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Semi-monthly Bournal, Embellished with Engravings.

ONE DOLLAR PER ANNUM.

VOLUME XXVI.

W. B. STODDARD, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR.
HUDSON, N. Y. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1849.

TALES.

THE RUFFIAN BOY.
A Tale Founded on Fact.

BY MRS. AMELIA OPIE.
[Concluded.]

Steinheim had been found strewed with flowers; and on a piece of paper, which was found fastened into the sod by a stick, were written these words; "A tribute of regret, deep, but, alas! unavailing." On inquiry, it was ascertained, that one morning at day-break, a tall and majestic-looking man had been seen to leave the church-yard, hiding his face with his hands, had instantly mounted a very

Her next step was to desire constant masses to fleet steed, and had disappeared directly." They be said for the soul of the impenitent Geraldi.

"Now, then," said Waldemar, "we may ven. ture to go to Brussels." And Ethelind assented; but she heaved a deep sigh, while she thought of Mina and her mother. Preparations were immediately begun for their removal, and after a pleasant journey the travelers reached Brussels; nor was it long before they were settled in their new abode, and once more happy.

True, they had left many dear and attached friends in Bohemia but then Ethelind found her brother and his family, and the friends of her childhood, at Brussels; and but for one fatal event all her recollections of Brussels and its environs would have been full of tenderness and pleasure. However, in spite of one painful remembrance, Ethelind enjoyed the prospect of making Brussels her future residence, as she found the memory of her parents and herself was still precious in the hearts of their former companions,

The first thing which Ethelind and Waldemar did, on taking possession of their new territory, was to cause a strict inquiry to be made into the wants of the poor inhabitants around them; and their next, to relieve those wants for the present, and take means to prevent a recurrence of them in future; and thus, by making the great possessions which devolved upon them, a blessing to others, prove their deep sense of the mercy which had been so recently shown towards themselves.

Ethelind's next desire was to have the body of poor Madame Steinheim taken up, and removed to Brussels, to be interred there by the side of her murdered daughter; a desire, of which Waldemar immediately took means to secure the fulfilment ; and leave being granted, it was not long before the mortal remains of the sorely visited mother were united to those of her child, in the Cathedral Church at Brussels, where Waldemar caused a plain marble monument to be erected over them, in order to commemorate their virtues and their fate.

The persons sent to convey the body to Brussels, told this remarkable anecdote on their return, namely, "that a few days after Waldemar and Ethelind had left the inn, the grave of Madatne

added, it was supposed, at the inn, that this man was GERALDI DUVAL

"I have no doubt of it," said Ethelind, rejoiced to find any proof of proper feeling in her powerless enemy; now powerless before the Most Powerful!-now undergoing, from a Jadge that cannot err, the punishment due to his crimes.

"Yet, how inconsistent is it," said Waldemar, "for the same man who pursued your life with un. relenting hatred, to feel so much for the unintended murder which he perpetrated ?"

PAYABLE IN ADVANCE.

NUMBER 4.

life were too generally known not to make her an object for the gaze of curiosity.

But Waldemar was apprehensive lest she should carry her acquired love of retirement too far; and that when her children wanted her guidance into the world, she would find, from long disuse, that duty painful which otherwise it would be pleasing to her to perform. Accordingly he resolved to combat it as much as he could, though with gen. tleness. And not long after the monument had been erected to the memory of Madame Steinheim and of Mina, and when whatever had a tendency to recall past pains had therefore ceased to be agitated, Waldemar told Ethelind that he had a favour to request of her.

"Look upon it as granted, then," she replied, smiling.

But Waldemar shook his head, and told her he was by no means certain that his victory was 80 assured.

"Can I refuse any thing you wish ?" replied Ethelind, with quickness.

"Nous Verrons." And Waldemar explained his business.

He told Ethelind that an old friend of his, the Count de Friberg, whom some untoward circum. stances had made his enemy, but who was lately

"But they never offended him-I did; and I own to you that this little trait of discriminating feeling has been a balm to my wounded spirit. But it has made me deplore more than ever, that any consideration witheld my beloved father from en. deavouring, by some means or other, to reform Geraldi, and from trying to convert an enemy into a friend. My dearest husband, unfortunate circum-reconciled to him, and he trusted for life, was stances made Geraldi what he was, and turned the milk of human kindness in his nature into gall. Think how hard a trial it must be, for an aspiring youth like him to see all his prospects close at fourteen, and to look forward to a long life, depriv. ed of every hope founded on virtue! Peace to his soul!"

