“I, and in a few brief years, all you,—­this panic-struck army, and all the population of fair Greece, will no longer be.  But other generations will arise, and ever and for ever will continue, to be made happier by our present acts, to be glorified by our valour.  The prayer of my youth was to be one among those who render the pages of earth’s history splendid; who exalt the race of man, and make this little globe a dwelling of the mighty.  Alas, for Raymond! the prayer of his youth is wasted—­the hopes of his manhood are null!

“From my dungeon in yonder city I cried, soon I will be thy lord!  When Evadne pronounced my death, I thought that the title of Victor of Constantinople would be written on my tomb, and I subdued all mortal fear.  I stand before its vanquished walls, and dare not call myself a conqueror.  So shall it not be!  Did not Alexander leap from the walls of the city of the Oxydracae, to shew his coward troops the way to victory, encountering alone the swords of its defenders?  Even so will I brave the plague—­and though no man follow, I will plant the Grecian standard on the height of St. Sophia.”

Reason came unavailing to such high-wrought feelings.  In vain I shewed him, that when winter came, the cold would dissipate the pestilential air, and restore courage to the Greeks.  “Talk not of other season than this!” he cried.  “I have lived my last winter, and the date of this year, 2092, will be carved upon my tomb.  Already do I see,” he continued, looking up mournfully, “the bourne and precipitate edge of my existence, over which I plunge into the gloomy mystery of the life to come.  I am prepared, so that I leave behind a trail of light so radiant, that my worst enemies cannot cloud it.  I owe this to Greece, to you, to my surviving Perdita, and to myself, the victim of ambition.”

We were interrupted by an attendant, who announced, that the staff of Raymond was assembled in the council-chamber.  He requested me in the meantime to ride through the camp, and to observe and report to him the dispositions of the soldiers; he then left me.  I had been excited to the utmost by the proceedings of the day, and now more than ever by the passionate language of Raymond.  Alas! for human reason!  He accused the Greeks of superstition:  what name did he give to the faith he lent to the predictions of Evadne?  I passed from the palace of Sweet Waters to the plain on which the encampment lay, and found its inhabitants in commotion.  The arrival of several with fresh stories of marvels, from the fleet; the exaggerations bestowed on what was already known; tales of old prophecies, of fearful histories of whole regions which had been laid waste during the present year by pestilence, alarmed and occupied the troops.  Discipline was lost; the army disbanded itself.  Each individual, before a part of a great whole moving only in unison with others, now became resolved into the unit nature had made him, and thought of himself only.  They stole off at first by ones and twos, then in larger companies, until, unimpeded by the officers, whole battalions sought the road that led to Macedonia.