The young lady has well chosen her companion. She too is as slender and as supple as he; her limbs are just as flexible as his; her slight figure has the same undulating motion, and in her languid eyes burns just the same savage, half-quenched fire which we see in the eyes of the half-tamed beast of prey. She lies supine on the ottoman. The amber mouthpiece of her fragrant narghily droops from her listless hand. Close by, on a little ivory table, spiced sherbet exhales from a golden bowl. There too, on Japanese dishes, lie heaps of luscious fruit—golden, warty melons; pine-apples; the red fruit of the palm; fragrant clusters of grapes—and, dripping down upon a little silver platter, snow-white comb-honey, gathered by the bees in the days of the acacia's bloom.

Azrael bestows not a glance on the luscious fruits. When, from time to time, she raises her languid eyes, half hidden by their long silken lashes, one is almost thunderstruck: such burning glances are only to be found beneath southern skies, whose summer is as glowing, as languishing, as parching as the eyes of this girl. An eternal desire burns in those eyes, unspeakable, unappeasable, which enjoyment feeds without satisfying. If you gave her a world she would instantly demand another. Even when every sense is sated with bliss and rapture, her heart remains empty, and yearns after the unattainable. Those who love her, she hates; those who hate her, she loves. Die for her, and she will mock you; kill her, and she will adore you.

Her oval face is as pale as though the burning rays of her eyes had burnt up all its roses; but when she closes her eyes, and her bosom heaves convulsively beneath the fire of her secret thoughts, the bright crimson blood suffuses her cheeks once more.

And how her lips tremble! She is in a brown study. She speaks to no one. Dancing and singing, the girls of the harem circle round her. A little negro boy kneels before her with a silver mirror. Half-naked female slaves shower down rose-leaves upon her, and fan her with peacock's feathers. Azrael sees them and hears them not. She looks into the mirror, and speaks to herself, as if she would read her own thoughts from her own features; her lips tremble, smile, and pout defiance; her eye entices, languishes, weeps, or flashes rejection; at one moment she transports you into the seventh heaven of delight, at the next she dashes you to the earth. And now some cruel thought, some demoniacal idea has got hold of her. She retracts her upper lip, exposing her tightly-clenched teeth; her contracted eyebrows draw a trembling furrow across her snow-white forehead; the pupils of her eye disappear, leaving only the upturned whites visible; the beauty lines round the corners of her mouth grow crooked, and give the expression of a Fury to the beautiful countenance; her curling tresses, like writhing snakes, twist down on both sides of her. Her tremulous fingers, involuntarily and spasmodically, clutch at the smooth neck of the panther, and the tortured beast roars aloud for pain.

The favourite shrinks back from her own countenance. She thrusts aside the little negro, mirror and all; wraps her starry veil around her; turns upon her side with her tiny scarlet-slippered feet beneath her; presses her supple body against the panther's neck, and leaning upon her elbows, glances around with such a savage, menacing look, that every one on whom it falls, not even excepting the wild beast, shrinks back with fear.

But she cannot keep still a moment. A tormenting weariness compels her every moment to shift her position. Now she reclines on her divan, and raising her arms aloft, throws back her head and neck; all her limbs writhe like the folds of a serpent; in her eyes sparkle the tears of smothered desires.

None dare ask her, "What ailest thee?" Azrael is so capricious. Perhaps the questioner might please her, and she would command her to straightway leap down before her eyes from the highest pinnacle of the Corsar's castle into the abyss below. It is therefore neither wise nor safe to try to please Azrael.

But lo! a gold-trellised door opens, and Azrael's tearful eyes sparkle with joy when she perceives who it is that enters. It is the old woman with the warty chin, whom we have already met at the cavern's mouth. A ghastly, hideous duenna! Turkish women age prematurely. Ten years ago Babaye was Corsar Beg's favourite mistress, now she is Azrael's favourite slave.

The hag sits down at Azrael's feet. She alone has the privilege of sitting down before Azrael.

