“Thus the stream of time rolled on, burying beneath its dark waves, our little span of present, in the huge ocean of a perpetual past, and devouring, as the food of both, our swift decaying future.  But I floated on its surface, and beheld whole generations flourish and fade away, while age and silver hairs, growing infirmities, and the closing sigh that ends them all, mocked me with a horrible exemption.  I remained, and might have remained, for ages yet to come, the fixed and unaltered image of what I was, when in Mauritania I encountered the potent Amaimon, the damned magician of the den, but for that—­woman’s faith, and man’s fidelity—­which have made me what I AM!

“This was my destiny.  Now mark, how I became enthralled to it; and how it befell, that at last I shook it off, and found redemption.

“In my middle manhood, when scarcely forty summers had glowed within my veins, I left my native Italy, and journeyed to the Holy Land, upon the strict vow of a self-imposed penance.  It was for no sin committed in my days of youth, but for the satisfaction of an ardent piety, and the growing spirit of a long enkindled devotion.  I had patrimonial wealth in Apulia; I had kindred; I had friends.  I renounced them all, to dedicate myself, thenceforth, to the service of THE CROSS.  My purpose was blessed, by a virtuous mother’s prayers, that I might approve myself a worthy soldier of Christ; and it was sanctified by a holy priest at the altar.

“Even now, the recollection is strong within me, of the feelings with which, as the rising sun illumined the tops of the surrounding hills, I approached the once glorious, and still sacred, city of Jerusalem—­that chosen seat of the Godhead—­that Queen among the nations.  Eclipsed, though it was, and its majestic head trodden into the dust, by the foot of the infidel, my gladdened eyes dwelt upon what was imperishable, and my wrapt imagination pictured what was destroyed.  The valleys of Jehosaphat and Gehinnon, Mount Calvary, Mount Zion, and Mount Acre, stretched before me.  The palace of King Herod, with its sumptuous halls of marble and of gold—­the gorgeous Temple of Solomon—­the lofty towers of Phaseolus and Mariamne—­the palace of the Maccabees—­the Hippodrome—­the houses of many of the prophets—­grew into existence again, beneath the creative force of fancy.  I stood and wept.  I knelt, and kissed the consecrated earth which once a Saviour trod.”

* * * * *

“THE HUNTED STAG:  A SKETCH.

  What sounds are on the mountain blast? 
  Like bullet from the arbalast,
  Was it the hunted quarry past
    Right up Ben-ledi’s side?—­
  So near, so rapidly he dash’d,
  Yon lichen’d bough has scarcely plash’d
    Into the torrent’s tide. 
  Ay!—­The good hound may bay beneath,
    The hunter wind his horn;
  He dared ye through the flooded Teith
    As a warrior in his scorn! 
  Dash the red rowel in the steed,
    Spur, laggards, while ye may! 
  St. Hubert’s shaft to a stripling reed,
    He dies no death to-day!