the name of one so young, so faithful must be uttered in my prayers evermore; and I would ask this of thee at our parting." "It is Charlotte Cronstedt," replied the maiden sadly-" once a proud, and now a dishonoured name." 66 "Now shouldst thou, indeed, pray heaven to aid me, poor orphan," he cried, fervently. Oh! ask thou a blessing on my work, and thy father's soul will call one on thee." Astonishment held the young girl silent, as, again clasping her hand in farewell, he turned from her to hide the tears of pity and admiration. "Pray for me-God guide thee!" fell on her ear, waking her from her dream of bewilderment; but reply was vain-the miner had plunged into the depths of the forest, and was lost to sight. And the secret of the young girl was kept, even when the mystery had passed away, and tidings had reached Siljan that at the same hour that the fugitive miner left his shelter in the mountains the standard of revolt had been unfurled on every height in Dalécarlia. * * * small voice of reason, and the feeling that the hand that held them was tireless, most of the conspirators submitted themselves to his will, brought by the mighty argument of a noble mind to comprehend the motive of the seeming tyranny; and there now remained disaffected "Cronstedt !" cried the miner, gazing on her but a few fanatics-too small a number to be with sparkling eyes. "Cronstedt! The mar- dreaded as enemies of the state, but the more to tyred victim of Christiern? Thou his child?" be distrusted as they conspired in secret. These The lips of the speaker quivered with emo--despite the late defeat of their companionstion, and his brow with inward suffering was formed themselves into a band, and, guided only more sternly contracted than it had been amid by revenge, resolved on achieving by assassinathe deep anguish of mind and body so lately tion the destruction of one too mighty endured. to be openly attacked. The names of the intended regicides were deposited in an urn; and the one destined to strike the blow was a young man of the name of Carlson, of noble family, and led to join the conspiracy more from that family's blind prejudice than his own conviction. He set out for Stockholm on his dark mission, bound by an oath to fulfil it, but crushed by remorse, and utterly lost to all hope of peace hereafter. A review soon gave him an opportunity of approaching the king; and as he stood among his suite, looking on the scene, habited, as was his custom, in a uniform less brilliant than that of any of the officers, the destroyer seized the moment to mingle with the group. But that very simplicity of dress preserved his victim; for Carlson, to whom Gustavus was unknown, singled out one of his staff, and with a murmured prayer for his own lost soul, struck the nobleman to the earth; but the inward horror of the murderer proved the salvation of his unconscious enemy, for the hand, trembling as it rose, inflicted but a slight wound. The discovered and defeated crime was not the less a capital one; and the unhappy conspirator was hurried amid execrations from the royal presence to an immediate trial. As soon as his arrest was made known to the hidden instigators of the plot, they looked on themselves as lost; and already heard, in fancy, the pardon of the young criminal purchased by their own detection. But they knew not the bright spark of honour they had failed in quenching within the breast of their countryman. Truth was still there, companion with hopeless despair, but not treachery; and among the misguided band for whom he suffered, the knowledge of his silence grew into reverence for his fidelity. There were many who would then have parted with their very household gods to have stretched forth the saving hand; but there was one heart on which the dread tidings of condemnation fell to bend it almost to its breaking-that of a young and simple-hearted girl, long linked in soul with the young Swede, and shortly to have become the sharer of his weal or woe for evermore. who, in searching for such earnest trust and gentle devotion, could have passed from the fair valley of Siljan without hearing from its peasant children that they knew such virtues only by the name of their orphan benefactress, the young Charlotte Cronstedt? It had been even thusthe heroine of the poor miner's adventure of six years past, the then fearless protectress of Six years had passed away. The ferocious Christiern had been driven from the throne Sweden, united by him to Denmark, had been separated from it, and she had chosen as her king the hero to whom she owed her liberation -the son of the Duke of Grispsholm, Gustavus Vasa. The ambition of the young Swede had been, not only to reign over his beloved country, but to raise that country from the abject state into which it had been plunged, and to restore it to the rank which it had