"Are we weary then?" said the beldame to the beautiful odalisk, with a confidential leer, displaying a row of jagged fangs black from sugar-sucking and betel-chewing. "We find no joy in anything, eh? What! have not the Bayaderes[22] danced amidst a circle of burning tapers? Or has that also lost its charm? Are the Persian silks already shabby and threadbare? Is there no longer any flavour in the honeycomb or any perfume in the pine-apple? Have the pearls of Ceylon lost their lustre? Do the songs of the Italian eunuchs vex and weary? And has the mirror nothing beautiful to show? Wherefore is the Sun of suns so moody and so impatient? Why should a cloud obscure the heaven of Damanhour? Shall I delight her of the alabaster forehead with a tale? Shall I tell the story of the captive lion which Medzsnun, the immortal poet, has written?"

Azrael cast down her languid eyelids by way of assent.

"Once upon a time they captured a lion in the palm forests of Bilidulgherid. A rich and powerful Dey bought the beast for a thousand gold pieces. The Dey was a mighty man. At his command they built for the lion a cage of gold so large that palm-trees could stand upright therein. The ceiling of the cage was inlaid with lapis-lazuli. They brought to it, from the distant mountains, a spring of living water, and the floor was decked with purple carpets. But the lion was sad and silent. All day it lay there sullen and morose. Only when the sun had set would it arise with an angry roar, shake the door of its cage, and terrify the silence of the night. The Dey asked the lion, 'What dost thou lack, my beautiful beast? Thy house is of gold. Thou dost eat with me out of the same dish, and thy drink is the crystal spring! What more dost thou desire? Wouldst thou bathe in ambergris? Or dost thou desire for supper the hearts of my favourite odalisks?' The lion roared and made answer, 'My cage, though it be of gold, is still a cage; these palm-trees are not the groves of Nubia, and this basin is not the springs of the desert of Berzendar. I want neither thy perfumes nor thy spices, nor the throbbing hearts of thy slaves. Give me back the free air of the desert, there will I speedily find again my good-humour!'"

Babaye was silent. The odalisk, with a tremulous sigh, bowed down her head upon her aching bosom, and beckoned to the duenna to tell her yet another tale.

"Wouldst thou hear the story of the fairy and the mortal maiden? Once upon a time the fairy of the rainbow perceived a lovely maiden, enticed her away with sweet words, and took her over the bridge of the seven colours into the third heaven. There, everything was more beautiful than it is on earth—the flower a languid diamond; the sigh of the zephyr a melodious song; the pillars of the palaces nought but crystal and gems. There every sense experienced a threefold greater bliss than here below. The fairy treated the maiden like the apple of her eye—fairies know the secret of loving tenderly—and yet the girl was sad. She grew weary in heaven, and whenever the fairy went away to suck up water for the sky from the ocean, she saw how the girl bent over the rainbow-bridge, and looked longingly down upon the cloudy earth. 'What lackest thou?' she asked the maiden. 'Wherefore dost thou look down so upon the earth? Speak! What dost thou want? Command me, and I'll fetch it for thee!'—'Stars are falling down from heaven,' replied the girl, 'and they fall upon the earth. Give me of them, and I will make a pearly coronet for my hair!' And the fairy went and brought the stars. Again the maiden looked down sadly upon the earth. Again the fairy asked her, 'What dost thou lack? Is there aught on earth that thy soul desirest?' The maiden answered, 'There below dance slim damsels, and look up smilingly at me! Wherefore are they happier than I? Would that I had their heads to play at ball with!' And the fairy brought the heads of the damsels for the maiden to play at ball with."

Azrael looked at the hag with contracted eyebrows, half raised herself upon her elbows, and sought in her golden girdle for the malachite handle of her little dagger.

"Once more the maiden looked down upon the earth," resumed Babaye, smiling. "'Is aught else to be found there that is worth a wish?' asked the fairy in despair. 'Below there, youthful heroes are walking to and fro,' returned the maiden, 'and they are all so sweet and so lovely. Thou art a fairy, 'tis true, but thou art alone in heaven. Thou canst not give me fresh love. Let me go back again to earth.'"

Azrael sprang from the ottoman with glowing cheeks, and seized the beldame by the shoulder. Her bosom heaved tumultuously; a threatening scarlet flamed upon her burning face. All the muscles of her snow-white arms seemed to quiver.

Babaye looked up at her with a grin.

"Come into thy bathing-chamber," said she to the agitated odalisk. "The agate basin exhales the perfumes of spikenard and ambergris. Whilst thou art there alone, I will entertain thee. I know still more beautiful tales which shall rejoice thy heart."

