that since the hour you returned from your captivity in Mount Lebanon, powers are yours which no one can resist with impunity. I would have warned the boy to beware how he provoked their exercise.'

"Hark thee, Hubert: there is a power in that boy of which he is himself unconscious, that passes my control. I say beware of him: he holds the destiny of thy master, and he holds thine, for I will not fall alone or unavenged! Meet me, after thou art relieved, in the secret chamber, and thou shalt see my danger and thine."

The count, without waiting a reply, left the battlements, and Hubert, who comprehended not the danger so obscurely hinted, remained in a state of the utmost perplexity.

Jocelyn lay on his couch in the apartment assigned to him, turning from side to side, in the vain hope of sleep; his thoughts, at one time, roved to the days of childhood, when he played at the feet of his beloved mother; then the circumstances of her sudden death returned to his mind -his father's grief-his own wondering sorrow; and imagination seemed to trace some inexplicable connection between the catastrophe and the castle which now for the first time he visited. Thick-coming fancies made his reverie a maze of tangled confusion: images of horror swam through his head, and no effort that he could make sufficed to shake off the unaccountable depression of his spirits. "All good angels be my guardians!" he exclaimed; "for assuredly some spell is upon me."

"The powers of evil sleep not," said a voice that sounded close to his ear.

He sprung from his couch; a faint starlight gleamed through the casement, but showed no form in the small apartment. "Who spoke?" said he "in the name of all that is holy, answer!"

The voice sounded from between

him and the window, yet was there nought visible: it replied "A being whom mortal eyes see not, until their vision is sharpened by superior agency; one who is here to work thee good which may not be told, and to shield thee from evil which cannot be named. Follow the light which now kindles in thy chamber, and whatever thou shalt see speak not as thou valuest life."

As the voice ceased, a gleam of light, like that which sometimes roves over the morass, arose in the midst of the chamber, and slowly proceeded towards the door. Jocelyn followed this guide, and after passing through several galleries and passages which led to an uninhabited part of the castle, at last stopped at a secret door: it opened on his approach, and he found himself in a narrow seat that overlooked a ruined chapel.

"Be cautious, watchful, and silent," whispered the attending voice; “I am near you, be not afraid."

Steps on the pavement beneath now arrested his attention, and he saw the count, followed by Hubert, enter the chapel, and, advancing to the broken altar, take some implements from a basket, and range them in a circle on the floor.

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"He is about to evoke the powers of evil," whispered the voice in Jocelyn's ear: repeat the spell thy mother taught thee the hour before she died."

Jocelyn muttered to himself a prayer, of the import of which he was scarce conscious, and felt his courage supernaturally strengthened. The count, in the meantime, having completed his preparations, placed a censer on the altar, and threw upon it some incense, which kindled into a bright flame, and diffused a sweet fragrance over the chapel. As the flame rose, Arnold and Hubert stepped hastily within the circle, and the former, in a firm voice, spoke the words of invocation.

whom I have done so much rise to be Queen of the East? shall my daughter sit upon a throne ?"

At these words the flame rose suddenly from the altar, and, flashing vividly over the chapel, disappeared.

"Villain!" said the count, catching at Hubert in the darkness, "this disappointment is thy work; but I will be revenged."

The affrighted Hubert in vain declared that he had not muttered a single prayer, and fled from the chapel, pursued by his enraged master.

"Do thou now retire to thy chamber," whispered the voice to Jocelyn; "and this night shalt thou learn who thou art, and who I am."