once held among European nations. To achieve this, his first determination was to sweep away the numerous abuses which had crept the more easily into the factiontorn kingdom, to destroy its strength in its unity. It was a perilous task for the young reformer; but Gustavus walked with a firms tep on the high path which his unswerving judgment had pointed out, regardless of danger in the attempt. Unhappily, his people did not always see, at their commencement, the aim and intention of acts framed and executed for their interest alone; the veil of prejudice hid from their sight the motive; and it often happened that, regarding their benefactor as an enemy, they repaid his zealous efforts for their good by a blind hatred. The Dalecarlians, above all, proud of having been the first to rise against Christiern, haughtily asserted their right to dictate laws and measures to the king they themselves had placed on the throne. Indignant at beholding their longobserved customs swept away for the general interest of the nation, they rose in a mass; but their first burst of rebellion was crushed by the prudence and foresight of Gustavus. By the And distress, and the now beautiful and high-souled woman, the betrothed of Carlson, were the same. The knowledge that the unhappy criminal lay in his bonds, awaiting an ignominious death, only reached the young bride to be followed by a fixed resolve to save him, or to look upon her home no more. Sadly, but firmly, she performed her wonted acts of charity for the last time, bowed down by hopeless misery. In vain her friends crowded round her, to weaken the stern determination of leaving her birth-place to seek the royal pardon at Stockholm; they were answered by her gaze of silent, imploring agony, and they felt their prayers vain. One only among them bowed to her reasoning, and gloried in her noble fidelity; for there arose admiration, and not anger, in the kinsman's breast as he listened to her vow of sharing an exile's bitter lot, if he were granted but life. Won over to aid her mission, the young convert undertook to present her petition to the king and crave his clemency; and thus the allies, in their work of life or death, set out from their fair valley to seek the great world of the capital. "The palace!" added the man mysteriously, leading her on. And in those words came a new burst of Hope's sunshine to the young girl's heart. "The palace! This, then, the home of their hidden friend! Beneath the royal roof-near, privileged, perhaps, to ask and receive of one who had the power to avert the dreadful sentence, and give two beings back to happiness!" While visions of such joy already in her grasp came blinding her to the stern reality of her fate, the conductor flung open a door in the lofty gallery, motioned her to advance, closed it behind her, and she stood in the presence of the crim nal. With a cry of wild joy, the long-parted rushed into each other's arms. The sight of his young bride brought back, for a moment, a gleam of past peace to his features; but the glow of intense delight, of hope and courage, mantling her fair cheek, told so plainly of her inability to look on their certain doom, that the conspirator bent his head upon his breast to hide the glistening drops which filled his eyes. 66 Courage! for my sake!" murmured the heroic girl. "Courage!" repeated the young man bitterly. "Ay, to meet death! I have that; hope is over; I am condemned." Neither spoke when those words died away. The bright day-dreams were gone; and as if conscious, even in her misery, that a word. breathing her heart's agony, would fill to the brim her husband's cup of wretchedness, Char lotte clung to him with the wild strength of despair, but in silence. The sound of approaching steps seemed to both as the knell of the victim, and with beating pulses they awaited the entrance of the new comer. The noble family of the murdered Cronstedt was sufficient passport for his kinsman; and the young suppliant mingled with the court each day, watching the moment for his attempt; and each day saw poor Charlotte, buried in her obscure retreat, withering in suspense. Eight days had passed, and no tidings. On the ninth, a letter was brought to her secretly, but it was not the prayed-for answer. It bore no royal symbol of mercy; yet the hurried words were read again and again, and wept over with transport, for they were those of Carlson. His fate had not been finally decided; he yet lay in bonds, For an instant the but not uncared for, for a mysterious hand had brought him the news of her arrival in Stock-young girl hid her face on Carlson's shoulder, holm, and, at the same time, promises of one while the hot tears of hopeless misery burst last interview with her. The bearer of the letter, forth at last. All was over now, and the reality he said, would conduct her to his prison