Azrael, all tremulous, drew her veil around her neck, and with nervous irritability beckoned to the girls to be gone. They escaped through the side-door in terrified haste; nor were they fearful without good cause, for as soon as Azrael had withdrawn, the deserted panther, freed from the thrall of his mistress, stretched himself to his full length, lolled out his red tongue as far as it would go, protruded his sharp claws, lowered his head with a menacing growl, sprang at a single bound into the middle of the room, careered twice or thrice round the walls, savagely howling and snuffing at every door behind which he scented the vanished slaves, scratched at the threshold with bloodthirsty rage, and whined peevishly because he could not get at them. Then he crouched down by the water-basin, rested his fore-paws thereon, lapped up the crystal-clear stream with his long red tongue, then, rolling himself into a ball on the soft carpet, seized his long speckled tail between his hind legs and played with it like a cat. Then he stood up again, looked around with cunning, malignant eyes, and perceiving a large white cockatoo in a bronze cage, wriggled towards it on his belly, and watched it for a long time with lowered head and restless tail. Suddenly, with one bound, he sprang upon it, and seized the bar of the cage with his claws. The terrified cockatoo, loudly screeching, struck at his assailant with his crooked bill; and the panther, who could neither overthrow the cage nor destroy it, for it was nailed fast to the ground, leaped over it again and again, roaring furiously, and then cowered down before it, lashing the ground on both sides of him with his tail, and gaping from time to time at the terrified bird with his wide bloodthirsty jaws, whilst the cockatoo screeched, whistled, fluttered about the cage, and hacked away at his inaccessible perch.

Along the hollow, labyrinthine way which meanders into the Corsar's castle, the trampling of a troop of horsemen is faintly audible. The clash of arms resounds from the depths of the wood long before we can discern who are approaching. Now they have climbed to the mountain summit where the road runs along the rocky ridge. It is Corsar Beg himself with his robber band. The booty-laden mules lead the way. The treasures of pillaged churches gleam forth from the leathern sacks piled one on the top of the other. In the centre rides the Beg himself, with his motley body-guard recruited from every kind of Turkish cavalry—silk-clad Spahis with long lances, bare-armed Baskirs with bows and arrows, Bedouins in snow-white mantles with long, brass-tipped muskets. The Beg is a man in the prime of life. His brown, almost black countenance makes his slight beard and moustaches nearly invisible. His lips and eyes are large and swollen. His projecting cheek-bones and broad chin give him a truculent, ferocious air, with which his massive shoulders and enormous muscular development well agree. His clothing is tastelessly overladen with gems. A string of pearls goes round his turban. Large gold rings hang glistening down from his ears. His dolman is embroidered with a flower-pattern of precious stones, and everything about his horse, from its hoofs to its snaffle, is of pure gold. His round shield is made of burnished silver, and the head of his morning-star consists of a single cornelian.

His troop follows him in silence. Many of the horsemen carry behind them half-swooning Christian girls on whom they do not bestow a glance. The garments of all these freebooters are stained with blood; some of them have not even taken the trouble to wipe away the blood-stains from their faces.

The mules, whipped by the fellahs, trot noiselessly towards the fortress; the host ambles after them along the narrow path. The Timariot infantry straggle behind, and quarrel among themselves about the booty which they carry on their shoulders. No one pursues them.

The large oval room is empty. The women of the harem have withdrawn into their own apartments. Azrael is alone.

On quitting her perfumed bath, she has a hammock slung over the fountain, reclines therein, rocks herself luxuriously to and fro, and lets her glowing, snow-white limbs be splashed by the water-jet. She folds her arms across her bosom, and, with a self-complacent smile, watches the diamond jet break against her lithe body as the swaying hammock cuts across it with its charming burden.

The red curtains are let down to keep out the rays of sunset, but a rose-coloured light pervades the room, suffusing every object with a soft and magic hue. The odalisk appears like a rosy water-nymph swinging on a bright lotus-leaf over a fountain of liquid rubies.

The atmosphere of the room is impregnated with a bewitching, love-inspiring perfume. Not a sound is to be heard save the pattering of the water-drops as they fall back into the basin.