Returning to his room, guided by the mysterious light, Jocelyn heard the count give orders for the immediate confinement of Hubert in a dungeon, with a strict command that none should be allowed to hold any communication with him. The young page proceeded without paying any regard to this circumstance, and passed on to his couch. Scarcely had he thrown himself upon the bed when the following narrative was not so much spoken in his ear as written mysteriously on his soul:

"Thy mother, Jocelyn, was the only child of a Georgian prince, who had learned the secrets of mystic power from the descendants of the Magi, concealed in the recesses of Mount Caucasus. His art disclosed

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to him that the term of his mortal career would be prematurely ended, and he therefore instructed her, when reason first began to dawn, in the arts by which the elemental spirits are compelled to obey the behests of men. He was assassinated by his younger brother, and thy parent would have shared his fate had she not been warned by an attendant spirit, and sought safety in flight. After many wanderings she reached the Christian principality of Edessa, and was ceived into the convent founded by the piety of the Courtenays. The abbess treated her with the tenderness of a daughter, and instructed her in the benevolent principles of the gospel. Your mother, in return, entrusted her with the secret of the supernatural power that she possessed, and, at her persuasion, resolved never to exercise it but under the pressure of overwhelming necessity. The deceased Prince of Georgia had loved me more than any of the elemental spirits that were subject to his skill; I was then perfectly pure, and none but the good could claim my services. I had also twice served thy mother, the Princess Zilla, and was delighted with the sympathy she felt for beings of another nature. From a cause thou canst not comprehend, from a crime thou canst not conceive, a stain came upon the

purity of my nature, and I was forced, for a season, to obey the powers of evil. My new master was a prince of the Batheniens, and his service was a bitter thraldom. He was engaged in a war against the Christians, and, by the agency of his spirits, prevailed in every engagement. By his command I watched particularly over a young Frank whom he anxiously desired to obtain as a prisoner, because the powers of evil had declared that in the stranger he would find an associate as daring and as impious as himself. The present Count Arnold, then very young in years but old in guilt, was the object thus confided to my care. Though not past his eighteenth year, the murders of a father and brother were upon his conscience, and he deemed no crime too great as a price for the gratification of his ambition. I overthrew his steed in a skirmish near Mount Carmel, and kept him fixed to the earth until he was secured by a party of my master's soldiers; and I saw him conveyed in safety to the caverns of the mountain.

"A month had elapsed ere I was summoned to the presence of the Bathenien prince: it was at midnight when I obeyed the call: he stood in his hall of power, accompanied by the youthful Frank, who was about to seal his apostacy, and swear allegiance to Eblis the prince of evil. I saw him rend the cross-I saw him kiss the crescent-I heard the awful Eblis pronounce the words, 'He is ours!' and all the thrones, powers, and dominations in the realms of Zetanai, answered, He is ours!' Edessa was attacked by hordes, under the guidance of a leader more formidable than any that had yet appeared in its plains. The renegade Arnold, disguised by the name of Ilderim, led the Moslem to certain conquest, and the blood of the gallant Courtenays was spilled in vain. The convent in which thy mother resided was surprised and stormed on the day that my bondage terminated. The unfortunate nuns were dragged from their cells by the pitiless barbarians, and thy mother was seized as an appropriate present for the chieftain. She was dragged before Ilderim, who was struck with her charms, and or

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dered her to be sent, under an escort, to the caverns of Carmel. With some of the western courtesy which he still retained, he advanced to offer her some consolation, and the turban accidentally falling from his brow, disclosed features that she had once seen on the table of her destiny as those of her mortal foe. Her courage rose at the prospect of danger: she heard his honeyed words in silence, and he, auguring from thence that she listened with favour, gave strict commands that she should be treated with all possible respect. When permitted to retire and make preparations for her journey, she had recourse to her father's arts, and summoned me to her presence. I obeyed: she heard the tale of my miseries, and promised to intercede with the prince of our race for my complete pardon. I prepared for her the means of rescue. escort set out that night; by my arts they were led into the plains, and a company of Christian warriors, headed by thy father, brought upon their track. After a brief struggle thy mother was rescued, and was soon after united in marriage to thy father. Thy parents returned to Europe, while Ilderim ruled as a prince at Edessa. He was there married to a Bathenien princess, by whom he had a daughter; one of the captives whom he detained as a slave was the wife of the chief of the Courtenays, and had a daughter nearly of the same age as Ilderim's. It happened that the renegade's castle was attacked by a wandering troop of Le Gukians, and stormed at the very moment that he was coming home. A fierce fight ensued between the Le Gukians and the followers of Ilderim: in the confusion the Countess of Courtenay and the chief household slaves of Ilderim were slain; his wife fled to the woods with her child on the first aların, and being seized by another troop of Tartars, both were carried captives to the desert. In the contest the castle caught fire, Ilderim believed that his wife had perished in the flames, and that Emmeline Courtenay, whom he rescued with difficulty, was his own daughter.