if she of her fate seemed opening on her sight, as she could forget her pride sufficiently to come thus raised her eyes and stretched forth her hands in secretly for a criminal's last blessing on her de- supplication for yet a few moments more; they were still extended, as if powerless, her eyes the same dark cloth dress, the same small fur bent fixedly on the object before her. Wearing cap, bearing the same bent staff for support, stood the miner, whose hand she had grasped in pity six years before. "I see you know me, lady," he said, approaching her with the same confess, would not have carried me so far, as reverence as of old. "My memory, I must the miner's poor remembrance." regards yourself, had I not seen you still wearing He lifted her hand as he spoke, and gazed with emotion on the pictured bracelet, which had been his gift. "I thank you for preserving it," he continued. "For me, I have had no other remembrance than your name, and you see I have kept that faithfully; for I am here to serve you." votion. Pride! oh, how long had that been swept from the heart of the reader! What had the regicide's bride to do with it now? To hear that he waited for her was but to be followed by her flight to him. There was hope even while the little of life remained; and she set forth with her guide, even with the unclosed and unfinished letter in her hand. It was almost midnight when they paused in their journey, and Charlotte's eyes were raised eagerly to catch the first sad glimpse of the dread walls which held her from the criminal. True, there were massive portals, frowning arches, telling of strength and splendour; but there were countless lights gleaming from the high windows noble halls, glittering in gilded state, that spoke of comforts unmeet for the condemned assassin. A confused idea of some new dread rushed to her mind as she grasped the arm of the guide. "Is not this towards the young criminal. suspicion for the six past years, has become a certainty to-day. Tell me, that as this mean dress then sheltered oppressed nobility, it now disguises rank and power-mighty power-even such as can aid in saving me. Oh! do not turn from me. I am now in my turn wretched, most wretched! Do not say you cannot save me, and him." No, Charlotte," replied the miner kindly; "you have the right of asking me what you will, and I the power of granting it. I am Gustavus Vasa." "The King!" burst from the lips of each of t'e young betrothed. Your debtor, Charlotte, neither more nor less, even now," replied Gustavus, raising the Martyr's daughter, who had sunk on her knees before him. "And now listen, Carlson," he continued, turning to the young man. "I know you to be brave and loyal; I know too that your name is loved and respected in Dalécarlia; and thus, I will not offer you one of those half-pardons, which only afford growth to evil passions, or impose upon the receiver the duty of expressing a gratitude which never can, never would take its rise in the heart. Between us two there is no mean path; we must be friends or enemies. If friends, here is my hand; if enemies, take that sword and finish your intended work. My life is not my own; I owe it to your young bride." As he spoke he pointed to an unsheathed sword, placed on a table near him, and stood awaiting the conspirator's decision. But already that decision was made, and the conspirator kneeling at his feet, bathed the royal hand with the unrestrained tears of wondering admiration and remorse. "Sire-great king!" burst from the young man's lips in broken tones. " May heaven grant that each drop of this blood flow when needed to save yours, and bind to you every rebel heart, like mine! Pardon them in me, gracious liege! They are your children. The hand you have deigned to touch has been guided by those whose eyes were darkened by crime, while their souls were worshipping the name even of such generosity as this. Oh! sire, hear me swear by this now held out to me, that one month from this time shall bring every rebel subject in Dalécarlia to your feet. The vow of the young Swede was kept. Before the allotted time Gustavus looked down with a proud smile of happiness upon the kneeling mass of his erewhile-estranged countrymen, the restored children of his loved Sweden. While the instrument to work this mighty change--the one long turned against the safety of his king-Carlson, the fond husband of the Martyr's orphan, lived on amid the Elysium which had opened for him, the devotion of a young and noble heart, and the proud esteem of an unchanging friend and grateful sovereign. SERENADE. Meet me, love, at the twilight hour, I have met thee bright as a ray of light, I have hung on the words from thy lips that fell, I have met thee, love, in the gaudy day, 6 CHAP. XXXI. actually tried, to divorce the sweet image of his niece from his affections, so convinced