All at once the familiar winding of a horn is heard outside. The prancing and neighing of horses in the courtyard scares away the silence. Above the din rises the word of command of a well-known voice. Azrael smiles, and rocks herself still more swiftly in her hammock. A fatal enticement lurks in her eyes as she looks towards the golden-trellised door, and throws back her head.

A minute later, and we hear hasty steps approaching. Impelled by love, Corsar Beg is hastening towards his earthly paradise. The turning of a key is audible in the golden door. Azrael laughs aloud, and rocks herself still more swiftly in her bright-winged hammock.

The shadows of night have descended. Every living thing sleeps soundly. Love alone is wakeful.

"Oh, I fear me! I fear me!" whispers Azrael, clinging still more closely to the breast of the wild Moorish horseman.

"Why dost thou tremble? I am here," and he embraces her slim waist.

"Hamaliel hath brought me evil dreams," returns the odalisk. "I dreamt that the Giaours stormed thy castle in the night-time and murdered thee. I would have hurled myself down from the battlements, but I could not because I was a captive. A Christian held me in his arms! Mashallah! it was frightful!"

"Fear not!" said the Corsar. "The Koran says that only birds can fly, and none can get into this castle without wings. But even if we were surprised thou hast no cause to fear falling into the hands of the Infidel, or being defiled by the touch of the Giaour, for under the ottoman on which we now lie a lunt is laid which goes right down into the powder-chamber. If all were lost, thou hast but to touch that lunt with this night-lamp, and the whole castle with us and our foes would fly into the air."

"Oh, what a consoling thought!" sighs Azrael, softly pressing her lips to the Corsar's cheeks, and seeming to slumber once more.

The night-lamp flickers feebly on its tripod, multiplying its own shadow. The watchers snore before the doors.

Suddenly Azrael springs screaming from her couch, dragging the Beg along with her.

"La illah, il allah! Dost thou not hear the noise of the Jins?" she cries, trembling in every limb.

The Beg stares around him in terror. A tempest is raging outside. The weathercocks creak and rattle. The wind tears the tiles from the summits of the minarets, and hurls them on to the cupolas of the kiosk. The lightning flashes, and the thunder teaches the rocks to tremble.

"Dost thou hear how they howl, those invisible beings, and rattle at the barred and bolted windows with a mighty hand?"

"By the shadow of Allah! I hear them right well," murmurs the trembling freebooter, with wildly staring eyes.

"Mercy! mercy! Avaunt, ye evil spirits!" cries Azrael, sinking down upon the floor with dishevelled tresses, and stretching wide her naked arms. "Ye shall be whipped with sunbeams and the darkness shall swallow you! Go hence to the Giaours and torture them! May ye break your wings on the horns of our half-moons, as ye whirl past them in your hosts!—Ha, how their eyes flash! Shadow of Allah, conceal us, lest they look upon us with their fiery eyes!"

The big, strong man, all trembling, lies on his face beside Azrael, and hides himself beneath her mantle and her long flowing tresses. His superstitious terror has stolen every feeling of manliness from his breast; he quakes like a child.

"Dost hear! dost hear how they murmur! Repeat rapidly and aloud the prayer of Naama, and stop thy ears that thou mayst not hear what they say!"

At that moment a terrible gust broke one of the panes of glass, and the free invading air began to move the heavy curtains to and fro, and make the lamp flicker.

"Ha! Dost thou see him?" cried Azrael. "Pst! Look not thither! Open not thine eyes! Hide thy face! Duck down by me! Cover thee with my mantle! It is Asasiel, the Angel of Death! Dost thou not feel his cold sigh upon thy cheek? Pst! Be covered! Perchance he will not see thee!"

Corsar Beg clung convulsively to Azrael's garment, and covered his face with his hands.

"What wouldst thou?" cried Azrael, as if addressing an invisible spirit. "Black shadow, with blue sparkling eyes of fire, for whom dost thou come? There is none here but I. Corsar Beg has not come home! Come later! Come an hour hence! Avaunt, avaunt, black being! May Allah crush thy head in the dust! Come an hour hence, and be for ever accursed!"

Corsar dared not open his eyes. Azrael bent half over him, to shield him from the eyes of the Angel of Death.

"Avaunt! avaunt!"

At that moment the lightning struck one of the bastions, and shook the mountain to its very base. The crackling roar of the thunder, like an infernal trumpet-blast, went clanging up to heaven.

