Her fingers became entangled in the ribbon of the general’s locket that I had tied round my neck, and by accident the locket opened.  She became deathly pale as she saw its contents; then, springing to her feet, she gave me one glance—­fleeting, but how full of sorrow!—­and ran to the middle of the bridge.  The petard had done its work.  She beckoned to the column to come on; they answered with a cheer.  Presently four grenadiers fell to the rear, carrying between them the body of Minette.

They gave her a military funeral; and I was told that a giant soldier, a corporal it was thought, kneeled down to kiss her before she was covered with the earth, then lay quietly down in the grass.  When they sought to move him, he was stone dead.

When I had recovered from my wound, it was nothing to me that Napoleon, besides giving me his Grand Cross, had made me general of brigade.  For Napoleon was no longer emperor, and I would not serve the king who succeeded him.  But ere I left France I saw Marie de Meudon, it might be, I thought, for the last time.  At the sight of her my old passion returned, and I dared to utter it.  I know not how incoherently the tale was told; I can but remember the bursting feeling of my bosom, as she placed her hand in mine, and said, “It is yours.”

* * * * *

M.G.  LEWIS

Ambrosio, or the Monk

There was a time—­of no great duration—­when Lewis’ “Monk” was the most popular book in England.  At the end of the eighteenth century the vogue of the “Gothic” romance of ghosts and mysteries was at its height; and this work, written in ten weeks by a young man of nineteen, caught the public fancy tremendously, and Matthew Gregory Lewis was straightway accepted as an adept at making the flesh creep.  Taste changes in horrors, as in other things, and “Ambrosio, or The Monk,” would give nightmares to few modern readers.  Its author, who was born in London on July 9, 1775, and published “The Monk” in 1795, wrote many supernatural tales and poems, and also several plays—­one of which, “The Castle Spectre,” caused the hair of Drury Lane audiences to stand on end for sixty successive nights, a long run in those days.  Lewis, who was a wealthy man, sat for some years in Parliament; he had many distinguished friends among men of letters—­Scott and Southey contributed largely to the first volume of his “Tales of Wonder.”  He died on May 13, 1818.

I.—­The Recluse

The Church of the Capuchins in Madrid had never witnessed a more numerous assembly than that which gathered to hear the sermon of Ambrosio, the abbot.  All Madrid rang with his praises.  Brought mysteriously to the abbey door while yet an infant, he had remained for all the thirty years of his life within its precincts.  All his days had been spent in seclusion, study, and mortification of the flesh; his knowledge was profound, his eloquence most persuasive; his only fault was an excess of severity in judging the human feelings from which he himself was exempted.