And at Brussels, as well as at Prague, Ethelind ordered masses for the soul of Geraldi Duval. "If they do nothing for the soul of Geraldi, sweet enthusiast," thought Meynell, (who was now on a visit at Brussels,) "they will do much for yours." But he kept his implied heresy to himself, respecting Ethelind's true piety too much to utter what he thought.

come to reside at Brussels, and was going to give a grand ball on his eldest son's coming of age. "And," added he, " though I know your aversion to such scenes, I ventured to say I hoped you would oblige me and gratify the children by accepting his invitation ?"

"The children! Are they invited ?"

"O yes, it is a child's ball, also; and the children are to have their own ball-room to themselves, and their own supper. Their parents and others are to come in fancy dresses, with masks, or in characters, or in dominos."

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A masked ball, too! No, no, indeed, I cannot, cannot, go to it"

"But I will not go without you; and if I stay away, my friend will fancy my reconciliation with Ac-him is not sincere, or I should have had pleasure in bearing so public a testimony to our renewed intimacy; for it was at Brussels, just before I knew you, that we quarrelled, and our difference was generally known. Then the children, too, would be sorry not to go, as most of their young friends will be there; and Madame de Friberg and her little girls are coming to call on you to-day."

Waldemar and Ethelind now imagined them. selves happily settled at Brussels for life. cordingly, they received the visits of their friends, visited them in return, and made acquaintances for the sake of their children, who would, in two or three years be introduced into the world. But Ethelind's mind had been weaned, by the trials she had undergone, from any thing that came under the description of public amusements, or public balls, and she had a decided aversion to appear at them; especially, as the remarkable events of her

To be brief, Ethelind gave at last a reluctant consent, saying, "But allow me to tell you, I go

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because it is your desire that I should go; and it is a wife's duty, and it is always my pleasure, to obey my husband."

The appointed evening arrived; and Ethelind in a fancy dress, and Waldemar in a blue domino and mask, entered the carriage to convey them to this ball, accompanied by their two eldest children. "Where does the Count de Friberg live?" said Ethelind.

Waldemar informed her; but added, "We are not going to his house; the ball is held at some public rooms."

"I wonder at which of the public rooms?" said Ethelind, turning very faint, as she recollected the last ball that she had attended at public rooms in Brussels. But Waldemar could not tell her. All he knew was, that the entrance to it was at a splendid portico in such a street, (mentioning the name of it,) and Ethelind's mind was immediately relieved.

Accordingly, he left her, and ran down the dreaded passage, which was nearer the spot where his carriage was then stationed, than the new por. tico; while Ethelind, as she followed him with her eyes till his blue domino was lost in the crowd, said to herself, “ To be sure he will not wish me to go along that passage to the coach, and pass that spot!"

rank as a partner, as if to mark that she refused Geraldi on account of his being lowly born, his feelings became uncontrollable, and he rushed from

But that vengeance failed. And what increased the agony of his disappointment was, that Mina's life and the reason of her mother were the unintended sacrifices of his revenge; for they had both treated him always with kind and encouraging at

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This man, after a series of profligacy and extrav. agance, had been thrown into prison for debt;and strange to say, instead of avoiding, he sought the presence of the murderer of his sister and the destroyer of his mother; and he spoke some degree of comfort to the heart of Geraldi, by assuring him that he forgave him his unintentional crime while trying to obtain a just revenge, but that he never would forgive ETHELIND, for being the cause of his sister's danger and death.

and the changes which had taken place in the furniture and other things, she was actually in those very rooms where the horrible event which had darkened over her destiny had actually happened. { the room to prepare the meditated vengeance.— Nay, as that passage-entrance appcared neither to have been painted nor cleaned, since the last time she entered it, she even fancied she saw some of the murdered Mina's blood still staining the wall and the floor; and when Waldemar returned to her, he found her nearly fainting, and in the great-tention, and his beloved mother had more than est emotion. once received services from Madame Steinheim. "Take me hence, take me hence!" she cried, Still, time might not perhaps have increased "this place is not good for me-let me go away his enmity to Ethelind if it did not subdue it, had directly!" And then, as well as she could, she he not met in the prison with a companion who explained to him the cause of her distress, and the used every art to inflame his resentment, and keep extent of her horrible suspicions. Waldemar im-up his terrible resolution of pursuing his revenge mediately saw that to combat such feelings was as soon as ever the term of his imprisonment was impossible; he resolved, therefore, to remove her over; and his companion was no other than the instantly from the place which called them forth; worthless and unnatural son of poor Madame and having assured her he would call up the car. Steinheim. When they arrived at this portico, they found itriage directly, he told her, that when he had seen not only splendid in architecture, but from the her home he would return for the children. blaze of lights which adorned it for the occasion; and Ethelind saw nothing to remind her of the rooms of former days. Still she could not enjoy the scene around her; she could not but remember that her daughters were within two years as old as she was when she went to that ball which had so fatally influenced her future life; and she trembled lest some unforeseen occurrence, as unforeseen as the event which she recalled had been to her, should cloud over the bright morning of their days and make her suffer again in the persons of her children. But Ethelind, who hung on Madame de Friberg's arm (a lady with whom she was exces. sively pleased,) felt it incumbent on her to drive away those saddening, and, probably, ill-founded fears, and look the gaiety which she felt not. That evening Waldemar, for the first time in his life, left the side of Ethelind. He quitted her in order to indulge himself in the amusement of talk-dwelling on his blighted prospects, and pining for ing in a feigned voice to those whom he knew un- revenge on her as the cause. der their disguises, and of occasioning them a sort Geraldi was, with reason, vain of his personal of impatient but vain desire to know who he was advantages; he possessed uncommon symmetry -an amusement well known to frequenters of mas- and beauty of form and feature; he had also conquerades. His unusual desertion, though perfect-scious energy of character, sufficient to execute ly excusable, did not tend to raise her spirits; and any project of his proud ambition; and he had long ere the festive crowd around felt the slightest been taught by his partial parents to believe that, wish to disperse, Ethelind sighed to return to a could he acquire wealth and connexions by form scene more congenial to her; and nothing but hering an advantageous marriage, the obscurity of his dislike to vez Waldemar prevented her from beg-birth would be forgotten, and his towering wishes ging to retire, as she knew Madame de Friberg gratified.