"Ah!" cried Azrael, and she sank down upon the Corsar, encircled his body with her arms, and so remained till the rumbling of the thunder had died away, and a gentle shower began to patter down upon the copper roof. Then the tempest gradually passed away, sighing and moaning around the windows, and finally dying away among the distant forests.

Azrael softly raised her head and looked around.

"He is gone," she whispered, in a scarcely audible tone. "He said he would return in an hour. Corsar, thou hast yet another hour to live."

"An hour!" repeated Corsar faintly. "Alas! Azrael, where canst thou conceal me?"

"It cannot be. Asasiel is inexorable. Another hour, and he will take thee away."

"Bargain with him. If he must have the dead, I will behead a hundred of my slaves. Promise him blood, treasure, prayers, and burning villages. All, all he shall have, only let him give me back my life!"

"Too late. In my dreams I saw thy sword break in twain. Thy days are numbered. Nay, thou hast but one chance left, but one way of thwarting the Angel of Blood: if only one among the dead will change names with thee, so that Asasiel may carry him off instead of thee."

"Oh yes! oh yes!" stammered the strong man, beside himself for fear. "Oh, seek me out some such dead man who will change names with me. Thou dost know the incantations. Go! call up one from the grave! Promise him anything, everything, whoever he may be—a fellah, a rajah, it matters not. I'll give him my name and take his. Go!"

"Nay, but thou must go also. Gird on thy kaftan quickly. Leave thy weapons here. Spirits fear not sharp steel. We will descend into the churchyard beneath the fortress walls; kindle ambergris and borax on a tripod; hurl the magic wand into the nearest grave, and so compel the dwellers therein to appear before thee. When the spirit appears he will stand motionless, but thou must advance towards him, and cry thrice in a loud voice—'Die for me!' whereupon the spirit will vanish, and Asasiel will cease from troubling thee."

"But thou too wilt be close at hand?" stammered the Corsar, grasping tightly the arm of the odalisk, as if he feared that Death would instantly seize him if he let her go.

"Yes, I will be by thy side. But hasten. An hour is but a brief respite."

Corsar quickly threw his upper garment around him, and recited in broken sentences the beginning of a prayer, the end of which he could not recollect.

"Wake none of the watch," said Azrael cautiously. "The power of the spell might be broken if we met any living soul who should say a prayer contrary to ours. We will saddle the horses ourselves and descend by secret paths. Speak not a word by the way, nor cast a glance behind thee."

The Beg was ready. He was just putting on his fur-lined kaftan, for his limbs felt frozen, when the odalisk called to the panther, which was reposing on the carpet.

"Oglan,[23] thou shalt go with us and keep watch, and if we fall in with a wild beast, thou shalt defend us."

As if he understood the words of his mistress, the panther rose up on his hind legs and placed his fore-paws on her arm, while the trembling man clung to her on the other side.

The Turkish cemetery beneath the walls of the fortress is planted with cypress trees. The turbaned graves, with their coffin-like slabs, peer forth, ghastly white, from among the dark weeping-willows. The sound of the approaching footsteps startles away a grey wolf from among the tombs, the sole inhabitant of that desolation. Since the last shower the clouds have dispersed, and here and there the dark-blue sky looks through with its diamond stars. Raindrops trickle down from the leaves of the trees.

From time to time the rumbling of the storm is still heard faintly in the distance. Sheet-lightning flickers above the mountain crests, painting everything white for an instant. The lightning, like the night, can only give one colour to this region—the one paints it white, the other black.

The nightly shapes reach the churchyard by the secret path and dismount among the graves. Azrael places the reins of both horses in Oglan's jaws, and the shrewd beast remains sitting there on his haunches, holding both the snorting horses as firmly as if they were fastened to a stake.

The Moorish horseman and the odalisk ascend a high funereal mound, the tombstone of which is barely visible through the dependent branches of a weeping willow.

"Something more than a slave must rest beneath that stone," whispered Azrael to the quaking horseman; and placing her magic tripod on the tomb, she ignited with a phosphorous pellet the powdered ambergris and borax, which flickered up and cast a whitish glare all around the grave.

There was a slight rustle in the distance. The Corsar's horse neighed uneasily.

"What was that?" asked the Corsar.