was he that her unhappy love for Arthur, combined with Isabella's authority, and, no doubt, the Oh! love, love, strong as death-from such an threat of some terrible alternative should she hour Pressing out joy by thine immortal power; "But woe for him who felt that heart grow still, refuse, would compel her acceptance of the prof fered cross, and so sever them for ever. How little can man, even the most gentle and affec tionate, read woman! It was the day completing the eleventh month after Don Ferdinand's murder, when Julien Morales repaired earlier than usual to the little temple, there to read the service for the dead appointed for the day, and thence proceeded to his nephew's grave. An unusual object, which had fallen on, or was kneeling beside the grave, caught his eye, and impelled him to quicken his pace. His heart throbbed as he recognised the garb of a novice, and to such a degree as almost to deprive him of all power, as in the white, chiselled features, resting on the cold, damp sod, he recognised his niece, and believed, for the first agonising moment, that it was but clay resting against clay; and that the sweet, pure, spirit had but guided her to that grave and flown. But Death for a brief interval withdrew his grasp though his shaft had reached her, and no human hand could draw it back. Father Denis had con ducted her so carefully and tenderly to the fron tiers of Castile, that she had scarcely felt fatigue, and encountered no exposure to the elements; but when he left her, her desire to reach her home became stronger, with the seeming phy sical incapacity to do so. Her spirit gave way. and mental and bodily exhaustion followed. The season was unusually damp and tempestuous, and, though scarcely felt at the time, sowed the seeds of cold and decline, from which her naturally good constitution might, in the very midst of her trials, otherwise have saved her. Her repugnance to encounter the eyes or speech of her fellows, lest her disguise should be pene trated, caused her to shrink from entering any habitation, except for the single night which in tervened, between the period of the Father's leaving her and her reaching the secret entrance to the Vale. Her wallet provided her with more food than her parched throat could swallow; The glowing light of a glorious sunset lingered on the Vale of Cedars, displaying that calm and beautiful retreat in all the fair and rich luxuriance of former years. Reuben and Ruth, the aged retainers of the house of Henriquez, had made it their pride and occupation to preserve the cherished retreat, lovely as it had been left. Nor were they its only inmates; their daughter, her husband, and children, after various struggles in the Christian world, had been settled in the Vale by the benevolence of Ferdinand Morales-their sole duty, to preserve it in such order, as to render it a fitting place of refuge, for any who should need it. Within the last twelvemonths, another inmate had been added to them. Weary of his wanderings, and of the constant course of deception which his apparent profession of a monk demanded, Julien Morales had returned to the home of his childhood, there to fix his permanent abode; only to make such excursions from it, as the interests of his niece might demand. Her destiny was his sole anxious thought. Her detention by Isabella convinced him, that her disguise had been penetrated, and filled him with solicitude for her spiritual, yet more than her temporal welfare. Royal protection of a Jewess was so unprecedented, that it could only argue the hope-nay, perhaps convictionof her final conversion. And the old man and for the consuming thirst, the fresh streams that so often bubbled across her path, gave her all she needed. The fellowship of man, then, was unrequired, and, as the second night fell, so comparatively short a distance lay between her and her home, that, buoyed up by the desire to reach it, she was not sensible of her utter exhaustion, till she stood within the little graveyard of the Vale; and the moon shining softly and clearly on the head-stones, disclosed to her the grave of her husband. She was totally ignorant that he had been borne there; and the rush of feeling which came over her, as she read his name-the memories of their happy, innocent, childhood, of all his love for her-that had he been but spared, all the last year's misery might have been averted, for she would have loved him, ay, even as he loved her; and he would have guarded, saved-so overpowered her, that she had sunk down upon the senseless earth which covered him, conscious only of the wild, sickly longing, like him to flee away and be at rest. She had reached her home; exertion no longer needed, the unnatural strength ebbed fast, and the frail tenement withered, hour by hour, away. And how might Julien mourn! Her work on earth was