But to return to Geraldi Duval, the author of those sufferings which were now so forcibly and so unexpectedly recalled to the mind of Ethelind, and and who at that very moment was, though supposed dead, alive in Brussels.

Geraldi, who had witnessed, almost with disgust the regard which Steinheim expressed for him, the" man who had destroyed his mother, (as he knew that he himself could never have borne the sight of the being who had murdered his,) was reconciled Ethelind showed her knowledge of the human to this unnatural forgiveness, by Steinheim's proheart, in her conviction that the punishment of fessions of eternal hatred towards Ethelind, as the Geraldi was not likely to eradicate his hatred to-real or original cause of the destruction of those wards her, but rather to increase it; and in the whom he loved; and thus, by administering food enforced solitude of his prison, he was for ever to his hate, Steinheim succeeded in lulling asleep the good feelings which would have closed his heart against this designing villain.

and her husband would take care of her children; It was therefore not only boyish passion, but
and having seen them already dance several dan-worldly prudence, which led him to endeavour to
ces, even her maternal pride was sufficiently recommend himself to Ethelind Manstein; and
satisfied.
her disdain of him, which he attributed wholly to
pride, and to scorn of his humble birth, stung him
to the quick, as it convinced him that his parents
were deceived in thinking he could ever get above
the disadvantages of his parentage, and that the
failure of all the aspirings of his ambition was to be
predicted from this unfortunate instance. There-
fore, it was not the mere circumstance of Ethelind's
refusal to dance with him, but what that circum-
stance proved, which maddened the unhappy
youth into the desire of personal and immediate
vengeance; and when he saw Ethelind daring, by
dancing with another, though she had refused him
to pass a personal affront on him, and one which
he was sure she would not have ventured to pass
on another—when, too she had accepted a man of

But Waldemar would not as yet allow her to leave the room; and being weary of standing, she left the arm of the countess, and went to a retired seat near a sort of door of entrance, which was thrown open, and by that means refreshed the rooms considerably. Ethelind sat for a few minutes on this seat lost in reverie, and inattentive to the passing objects; but suddenly turning to look through this entrance-door along the passage to which it led-a passage only faintly illuminated she started from her seat in strong and overwhelming emotion; for she recognised in that passage the very spot where Geraldi, so many years ago, had stabbed his innocent victim; and found that, though she had been deceived by a new entrance,

Geraldi did not suspect why Steinheim felt and acted thus. In the first place, Steinheim was a being in whom selfishness and vice had utterly annihilated the feelings of nature. As Mina would have shared with him his paternal fortune, he rejoiced at her death, after the first shock was over; and when the benevolent Mansteins offered to take charge of his unconscious mother, and he took possession of her fortune, he thought Geraldi the greatest benefactor he had ever known; and he would have told him so when he saw him, had he not discovered that the youth had affections and feelings with which he had no sympathy, and which indeed he did not expect to find in the RUFFIAN BOY. But he also hated Ethelind, and hated her parents; simply because he had injured them, and they had too greatly obliged him.

Manstein not only maintained his mother, (though he pretended he would allow him money for her board,) but he had lent him a considerable sum of money, for which, on hearing of his dis. tresses, he had cancelled the bond. But Ethelind, aware of the vileness of his character, on his application to her, after her father's death, to lend him money, had positively refused to befriend him in any way, and by that means made him her deadly enemy as well as Geraldi, whom he, therefore, had a pleasure in spiriting up to perseverance, in what he called his meritorious intentions.

