peared wholly among the heavy mists that gathered and dispersed around the hills; sometimes he stood on a peak, measuring with doubtful and cautious glance the precipice he was about to plunge into; and more often treading with a pace and aspect that at once implied weariness, resignation, subdued fears, and humble hopes, down the steep and perilous paths which wound along the sides of these rocky hills-some hollowed by the mountain-stream, some broken up by the earthquake, and a very few bearing marks of human attempts (apparently resigned in despair) to shape a track for the traveller down declivities almost impassable.

The mists increasing as the dim autumnal morning broke, the monk lost all view of his way; and as the heavy vapours rolled like an ocean in foam beneath him, he seated himself on a projecting crag, looking like a mariner perched on the fragment of a wreck, and gazing sadly on the ocean that surrounds him. As the monk seated himself, his staff, as lightly as it was leant on by a feeble hand,

detached a huge mass of loosened stone from the cliff, which went flashing and thundering down the precipice, and sinking amid the waters of a dark quiet mountain-lake, sent its agitated waves in ripple and foam to the shore. At the sound, so abrupt and unexpected amid that deep and stilly loneliness, the thousand echoes of the hills awoke; the eagle started from his aerie, and added his wild scream to the clamour; and the mist itself, by the strong percussion of the air, parted for a moment, then slowly and dimly gathered and settled again. then was still; the echoes subsided, the scream died away, the lake lay still again, and the silence became more profound and touching from the contrast

All

The monk looked round him at first with that expression of wonder mingled with curiosity and awe, which the slightest phenomena of nature amid these her deep and profound recesses of solitude must cause it was like the cry of treason in the chamber of a slumbering monarch." And here,

even here," said the monk," amid the stillness of the everlasting mountains, of the primeval lakes, the fall of a pebble can cause inquietude inquietude and uproar! The rocks make war on the waters, and the wide echoes take part in the fray-inanimate nature itself becomes hostile around me ;-but how soon that enmity is appeased!" His mind reverted sadly to the assembly of the Albigenses, whom he expected to find fixed as their mountains and cold as their streams -pure, passionless, and moveless: his mission had proved them far otherwise. His eye glanced involuntarily from the cliff he had now descended to the direction in which stood the lofty towers of Courtenaye, shrouded by the surrounding hills and by the mists that mantled them from summit to base," And thus," he exclaimed, "must man wander ever amid doubtful evils ;-and wherefore, but to show him there is on earth no certain good? Yon mountains shelter as fierce or fiercer passions in their cold breasts as those towers within whose proud walls lie

'knight, and noble, and prelate, all on fire with unholy feelings, baptized in the name of holy church, and defying the God of Mercy in wicked honour to his name! Wherefore is this ?" he exclaimed (his mental feet stumbling on the dark mountains)," wherefore is this, that from hovel to castle, from the persecuted peasant to the baron in his tower and the knight on his steed, we meet with nought that resembles thine image, nought that bears thine image and superscription O God! whither are we to turn? Wretchedness in castles, and pride in huts — evil every where good alone in Thee! Dry up thus, dry up thus every source from which we hoped to drain even a drop to slake our thirst, that our burning and insatiate hearts may turn at last to the fountain of living waters, and feel that there alone it may be quenched !"

Again his thoughts wandered back to the congregation of the Albigeois, and to the events which had occurred during his sojourn among them. On his first arrival, his habit

had given such offence to the more zealous among them, (though they could scarce expect a visitant in a less formidable garb,) that it was with much difficulty he gained access to their leaders. The known sanctity of his character, however, proved available security for him even among those who abjured his creed; and he was at length allowed to state the terms offered by the Pope's legate. Then "rose the riot and the din"- powerful objections from the teachers, and deep misgivings of heart among the congregation, too well founded on former instances of treachery and fears of their renewal. The Hugonot deputies, when admitted to an audience with Catharine of Medici, were never more tenacious of security, nor with more reason.

But instead of offering the proud security of prince and peer and prelate, (a pledge too often violated,) the monk of Montcalm pledged his own good faith for the safety of the Albigeois; and kissing the wooden cross appended to his rosary, he attested the Redeemer of all to witness the pledge.