steeds were all of that generous breed which the rich plains of Thessaly alone produce, and pawed the ground as if impatient of the bit by which their ardour was restrained by their riders; and the silver and gold which glittered on their frontlets and caparisons, showed the rivalry prevailing among these cavaliers in the splendour of the equipments, rather of their coursers than themselves.  But it was on him who rode in the midst of this gallant party, eclipsing all his comrades as the glare of lightning seems to obscure all lesser luminaries, that the eyes of the gazing crowd were now fixed.  He was completely armed at all points, except his head, and grasped in his hand an ashen lance; while a scarlet cloak, on which was depicted, in figures of gold tissue, the battle of the Centaurs with the Lapithae, flowed loose over his panoply, and was fastened in front with a clasp, representing Pallas sculptured in amber, and holding before her the Gorgon’s head on her shield.  The breeze, which blew back his locks from his forehead, gave his features more fully to view; and even the horse which bore him seemed to move with a statelier gait, arching his neck and proudly caracoling, as if conscious of the noble presence of his master; while the admiration of the surrounding multitude burst out into a spontaneous shout of applause, and some of the women of the lower class even threw fruit and flowers towards him, in the hope, I suppose, of drawing on themselves a glance of acknowledgement from his eye.”

[Footnote 58:  The incidents of the birth of Chariclea have been copied by Tasso in the story of Clorinda, as related to her by Arsete, in the 12th canto of “Gierusalemme Liberata.”  In the “Shah-Nameh,” also, Zal, the father of the Persian hero Rustan, being born with white hair, is exposed by his father Sam on the mountain of Elborz, where he is preserved and brought up by the giant-bird Simorgh.]

[Footnote 59:  “In the royal character”—­“[Greek:  grammasin Aithiopikois oy demotikois, alla basilikois].”  This distinction between the royal and popular system of hieroglyphics, as well as the etiquette, before mentioned, of inscribing the title of the king within a circle or oval, is borrowed, as need hardly be mentioned, from the monuments of Egypt.]

The cavalier thus eulogized by Calasiris is of course Theagenes, who, after thrice encompassing in due form the tomb of Neoptolemus, at length reaches the Temple of Apollo; but, during the performance of the ceremonial, it falls to his lot to receive the torch with which the altar is to be kindled from the hand of Chariclea, and love at first sight, mutual and instantaneous, is the result.  The aid of Calasiris is again invoked by both the lovers; and the good old gentleman, whose knowledge of the Ethiopian hieroglyphics, by enabling him to decipher the mysterious inscription on the fillet, has put him in possession of the true parentage of Chariclea, (which he does not, however,