjon was not shut; we needed only to push it open in order to enter a corner, dark and encumbered with rubbish, which was probably the place for the bodyguard in former times; from thence we passed into a vast circular hall, the chimneypiece of which still showed, on its coat of arms, the besants of the crusade; a large open window, traversed by the symbolic cross, plainly cut in the stone, lighted distinctly the lower part of this room, while the eye failed to pierce the uncertain shadows of the lofty, broken roof. At the sound of our steps, an invisible flock of birds flew out from the darkness, shaking down upon us the dust of centuries.

On mounting up the granite steps, ranged one above the other round the hall, into the embrasure of the window, we could overlook the deep moat and the ruined parts of the fortress; but we had noticed on our entrance a flight of steps cut in the thick wall, and we felt a childish impatience to push our discoveries further. We therefore undertook to ascend this rude staircase; I led the way, and Mlle. Marguerite followed bravely, holding up her long skirts as well as she could. From the top of the flat roof the view was vast and delicious. The soft tints of twilight were creeping over the ocean of halfgolden autumn foliage; the dark marshes, and the green, mossy ground near us, and the distant ranges of hills mingling with and crossing each other. As we gazed down upon this melancholy landscape, infinite in extent, we felt the peace of solitude, the silence of evening, the sadness of the past, descend into our hearts.

This charm was increased, for me at least, by the presence