"The Jins," replied Azrael; "look not behind thee."

With that she raised her magic staff, and pronounced in unintelligible words the exorcism over the grave.

"Thou restless spirit, appear at my bidding. Wherever thou art, beneath the dark tree of Hell, or in the garden of the Houris; whether thou dost pine in chains of fire or dost recline on beds of roses, obey my voice, fly through the air, dissipate the darkness, and appear before me in the mortal shape thou didst wear on earth. Appear!"

With these words she struck with her staff upon the stone slab, and immediately a lofty shape in a white winding-sheet rose up from behind the tomb.

"Now advance three steps forward and speak to it," cried Azrael to the confounded Moor.

With tottering footsteps Corsar Beg approached the shape, and cried with a hoarse, trembling voice—

"My name is Corsar Beg. Who then art thou, accursed spirit?"

"I am Balassa," replied the shape with a sonorous voice; and casting aside the white winding-sheet, a powerfully-built, fair-complexioned man appeared with a drawn sword in his hand. "Corsar Beg, you are my prisoner," cried he to the Turk, who stood there in his bewilderment as if turned to stone.

The next moment the Beg put his hand to his side, and not finding his sword there, rushed back with a howl of fury to his horse, threw himself like lightning into the saddle, and struck his sharp spurs into the flanks of his steed. But Oglan held the reins firmly between his teeth, and when the horse tried to start off, the panther planted his front paws firmly into the ground, and forced it back again.

"To hell with thee, accursed monster!" roared the Beg, foaming with rage, and striking at the panther with his fist; but the beast tugged the halter first to the right and then to left, and stopped the horse in its flight; terrified it with his leaps and bounds, and forced it to go round and round.

"Speak to this monster, Azrael!" cried the Beg. He turned round to look for his favourite, and he beheld her nestling lovingly in Balassa's bosom, with her snow-white arms encircling the young Hungarian's neck. At the same instant the woods all around teemed with life; the ambushed Hungarian soldiers rushed forth and tore the Beg from his horse, who, even when forced to the ground, tried to defend himself with stones.

"Be accursed!" gasped the vanquished freebooter.

The attacking squadrons marched before his very eyes through the secret passage into the fortress, and an hour later he could see, by the light of his burning palace, his favourite Azrael mounting up behind Balassa, and disdaining to bestow so much as a glance at the discomfited Beg.

CHAPTER IX.
THE PRINCE AND HIS MINISTER.

Several years have elapsed since Apafi became a Prince. We have reached that period when the unexpected death of Nicolas Zrinyi dissolved the faction of the malcontent Hungarians, compelling most of them to emigrate into Transylvania, which land, owing to the ceaseless antagonism of the German Emperor and the Turkish Sultan, was allowed to enjoy an independent government. It paid indeed a tribute to the Sublime Porte; but it adopted what measures it chose in its own Diet, and if the Tartars occasionally reduced a few villages to ashes, that was only another proof that they no longer regarded the land as their own property. All the strongholds were in the hands of the Prince. He could keep as many soldiers as his purse would pay for, wage war with whomsoever he could cope, and hoodwink the Turks whenever it pleased him so to do. The Turk had nothing to find fault with, either in the constitution of the land, its peculiar privileges, its patriarchal aristocracy, its Latin language, and its Hungarian dolman; or, again, in its manifold religions and its three distinct[24] and self-governing nationalities. All these things did not trouble him in the least. At most he pitied the poor gentlemen who made such a muddle of affairs of state; but he never made the slightest attempt to initiate them into his own much simpler political system.

Meanwhile, great changes had taken place at Ebesfalva. The dwelling of the Prince no longer consisted of a simple manor-house. On a neighbouring hill he had had a castle built with lofty, square towers, from the corners of which rose still loftier turrets. The entrance was guarded by two proudly rampant stone lions. On the façade, in bold relief, was carved the inscription: Fata viam inveniunt. A vestibule, connecting one wing of the castle with the other, and surrounded by a richly-gilded and ornamented trellis-work, runs along the front of the castle on huge, classically-carved stone pillars. The windows are all in the Perpendicular style, with old-fashioned ornaments, and you reach the inner courtyard by a subterranean corridor.