"Ere long the victorious Saladin appeared in Palestine, and determined

to extirpate the Batheniens: in vain they had recourse to unhallowed arts, he was protected by a spell more potent than theirs, and their forces fed before him as chaff before the wind. Ilderim saw the signs of impending ruin, and, abandoning Edessa, returned to Europe, and claimed the inheritance of his ancestors. The fame of Count Arnold's unexpected arrival soon spread through the neigh bouring provinces, and at length reached the ears of thy father. Having known the count in childhood, thy sire hasted to congratulate him, and invite him to his castle. The count was then busied in preparations for his nuptials with his present lady, and two years elapsed before he found an opportunity of accepting the invitation. Soon after your birth your mother had read the table of thy destiny, but its results remained a secret in her bosom: she, however, declared that her mortal foe would also be thy worst enemy, and that the dangers threatened by his machinations could only be averted by the incessant watchfulness of thy guardian spirits.

"At length the long expected visit of Count Arnold took place: he was received by the baron, thy father, with open arms, and the baroness was summoned to bail his arrival. With indescribable horror she beheld, as he raised his visor, the unforgotten features of the Bathenien Ilderim. She fled from the hall with a sudden shriek, leaving the baron and his guest overwhelmed with astonishment. It was then that she taught thee the holy spell, and the efficacious words that control the powers of evil, and whispered to thee the secrets which give dominion over the elemental spirits. Vested with influence which thou couldst not understand, a change came over thy soul of which thou wert scarcely conscious. Since that hour I have been bound to thy service, and watched over thy safety.

"The history of his marriage, which the baron communicated to the count, revealed to the latter the extent of his danger. Poison afforded him the means of escape, and the leech sent to see thy mother was bribed to administer a medicated draught. Un

suspicious of evil from one whom she had known so long, and distracted by the torturing recollections which the unexpected presence of Ilderim revived, she drank the cup of death, and knew not of her danger until it was too late to apply a remedy. Her last thoughts were of thee-at the midnight hour she sent for thee, and thou rememberest how she wept on thy cheeks, and told thee that Ilderim, who had destroyed her, would seek thy life also. While she spoke thus, he was communing with the demon Azaziel, and had learned that destiny had given to thee a powerful influence over his fate. I had watched this unholy communion, and I spoke it in thy mother's secret soul. Exhausted nature was sinking, and she burst into wild exclamations, which brought thy father and all the tenants of the castle to her room. Her passionate appeal to Ilderim, her obscure hints of danger, her predictions of evil threatening thy life, were understood only by one; the others deemed that she was insane. She saw their error, but her efforts to explain accelerated the effect of the poison, and she expired. Count Arnold remained to console thy father, and, when on the eve of departure, exacted from him a promise that thou shouldst be sent hither to learn the exercises of chivalry. Thou hast seen his power-thou knowest thy danger; in the hour of worst need and utmost extremity, but not before, use the maternal spell, and the spirit Ayubi will hear thee and obey."

It has taken us long to tell this history, but the whole was presented to the mind of Jocelyn at a single glance. Time and place are the limits of our mortal organs, but cannot fetter the soul. Scarce had he comprehended the mysterious narrative when a peaceful calm fell upon his senses, and he sunk into repose, from which he woke not until the sun was high in heaven.

When Jocelyn came forth in the morning he found the castle in confusion; letters of importance had reached the baron, requiring his presence in a distant province, and it was uncertain how long his stay would be protracted. Jocelyn sought Hubert,