his lips, to chafe his numbed limbs, to attempt to add ease to his posture and comfort to his retreat, repaid her for all danger and weariness, till the few moments that she could allot to her visit had elapsed, and she hasted to return, trembling, but glowing; anxious, but elated. The contemplation of this visit became a dream of delightsome anticipations all day, and its performance the cherished solace of the evening. That delicious picture of secret contemplation-that "joy of its own which the heart knoweth and a stranger doth not intermeddle with"-that hidden treasure which we retire to contemplate and sum in secret with a miser's joy and a miser's jealousy---is above all the enjoyments that ever were generalized by participation, or weakened by diffusion. Could mortal eye have beheld them, they would have presented a sight like that described in lines of mystical and magic beauty, Where young Adonis oft reposes, while Amand stood the sullen, jealous sentinel of these moments, ever warning Genevieve that they had elapsed almost from their commencement --- ever menacing her with the consequences during their hurried return, and often withholding his aid from her faltering steps, in jealous waywardness of spirit. Meanwhile, the damp confinement, and want of all accommodation suited to his state, delayed the perfect recovery of the knight long beyond the time that his youth and vigour promised, and in spite of the skill and assiduity of the leech; and it was not till the fourteenth evening of her visits that her patient seemed to evince sciousness, and feebly to and thank his visitor. some touch of con attempt to discover That night an au tumnal blast had strewed her path ankle-deep with leaves, which heavy rains had converted into mire; the roof of branches had been torn off the hut, and Genevieve trembled as she approached it, lest the storm should have disturbed the sufferer. To her astonishment she found him with both faculties and speech restored, and anxious to be led forth into the light even of the frowning and stormy heaven, murmuring, as he tossed on his bed of leaves, that nothing could restore his health but the free open air of heaven. "And thou shalt breathe it, if mine arm have power to support thee," said Genevieve. ---"Is it the touch of mortal or spirit that I feel pressing my burning brow with such delicious coolness?" answered the knight; "it feels like a wreath of fresh flowers around mine head."--" Angels do not now visit the desert," said Genevieve," as they did in the days of holy men of old: our sins have banished those heavenly visitants;--it is a mortal who supports thee."--" If I may judge by the clear music of thy voice, and the silky softness of thy touch," said the youth," doubtless one of a noble race.""Of the very humblest of fallen mortality," answered Genevieve, with a firm sadness: a peasant maiden; one to whom a noble knight would blush to owe a courtesy, and a Crusader would think it foul scorn to be in 66 debted, even for life." She spoke with deep emotion; for, by the stronger light, as they approached the rude aperture that served for door, she recognized in the wounded knight the youth who had preserved her the night she had been seized on, and she anticipated the effect which the disclosure of her birth and religion must have on a knight and a Crusader. "I understand thee," said the knight: "thou art of that unhappy faith which"Which teaches me, wherever good can be wrought, or mercy shown, not to pause to ask who is my neighbour," said Genevieve, forgetting that this scriptural allusion was probably lost on the hearer.-- 66 Thy faith, whether true or false," said the knight, smiling faintly, "owes me somewhat, even the preservation of a fair female heretic from the assault of ruffians, who menaced not, in truth, her life, but might have left her nought to prize in the life they spared. Mine arm," he added, reclining on the support of Genevieve, who proffered it more tenderly than ever---" mine arm was stronger then; yet still, I think, it could fell to earth aught that approached with touch of maculation that holy beauty."--" Dost thou remember her?" said Genevieve, in a voice scarce audible; "could a peasant damsel fling such spell over the memory of a noble knight and a Crusader ?"---“ On my bed of leaves," said the youth," that vision was with me. Oh, so lofty was her demeanour---so sweet and thrilling her voice---so purified and earth-abstracted the whole saintly vision, that I have sometimes thought an angel had descended among the heretics and worn her form, to win them back to heaven! Now, mock me if thou wilt, damsel; but in my wanderings I have often thought that a voice like her's breathed in my ears that a hand like her's smoothed my bed of leaves---that she was with me in my lonely wretchedness."--" She was with thee, she is with thee, she thanks, she blesses her preserver, but never, never can she repay him.” And, as she spoke, Genevieve threw back the hood that had hitherto concealed |