RURAL REPOSITORY.

He had also other designs on Geraldi, in which he succeeded; for that forlorn boy, looking on himself as necessarily an outcast from society, was induced by Steinheim to join with him a company of banditti, some of whom were then impris. oned with them, but were going to be discharged soon, whose greatest haunt was a cavern in the Hercynian forest, near which, unconsciously, Waldemar took up his abode on leaving Ratisbon; near which place also there was a cavern, in which Geraldi and Steinheim lay concealed when Geraldi first attacked Ethelind's life after he left prison. It was, therefore, no wonder that Geraldi, who was allowed the choice of a horse in his comrades' stables in the forest, should have a steed so swift of foot, nor that he should so long and so often elude pursuit. But even his steed did not always save him; and in a rencontre on the road, (in which Steinheim as killed,) Geraldi, Giuseppe Celarno, his cousin, and some of the band, were taken and confined at Altenburg. But having escaped from then, Geraldi (after his unsuccessful aim at Ethelind with a pistol) had fled with Giuseppe in disguise to England; and there, (as has been related above,) a man being murdered by the cousin of Geraldi, both of them for this offence, were thrown into prison.

But Geraldi, being aware that nothing could be proved against him, and that he probably would be set at liberty again, thought it expedient to prevail on Guiseppe to change names with him; and they agreed that Guiseppe should be arraigned under the name of Geraldi Duval, and he under that of Giuseppe Celarno. Hence arose the security of Meynell; a security increased by the resemblance before mentioned of Giuseppe to his relation. Geraldi congratulated himself on the deception which he and his cousin had practised, because, when he was liberated from prison, he knew that the idea of his being no more, would make his return to Germany less insecure than it would otherwise have been, and would also throw Waldemar and Ethelind so completely off their guard, that he might very likely be able to complete his still meditated vengeance.

He accordingly, though still disguised, embarked at Harwich, and landed at Ostend. While he was there, he saw by a Brussels paper that Baron Waldemar had lately succeeded to a large property in the immediate neighborhood of Brussels, and had recently taken possession of it.

To Brussels therefore Geraldi hastened; and he arrived early on the evening appointed for the ball to be given by the Count de Friberg; at those very rooms where, twenty-one years before, that event had taken place which was the means of making him a ruffian, and an outcast of society for life!

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'I shall then,” said he, " revenge not only my injury, but that of Mina Steinheim!" And so cager was he to enjoy this complete satisfaction to his hatred, that he felt even life indifferent to him, when compared with the interests of this great revenge.

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from the altar, to" call the sinner to repentance ;" but he rose from his parents' grave, sighed as he passed the tomb of two of his victims, and then repaired to the spot, whence he was resolved to watch for the moment to spring upon another victim.

As soon as the carriages began to arrive at the illuminated portico, which I have before described, Geraldi concealed himself behind the crowd assembled to see the company alight, and watched for the family of Waldemar.

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Waldemar alighted first, and Geraldi took par ticular notice of the decoration of his hat, and the colour of his domino. His mask, which he held in his hand, was he observed, only a common black When his plans were nearly arranged, he went mask; and having waited till he saw Ethelind to the cathedral, in order to visit the grave of his alight, and had thus ascertained the fact of her parents, a pious duty which he paid as soon as he being there, he was preparing to depart, when he was liberated from prison, seven years before, and saw Waldemar drop something as he tied on his which no consideration could have led him to omit mask, before he followed Ethelind and his children. paying again on his return to Brussels. Accord-Geraldi took up what he dropped, and found it to ingly, he bought flowers to strew over that grave be of the greatest importance to his purpose; for which was unnoticed and unknown by any other it was the ticket of admission for masks, and no eye. And this being, who was meditating the for. name was written on the back of it. bidden crime of murder, with scrupulous punctuali- Every circumstance favours my designs," ty was preparing to fulfil the commandment of thought Geraldi, and he immediately went to a "Honor thy father and thy mother;" not how-place where he knew masquerade dresses were to ever, with the wish of obeying the awful voice be procured. On the counter lay the fellow-dothat had commanded it, but merely from a feeling mino to Waldemar's, and a hat, which under his of filial tenderness, of which even his habits of direction in a short time was the very counterpart life, and his atrocious guilt in prospect, could not of his; and on his pretending dissatisfaction with divest him. the domino and the hat, the shopman said, he On entering the church, he was arrested on his could only assure him that the Baron de Waldeway to his parents' grave, by the sight of a new mar had been there, and had chosen a hat and do. monument; and he started with mixed emotion, at mino exactly the same in every particular. seeing by the light of the lamp over it, that it was erected to the memory of his two victims, victims deeply regretted by him; and, actuated by the same feelings as he had experienced before, with the same hand intended to take the life of her who had watched with exemplary tenderness over that existence which he had rendered joyless, he strew-ing the ticket. ed some of the flowers designed for his parents over the tomb of the Steinheims, and then threw himself, in a sort of hallowed paroxysm of filial affection, on the grave of his father and mother.

