The evening was serene and still, with scarcely a breath of wind stirring, and the flames blazed upward to the cavern roof; only now and then a light breeze from the sea wafted them on one side, and, at the sane time, dispersing the smoke, gave the Turks a momentary glimpse of the maiden, standing with uplifted hands, expectation, anxiety, and grief, depicted on her speaking countenance, as she invoked the spirit of the storm, while around her stood the few remaining Uzcoques, with sorrowing and downcast faces.

“They come not!” she exclaimed after a pause, during which the fire began to burn low for lack of fuel, and the noise of the musketry diminished and finally ceased.  “Uzcoques!” she cried in a louder voice, and with inspiration in her thrilling tones—­“Take heed and warning, for your hour is come.  Your crags and caverns, your rocky shores and howling storms, refuse you further service!”

She paused, and at that moment was heard the rush of a rapidly approaching boat.

“Speak not, ye messengers of evil!” exclaimed Strasolda in piercing accents.  “Utter not a word.  You have left Dansowich in the hands of the Venetians.”

There was no reply to her half frantic exclamation, and the deep silence was only broken by the footsteps of the new-comers, as with dejected looks they joined their companions.  Just then some damp branches that had lain smouldering and smoking on the fire, burned brightly up, and by their light Ibrahim and Hassan beheld the maiden kneeling in the midst of the pirates, her tearful face covered by her fair and slender fingers.  The next moment she raised her head and gazed into the cavern.

As she did so, the sorrowful expression of her features changed, and her countenance was lighted up with a look of rapture, while a loud cry burst from her lips.  Through the opening in the smoke, the prisoners became visible to her as they lay motionless in the interior of the cave, the light from the flames glowing on their red garments, and giving them the appearance of two statues of fire.  In the handsome countenance of one of the figures thus suddenly revealed to her, Strasolda recognized the young Moslem, whose prisoner she had been, and whose noble person and bearing, courteous manners, and gentle treatment, had more than once since the day of her captivity, occupied the thoughts and fancy of the Uzcoque maiden.  Unaware of Ibrahim’s capture, Strasolda did not for an instant suppose that she beheld him in flesh and blood before her.  To her excited and superstitious imagination, the figures of the Turks appeared formed out of fire itself, and she doubted not that the spirits of the cave had chosen this means of presenting to her, as in a prophetic mirror, a shadowy fore-knowledge of future and more favourable events.