done. Young, tried, frail as she was, she had been permitted to show forth the glory, the sustaining glory, of her faith, by a sacrifice whose magnitude was indeed apparent, but whose depth and intensity of suffering, none knew but Him for whom it had been made. She had been preserved from the crime-if possible, more fearful in the mind of the Hebrew than any other-apostacy; and though the first conviction, that she was indeed "passing away" even from his affection, was fraught with absolute anguish, yet her uncle could not, dared not, pray for life on earth. And in the peace, the calm, the depth of quietude which gradually sunk on her heart, infusing her every word and look and gentle smile, it was as if her spirit had already the foretaste of that blissful heaven for which his wings were plumed. As the frame dwindled, the expression of her sweet face became more and more unearthly in its exquisite beauty, the mind more and more beatified, and the heart more freed from earthly feeling. The reward of her constancy appeared in part bestowed on earth, for death itself was revealed to her-not as the King of Terrors, but as an Angel of Light, at whose touch the lingering raiment of mortality would dissolve, and the freed soul spring up rejoicing to its home, couches within the tent, through the opening of which, she could look forth on the varied beauties of the vale, and the rich, glorious hues dyeing the western skies. The Sabbath lamps were lighted, but their rays were faint and flickering in the still glowing atmosphere. A crimson ray from the departing luminary gleamed through the branches, and a faint glow-either from its reflection, or from that deceiving beauty, which too often gilds the features of the dying-rested on Marie's features, lighting up her large and lustrous eyes with unnatural brilliance. She had been speaking earnestly of that life beyond the grave, belief in which throughout her trials had been her sole sustainer. Julien had listened, wrapt and almost awe-struck, so completely did it seem as if the spirit, and not the mortal, spoke. "And thine own trials, my beloved one," he said," Has the question never come, why thou shouldst thus have been afflicted? Often, very often, my father, and only within the last few weeks has the full answer come; and I can say from my inmost heart, in the words of Job, 'It is good that I have been afflicted,' and that I believe all is well. While on earth, we must be in some degree of earth, and bear the penalty of our earthly nature. The infirmities and imperfections of that nature in others, as often as in ourselves, occasion human misery, which our God, in his infinite love, permits, to try our spirit's strength and faith, and so prepare us for that higher state of being, in which the spirit will move and act, when the earthly shell is shivered, and earthly infirmities are for ever stilled. In the time of suffering we cannot think thus; but looking back as I do now when the near vicinity of another world bids me regard my own past life almost as if it were another's-I feel it in my inmost heart, and bless God for every suffering which has prepared me thus early for his home. There is but one feeling, one wish of earth, remaining," she continued, after a long pause of utter exhaustion. "It is weak, perhaps, and wrong; but if-if Arthur could but know that fatal secret which made me seem a worse deceiver than I was—I know it cannot be, but it so haunts me. wedded one Christian, may he not think there needed not this sacrifice-sacrifice not of myself, but of his happiness. Oh! could I butHush! whose step is that?" she suddenly interrupted herself; and with the effort of strong excitement, started up, and laid her hand on her uncle's arm, If I "Nay, my child, there is no sound," he replied soothingly, after listening attentively for several moments, It was the Feast of the Tabernacles and the Sabbath eve. The tent-formed of branches of thick trees and fragrant shrubs-was erected, as we have seen it in a former page, a short distance from the temple. Marie's taste had once again been consulted in its decorations; her "But there is. Hark, dost thou not hear it hand, feeble as it was, had twined the lovely now? God of mercy! thou hast heard my wreaths of luscious flowers and arranged the prayer-it is his!" she exclaimed, sinking glowing fruit. With some difficulty she had powerlessly back, at the moment that even Julien's joined in the devotional service performed by duller ear had caught a rapid step; and in her uncle in the little temple-borne there in the another minute the branches were hastily pushed arms of old Reuben, for her weakness now prevent-aside, and Stanley indeed stood upon the thresed walking-and on the evening of the Sabbath in hold. the Festival, she reclined on one of the luxurious "Marie-and thus!" he passionately ex |