Strange, but not uncommon inconsistency of feelings! And the great master of human nature has represented Lady Macbeth as only deterred from murdering her sleeping and defenceless king, by his resemblance to her own father.

"Had he not resembled my father as he slept,
I'd have done it."

Is it then visionary to believe, that at the very moment when human beings are on the point of committing the worst actions, they are the most capable of being worked upon by virtuous motives, if presented to their mind?—Is it not likely, that while Geraldi's heart was thus softened by filial Geraldi overheard particulars of the intended tenderness, and almost virtuous remorse, the voice ball, and where it was to be held, in a coffee- of admonition and persuasion would not have been house, where he fearlessly entered, because the lost on him; and that, had any one, aware of his same paper which contained the account of Wal- bloody intentions, been at hand to address his best demar's change of abode, had also contained a long feelings, the ruffian deed might have been prevenaccount of his trial and supposed execution; and ted, and Ethelind saved? Had any one bidden he had the additional security of a reddish-colour-him look forward once more with hope, and said ed wig and false whiskers, and eye-brows of the to him, "You are supposed dead, and may in a same hue.

Having heard these, to hlm important particulars, (for the family of Waldemar was one of those named amongst the company expected to be at the ball,) Geraldi left the coffee-house to ruminate alone

foreign land and under another name, begin life and fame anew," he might perhaps, have been excited to forego his desperate and terrible intentions. But no voice spoke to him from the senseless marble, nor did the prophetic priest address him

This was enough ;—and desiring a porter might follow with them to his hotel, he led the way thither, and assumed the fatal disguise; but he concealed the domino with a large Italian ferriola ; and unmasked repaired to the scene of action, to watch for the best opportunity of masking and us.

Tickets were, he found, received at the door of the well-remembered passage, as well as at the portico; and Geraldi thought it would be best for him to show his at the former place, as it was ill lighted. He then entered the ball-room, in order to try how far he might venture to mingle in the crowd without fear of being found out as an intruder; and having done so, he saw that, if he took care to avoid being in the same room with Waldemar, he was in no danger of detection. He had been addressed several times as Waldemar, and had heard-" Ay, you will not speak; but we know you, baron," so often, that he found he indeed looked the man whom he wished to appear; but seeing the real Waldemar enter the room, he retired at the door by which he had entered.

It was not long after this that Waldemar, at the desire of Ethelind, went in search of her carriage; and Geraldi who had taken off his mask again, and had hidden his domino with his cloak, (which he had given to a by-stander to hold for him,) saw Ethelind pale and trembling standing at the foot of the passage; and was convinced, by the look of horror which her countenance assumed whenever her eye involuntarily glanced towards the spot where Mina fell, that the whole scene had recurred to her as strongly as if it had then happened. He was not surprised, therefore, to hear Waldemar calling for his servants, and telling them, as their lady was taken ill, that they should

fortune!" while a sort of delirious joy succeeded his
before frenzied despair.

go away instantly. "But," he added, the carriage
must go round and get as near the portico as pos-
sible, as your lady can't come up this passage;
The pulse of Ethelind now grew stronger and
therefore I will go with you, and see how far we stronger; but as the blood still flowed faster and
faster from the wound, every possible effort was
These directions, aud this care to save the feel. made to stop the bleeding; and when these efforts
ings of Ethelind, were, alas! the means of plac-were successful, it was judged expedient to remove
ing her in the way of destruction.

shall have to walk."

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the sufferer from the place where she was; as she Now is my time," thought the listening assas. would, on recovering her senses, recollect only too sin. Then throwing off his cloak and resuming well, that on that very bed she had herself knelt his mask, while the by-standers supposed the gen-beside the bleeding corpse of her friend, tleman was playing some masquerade trick he grasped his dagger, and prepared for the work of death.

Ethelind, meanwhile, was anxiously expecting the return of Waldemar, and watching for the blue domino. Geraldi, therefore, had little difficulty in effecting his purpose; for, taking him for Waldemar, she advanced a few steps to meet him, and eagerly put her hand in his, which trembled with emotion. But finding that he led her along the dreaded passage, she cried "Oh! not that way! Force me not to go that way! It would make the horrid scene live over again before me!"

