enabled to do so by contemplating the royal visage in the water, where he saw its expression become more and more what he desired.  Marsilius, meantime, saw the like symptoms in the face of Gan.  By degrees, he began to touch on that dissatisfaction with Charlemagne and his court, which he knew was in both their minds:  he lamented, not as to the ambassador, but as to the friend, the injuries which he said he had received from Charles in the repeated attacks on his dominions, and the emperor’s wish to crown Orlando king of them; till at length he plainly uttered his belief, that if that tremendous Paladin were but dead, good men would get their rights, and his visitor and himself have all things at their disposal.

Gan heaved a sigh, as if he was unwillingly compelled to allow the force of what the king said; but, unable to contain himself long, he lifted up his face, radiant with triumphant wickedness, and exclaimed, “Every word you utter is truth.  Die he must; and die also must Uliviero, who struck me that foul blow at court.  Is it treachery to punish affronts like those?  I have planned every thing—­I have settled every thing already with their besotted master.  Orlando could not be expected to be brought hither, where he has been accustomed to look for a crown; but he will come to the Spanish borders—­to Roncesvalles—­for the purpose of receiving the tribute.  Charles will await him, at no great distance, in St. John Pied de Port.  Orlando will bring but a small band with him; you, when you meet him, will have secretly your whole army at your back.  You surround him; and who receives tribute then?”

The new Judas had scarcely uttered these words, when the delight of him and his associate was interrupted by a change in the face of nature.  The sky was suddenly overcast; it thundered and lightened; a laurel was split in two from head to foot; the fountain ran into burning blood; there was an earthquake, and the carob-tree under which Gan was sitting, and which was of the species on which Judas Iscariot hung himself, dropped some of its fruit on his head.  The hair of the head rose in horror.

Marsilius, as well as Gan, was appalled at this omen; but on assembling his soothsayers, they came to the conclusion that the laurel-tree turned the omen against the emperor, the successor of the Caesars; though one of them renewed the consternation of Gan, by saying that he did not understand the meaning of the tree of Judas, and intimating that perhaps the ambassador could explain it.  Gan relieved his consternation with anger; the habit of wickedness prevailed over all considerations; and the king prepared to march for Roncesvalles at the head of all his forces.