himself in all respects-of faith, courage, and loyalty— as a Christian knight, he was now returning in triumph to receive the reward of his chivalry in the fair hand of Julie.

On the last day of the year Claude bade adieu to the Vieux Château. Julie was aware that it would be so; and yet his departure gave her pain. She wept as she extended her hand to him; and wept the more when she found that the lips were cold and tremulous to which it was pressed. Claude, however, bore the farewell with knightly pride. He had never spoken of his love, and had sworn never to do so while his brother lived. He mounted his steed; then paused, as if he had forgotten something. Julie raised her head, and their eyes again met; his face was as pale as marble; and the rigid and compressed lips bespoke his internal struggle. She stepped forward, in mingled grief and remorse, and uttered his name; but the young knight only bent his head in answer, and, closing his vizor, rode away.

All these circumstances passed in review before the damsel of Montargis during her twilight walk to the chapel of Saint Ouen; but by the time she arose from her knees by the altar, every other thought was lost in the delightful idea, that in a few minutes more she Iwould be in the arms of Roland.

An hour passed away, and she grew restless. She began to pace through the deserted aisle of the chapel, and start at the changing aspect of Saint Ouen, as his statue of white marble gleamed amidst the deepening shadows of evening. The silence was awful.

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The

echo of her light foot ran in whispers along the walls; and she stopped, shuddering. The colours of the western window were still faintly visible, and threw a red stain upon the font beneath, near the door; and here and there a streak of mellowed light, at regular intervals, marked the openings of the lateral windows. The middle of the chapel, however, was filled with shadows; on the opposite wall the spectral head of Saint Ouen shone with a ghastly paleness amidst the gloom; and at the eastern end, the statues of the altar-piece were scarcely visible against the darkened window behind.

Julie felt her heart grow sick. A strange confusion took possession of her faculties; the pavement seemed to open; dead faces stared at her wherever she turned her eyes; her name was pronounced in whispers; and as a chill blast of wind entered the chapel, and swept moaning round the walls, she sunk down at the foot of an image of the Virgin, near which she had been standing.

The impression upon her mind was, that the western door had opened, and that a funeral procession was in the act of entering! The whole nave seemed to be filled with moving shadows; and the whispering of voices, and the waving of garments, fell distinctly upon her ear. Had the door been really opened to the night wind? And were these things caused by the uncertain light admitted, and the waving of votive offerings and pictures, as the current of air rushed round the building? Julie half raised her head as the supposition suggested itself; but the next moment a new sensation

of faintness came over her, as she actually saw a human figure standing in the red light near the font.

The figure advanced; it was that of a man-of a knight, loaded with armour-yet no sound followed his footfalls! As he passed one of the windows, she saw that he bore the red pennon of Sir Roland de Vavassour in one hand, and a palm-branch in the other. Having glided at length as far as the middle of the nave, he stopped, and turned his face towards Julie, which gleamed in the surrounding darkness, as white as that of the marble statue of Saint Ouen. A low moan escaped her oppressed heart as she recognised the features of her lover; and the figure, seeming to fix his eyes upon her, advanced a step. But the next moment, waving his hand mournfully, he crossed his brow and bosom, and glided slowly away towards the altar. Julie fainted.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE DEAD LAKE.

THE tradition goes on to say, that the damsel of Montargis was delirious for some days after this adventure; and that, even when she had recovered, it was thought improper to run a risk of forcing her mind back into the fatal remembrance, by informing her that a palm-branch had actually been found on the altar! No trace of Sir Roland had been discovered; no knight had been seen in the neighbourhood; the fact was, therefore, certain beyond dispute, that what she had seen was an apparition. Julie, however, required no reasoning to convince her of this. It was the face of no living man she had seen; it was no armed warrior of earth who had glided through the chapel, without producing a sound by his tread. Roland, besides, would not have looked upon his love with those glassy eyes, had his arms been able to press her to his breast. It was, indeed, but the form of her gallant knight she had beheld-a shadow from his far and bloody grave; and a week had scarcely elapsed, when sure intelligence was received that he had perished in a storm

at sea.

The palm-branch was preserved by the monks as a relic of extraordinary sanctity; and many thought that the warrior, whose spirit had thus performed the vow

he had taken in the body, should be admitted into the holy army of the saints. That they were correct is more than probable; for, even without the ceremony of canonisation, the relic wrought numerous cures which were justly esteemed miraculous. The gratitude of the common people, however, does not wait to be sanctioned by papal bulls; and many a village maid who had recovered her bloom, withered by the miasma of the marsh, prayed fervently to the supernatural physician ; and many a young mother, as she held up her firstborn to the palm branch, invoked and blessed Saint Roland.

In the meantime, the old lord of Vavassour died, and Sir Claude returned to the Marais Vernier, to take possession of the family estates. For a time he grieved sincerely for the death of his brother; but gradually the world brightened before the eyes of the youthful knight. Julie was now his, beyond the intervention of fate; and his family, absorbed in their own selfish feelings, even attempted to push forward the new union with indecent haste. But Claude did not wish Julie to be merely his wife, but also his mistress; and, conscious that she loved him better than any living being, he resolved to await the revival of the crushed flower before he gathered it.

This took place in the due course of nature; but the flower had suffered a change. More beautiful than ever, its beauty was of a softer, grave nature; and its fragrance, before that of the rose and lily intermingled, was now the sweet perfume of the wall-flower growing upon monuments and ruins. This change, however,