Still, however, he dragged her along, to the wonder and alarm of Ethelind, whose slightest wish had usually power over her husband; and spite of her struggles he had now dragged her to the spot, stained as she believed, with Mina's blood when a well-known voice exclaimed-"Yes! the scene shall indeed live over again before thee!" and in an instant she felt the assassin's dagger in her side! And when Waldemar, who was seeking her, drew near with Madame de Friberg, he received her bleeding and insensible in his

arms.

Geraldi immediately tried to escape, and would have done so for he was armed and desperate had not his mask dropt off, which caused him to be recognized and seized by the officers of justice, who having found out that Guiseppe had been executed under the name of Geraldi, and that the latter had returned to Brussels, had been all day in pursuit of him, had traced him to the rooms, and were on the watch to seize him.

To resist them was, he soon found, impossible; and he was once more (for the same crime committed on the same spot, twenty-one years before) confined in the same prison."

But Waldemar was wholly unconscious of the projected escape, or fortunate detention, of the murderer; he saw nothing-but the murdered object whom he held in his arms; on whom he vainly lavished every tender and endearing epithet and vainly conjured to speak to him once more, and look on him once more.

Assistance was sent for and procured immediately, while Ethelind was carried and laid on the same bed on which the bleeding body of Mina had reposed; and for hours Ethelind seemed as certainly dead as Mina herself.

But at length one of the medical attendants ob. served that there was a little movement of the pulse, and that it was to be hoped the appearance of death was occasioned not by the loss of blood, or by the wound, but was a deep swoon, the consequence of excess of terror.

The instant Waldemar heard this opinion, he started up from his station at the pillow of Ethelind, and seizing the physician's hand, exclaimed, "Save her! save her! and command my life and

A litter, therefore, was procured, and Ethelind removed to the house of the Count de Friberg, which was at no great distance; and by the time she was conveyed into a chamber, she opened her eyes and gazed on the objects around her. But, alas! it was without any consciousness whatever; and the rapid pulse, flushed cheek, and glittering eye, proclaimed that she was now exposed to all the ravages and danger of fever.

Incessant were her ravings, most afflicting were the expressions in which she vented them, and agonizing were the images, constantly present to her mind. She knew no one, and she saw no image but that of Geraldi; whom she was constantly invoking to take her life, and spare that of her adored husband; and while that husband was holding her burning hand in his, and absorbed in watching her ever varying cheek, she used, in the most pathetic accents, to deplore his cruel absence and lament his unkindness in leaving her exposed to the fury of Geraldi.

She would then conjure Waldemar himself to go in search of Waldemar, and bring him to her; unconscious that his bitter tears fell upon her supplicating hands, and that she was speaking daggers to the heart of her husband, nearly as terrible as the dagger of Geraldi.

"No," replied Waldemar, "I did not come to insult you, but to oblige my injured wife."

Your wife!-is she not dead then!" demand

ed Geraldi.

"No and she is even out of danger."

I will not endeavour to describe the horrible re grets of Geraldi, mingled occasionally with bitter lamentations for the deaths of Madame Steinheim and the innocent Mina ; and an avowal of the melancholy pleasure with which he had strewed their tomb with flowers.

Waldemar, while Geraldi paused to take breath, could not help observing, "that Ethelind was as innocent a victim as Mina and her mother." "Innocent!-innocent! When she scorned me when her pride made her refuse her hand in the dance to the son of Theresa Duval; and when she even danced with another the moment after! The poor kind Steinheims never scorned Geraldi—and I killed them;-and she, the proud one, lives!— O my accursed fate! and she lives to triumph in it!"

"No she lives to deplore it; for she has never felt resentment towards you, Geraldi; and before I leave you, it is my duty perhaps, in pity to your sufferings, to assure you that Ethelind forgives and prays for you.”

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Forgives me-she forgives me !-What has she to forgive? She has had years of happiness; she has had a life of freedom, of friendship, of gratified affections, of unstained reputation, and probably of high respect and honour. And what has my life been?—and all the consequence of her devilish pride, which blighted the commencement of it! I loved her, Baron de Waldemar, baby as I was; I loved her, and she knew it ; and yet she humbled me, and yet she wounded me to the very soul! True, passion was, from the busy sugges But at length, with the fever, the delirium sub-tions of pride, instantly swallowed up in hatred— sided; and Ethelind recognised the anxious hus-but at the moment of her scorn I was an object of band, who had so fondly watched, and so fervent- pity; and she-she made me, from the consely prayed, beside her frenzied pillow during so quence of that evening, an object of abhorrence many sleepless nights. But the recognition was and an outcast of society!-Forgive me! She too calm, and she seemed not sufficiently alive to forgive me! No; she should implore my forgivethe overwhelming emotions of thankfulness and joyness, for having blasted all the fair promise of my which oppressed Waldemar and choked his ut

terance.

All danger for her life was, however, at an end, and the only fear remaining was for her reason.

