“This dark old square of canvas, my fair cousin,” said he, “has been an heirloom in the province-house from time immemorial.  As to the painter, I can tell you nothing; but if half the stories told of it be true, not one of the great Italian masters has ever produced so marvellous a piece of work as that before you.”

Captain Lincoln proceeded to relate some of the strange fables and fantasies which, as it was impossible to refute them by ocular demonstration, had grown to be articles of popular belief in reference to this old picture.  One of the wildest, and at the same time the best-accredited, accounts stated it to be an original and authentic portrait of the evil one, taken at a witch-meeting near Salem, and that its strong and terrible resemblance had been confirmed by several of the confessing wizards and witches at their trial in open court.  It was likewise affirmed that a familiar spirit or demon abode behind the blackness of the picture, and had shown himself at seasons of public calamity to more than one of the royal governors.  Shirley, for instance, had beheld this ominous apparition on the eve of General Abercrombie’s shameful and bloody defeat under the walls of Ticonderoga.  Many of the servants of the province-house had caught glimpses of a visage frowning down upon them at morning or evening twilight, or in the depths of night while raking up the fire that glimmered on the hearth beneath, although, if any were, bold enough to hold a torch before the picture, it would appear as black and undistinguishable as ever.  The oldest inhabitant of Boston recollected that his father—­in whose days the portrait had not wholly faded out of sight—­had once looked upon it, but would never suffer himself to be questioned as to the face which was there represented.  In connection with such stories, it was remarkable that over the top of the frame there were some ragged remnants of black silk, indicating that a veil had formerly hung down before the picture until the duskiness of time had so effectually concealed it.  But, after all, it was the most singular part of the affair that so many of the pompous governors of Massachusetts had allowed the obliterated picture to remain in the state-chamber of the province-house.

“Some of these fables are really awful,” observed Alice Vane, who had occasionally shuddered as well as smiled while her cousin spoke.  “It would be almost worth while to wipe away the black surface of the canvas, since the original picture can hardly be so formidable as those which fancy paints instead of it.”

“But would it be possible,” inquired her cousin,” to restore this dark picture to its pristine hues?”

“Such arts are known in Italy,” said Alice.

The lieutenant-governor had roused himself from his abstracted mood, and listened with a smile to the conversation of his young relatives.  Yet his voice had something peculiar in its tones when he undertook the explanation of the mystery.