One idea was predominant, and that was, that Geraldi was not really taken, though she was told that he was certainly in prison.

youth, and for having shut the present and the fu. ture world equally against me!"

Here Geraldi paused in strong and affecting emotion. And Waldemar-however unnatural such bitter resentment of so trifling a circumstance appeared to him, and however morbid the mind of the man-forgot all other feelings in pity for his "Did I ever deceive you, dearest ?" said blasted prospects; and with solemn earnestness he Waldemar. conjured him to tell him if there was any way in "No; but you have been deceived, and may be which he could serve him, or oblige him; and if so again." he would like to receive spiritual comfort from any "Well then-if I go to the prison and see particular person. Geraldi in irons, will you believe it?" "I will."

"Serve me!" said Geraldi, “ why, ay. Free me from these fetters, prevail on my enemies to And Waldemar went to the prison, agonizing as drop their prosecution against me, and give up the visit was to him.

-Waldemar was far more agitated than Geraldi, when through a grated window he beheld the still striking form and countenance of the unrelenting ruffian.

Geraldi knew him instantly, dark as was his dungeon; and springing up with a violence that made the clanging of his fetters sound to the inmost soul of Waldemar, he demanded "what the intrusion meant; and if the Baron de Waldemar came to triumph over his foe in chains ?"

your own; will you do that? You see I put your sincerity to a strong test, and ask a great service of you."

"You do; and one I cannot perform, as your enlargement is, you know, incompatible with my wife's safety."

"It is so; and you cannot save me, and ought not to save me; therefore why do you pretend to offer me your services ?"

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you can't do-Away with you!-As to spiritually, was not hardened; and the account of his last
aid, when I want it I'll send for it."
moments was such as to gratify the feeling heart

And Waldemar returned home.

" Well," said Ethelind, with a distrustful smile, "you have not seen him; he is fled again, I know." However, the assurances of Waldemar removed this impression, though nothing could convince her that he would not escape again; and she often earnestly begged Waldemar to let her retire into the safe walls of a convent. And so sure was she that Geraldi would be acquitted at the trial which was then going on, that Waldemar promised to at. tend the conclusion of it in person; and, if Geral. di was acquitted both of the robbery and murder, to return, and convey her immediately into a con

vent.

But Geraldi was convicted, and condemned to execution. Still, as two days were to elapse before the sentence was to take place, Ethelind, with that calm determination which was so alarming to be. hold, persisted in believing he would escape; and was every moment starting, and fancying he was on the stairs, or at the window; and Waldemar knew not how to combat this evidently diseased { state of nervous feeling. However, she seemed pleased with the idea of his going again to the prison, and he went.

Geraldi's face was turned towards the grate when Waldemar reached it; but he was so absorb. ed in thought that he was unconscious of his approach; and his countenance was so full of woe, and so devoid of the fierceness which usually distinguished it, that Waldemar beheld him with eyes tearful with compassion.

At length Geraldi saw him, and approaching him said, "Baron Waldemar, why you thus persist to visit me I know not; but I am told you are a kind-hearted man, and I believe you do not come to insult the wretched."

of Waldemar.

But no one could persuade Ethelind that he was really dead; she was sure that he even contrived to deceive the executioner, and that he feigned death; and Waldemar feared that her reason would never perfectly return. But as desperate cases require desperate cures, he waited on the magistrate, and obtained leave to bring Ethelind to see the body of Geraldi before it was clad in the habiliments of the grave. And that afternoon, without telling Ethelind whither he was carrying her, he led her to the room that contained the remains of her now powerless enemy. "Look there, incredulous Ethelind!" said Waldemar; "look on that well-known face, and tell me if you do not indeed see Geraldi ?"

Ethelind started with instinctive terror at the sight of those features; and said in a hurried voice "But he is only sleeeping! Let us away; he will kill me, you know when he wakes again!" Waldemar's heart now died within him, and he feared even the sight would not restore her to sane perception. But he persisted.--"Look again, dearest Ethelind! nay, move not so softly; nothing but the last dread trumpet can awake him now."

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of wine'; then lay in wait for the poor girl, as she left the place of entertainment, and, as he thought stabbed her to the heart; but in his flutter he had mistaken the object, and he had stabbed her companion. He was instantly seized, and as he was led to prison, he approached his intended victim, and said, "Je te retrouverai un jour !" On account of his extreme youth his sentence was not death, but imprisonment for twenty years. The term of his imprisonment is now about to expire.]

MISCELLANT.

From the Flag of our Union.
THE MANIA C.

BY LUCY A. BROCKSBANK.

CAN there be a more melancholy subject for contemplation than that presented by the Maniac? To behold the wild and wandering eye, from whence the light of reason has forever fled; to listen to the demon-like ravings, or the wild and incoherent moanings, that proceed from the lips upon which is fixed the seal of insanity, impressed even upon the once firm and rounded curve, now parted and trembling, as if agitated by the backward flow of life's current, which has forsaken the heart, leaving it cold and still; to consume, as with a liquid flame, the throbbing, whirling brain, from whose throne the godlike spirit may have departed never more to return?

Ethelind shuddered, and said in a low voice, The last dread trumpet! O, then, poor Geraldi!" She now approached still nearer; and as she saw that cheek, once, and always indeed, so round, and so blooming, now sunk, and pale, and livid'; Among the inmates of a lunatic asylum, I beand when she beheld those " 'bright and terrible held one young person, who, in particular, excited eyes" fast closed in the unyielding film of death-my sympathy. She was not more than sixteen the once full, red and scornful lip, now wan, thin and shut up with the perceptible tightness of dissolution, her bosom began to heave, and a rising sob indicated beginning conviction.

Waldemar's hopes instantly revived, and he ex"No, on my soul !" said Waldemar, speaking claimed, "Now, Ethelind, touch that hand, so of. in strong and evident emotion.

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'Again I thank you," said Geraldi. "Baron Waldemar," he continued, "I have seen a priest since you left me, and he has told me what has altered my feeling much towards Ethelind Manstein. I find that with all her pride she owned that Geraldi Duval had a soul. I find that be. lieving me dead, she ordered masses both at Prague and here, to be said for the soul of Geraldi Duval; she made me of importance in one way, however; and I thank her too.-Yes, and I believe I am glad I did not kill her ;-and-yes-yes-I believe I forgive her. And now," he added, as if willing to escape from any witness of his deep emotion, "leave me, leave me."

"Would I could save you!" exclaimed Waldemar, with that tone and in that accent of sincerity which carries conviction to the heart of the hearer. "You cannot; but I am told that my REDEEMER CAN, and I endeavour to believe it, Farewell!" "You shall have the prayers of us all," said Waldemar; and hastened away,

The next morning Geraldi expiated his crimes on the scaffold, where his demeanour, though man.

years of age, extremely beautiful and accomplished. I was informed that this young lady was the only child of a highly respectable and wealthy citizen, by whom she was almost idolized. Neither pains nor expense had been spared, in order to give her every advantage of education which money could ten armed against thy innocent life, though power-procure; but alas! their fond hopes were to be less now, and able to hurt thee no more." blasted-a cloud of mental darkness was destined Waldemar then took the hand of Ethelind, and to veil this bright and beautiful spirit; and the made it grasp the hand of Geraldi. gathering gloom-a settled melancholy, which As soon as she felt that icy coldness so peculiar, seemed but the precursor of raving madness, comso penetrating; that coldness which nothing livingpelled the agonized parents to resign their idol to knows, and which death alone can give, the aw. the walls of a lunatic asylum. Upon being introful touch carried conviction to her discased mind; duced to this unhappy child, (for she was but a tears, long strangers to her, burst in salutary tor- child,) I was struck with her extreme grace and rents from her eyes; and throwing herself in her beauty. Observing, that her large, melancholy husband's arms, she exclaimed, "O Waldemar! eyes fixed upon a bouquet of flowers, which I held I am now convinced, and you have cured me; but in my hand I presented them to her. Without a take me hence, for this sight is too much for me." smile, but with inimitable grace, she received them, and after looking at them for some moments, as if in silent admiration, she exclaimed, “Ah! do you see?-they are fading-they are dying?" and with her beautiful eyes swimming in tears, she arose and left the room, leaving the flowers behind her. Nothing, I was told, however bright and beautiful presented aught but the emblem of death and decay to this afflicted child. She would gaze sadly upon the features of a lovely babe, and, with her fingers plac.

From that hour Ethelind was restored to health of mind as well as of body; and nothing has since disturbed her happiness or that of her family, though a sudden gloom always overspreads the countenance both of Waldemar and Ethelind whenever the idea of Geraldi is recalled to them; but that gloom is occasioned by generous feeling for his fate, not by resentment of his crime. And Ethelind, while contemplating the bright prospects of her own sons, regrets that she was the means ofed upon its little wrist, apparently counting the blighting the fair promise of the youthful Geraldi.

[THIS story is founded on a fact which was related to me as follows :-About twenty years ago, a boy at Brussels, having been rejected as a partner at a ball, by a girl about his own age which was not much more than twelve, he left the ball-room went to a coffee house, and drank several glasses

rapid pulsations, as the warm current flowed on, then remark, with affected earnestness, that, "So many moments of its life had fled." But it occured to me, that if the sweet, soothing influences of the gospel could be brought to bear upon that disordered mind, it might produce a happy result. She seemed to imagine everything to be touched by death. Now, could she be made to comprehend

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