In this courtyard, instead of ploughs and wagons, our eye falls upon arquebusses and culverins. Instead of peasants, we see body-guards, in yellow dolmans and scarlet hose, swaggering before the doors. To reach the Prince's cabinet, one must traverse long corridors and re-echoing saloons, in which pages, footmen, and gentlemen of the bedchamber announce the newcomer from door to door, and when one has finally reached the reception-chamber, it is only to see, after all, not the Prince, but the Prince's chief councillor, Master Michael Teleki, the same bald-headed man whom we first met at Csakatorny, at that memorable hunt where Nicolas Zrinyi met his death. At that time the worthy gentleman was only one of Prince George Rakoczy's disgraced ex-captains; but since then a kind Providence has taken him by the hand, and he is now Captain-General of Kövar, and the Prince's omnipotent prime minister. His mother was the Princess's sister, and his aunt, whom he always calls sister (women seldom take offence at such mistakes), introduced him to her consort. Once near the Prince, Teleki needed no one's good word. His comprehensive intellect, vast knowledge, and statesmanlike dexterity made him indispensable to the Prince, who loved to bury himself among his books and his antiquities, and felt aggrieved when anything tore him away from his family circle or his favourite studies.

To-day, too, his reception-room is crammed to suffocation by gentlemen who seek an audience of his Highness. They are the fugitive Hungarians, of whom the Prince seems to stand in peculiar horror. These restless, bellicose, dark-browed people are an abomination to the easy-going, contemplative Prince. So he shuts himself up in his study, and the only person admitted to his presence is the learned and reverend John Passai, Professor at Nagy-Enyed, beloved by the Prince on account of his profound scholarship.

Apafi's private room is more like the study of a scholar than the cabinet of a ruler. All around stands filled with books in gilded bindings hide the walls, and in every corner lie heaps of plans and charts. In the very circumscribed intervening spaces stand consoles with clocks upon them, which the Prince always winds up himself; and the chairs and sofas are so overladen with books for immediate use, that whenever the Prince has a confidential visitor, he hardly knows where to bestow him. Nay, sometimes the stone floor itself is so bestrewn with outspread maps, dusty MSS., and open folios, that Teleki, when he enters, has to walk as circumspectly as one who picks his way circuitously through mud and mire.

The two gentlemen are at the present moment standing before the table, which is covered with all sorts of ancient coins. Apafi wears a short grey coat with loose sleeves, which is fastened round his loins by a silken cord. His headgear consists of a round skin cap. Passai is buttoned up in a dark-green, fur-lined mente, which reaches from his chin to his heels. His thick white hair is shoved back and held together by a large circular comb. His face, despite the wrinkles which cover it, is fresh and ruddy, and his teeth are as perfect as those of a youth.

Apafi is attentively regarding a gold piece, which he poises between his fingers and holds against the light. Passai stands hat in hand before the Prince like a log, with his wrinkled countenance fixed intently on his Highness.

Apafi petulantly turns and twists the coin in all directions.

"These are not Roman letters," he angrily murmurs; "neither are they Greek nor Cyrillic, and least of all Hunnish symbols. Where was it found?" he asked, turning to Passai.

"In Vasarhely, as the Wallachs were removing the ruins of the old temple."

"Deuce take them! They might have been better employed."

"It was a very ancient ruin, what they call a Roman temple."

"But it cannot have been a Roman temple, for this is not a Roman coin."

"That's my opinion too; but the Wallachs have a way of regarding all the ruins in Transylvania as Roman monuments."

"But why did they take it to pieces?"

"The villagers wanted to make lime of the statues."

"The impious wretches!" cried Apafi indignantly, "to turn such precious masterpieces of art into lime. And you have not striven to save at least a part of it from destruction?"

"I bought the lid of a sarcophagus adorned with sculptures, and a sphinx in a perfect state of preservation; but the Wallach who was charged with their removal was too lazy to have them lifted up as they stood, so he broke up the statues into five or six pieces, so that he might have less trouble in loading his cart."

"That man deserves to be impaled. I will issue a decree that no one shall henceforth lay a hand upon such antiquities."

"I am afraid your Highness will arrive too late, for when the people found that I was paying for these stones, the belief spread among them that I was seeking for diamonds and carbuncles therein, so they smashed the whole mass into such tiny morsels that they could now be offered for sale as sand."

"Have you spoken to that nobleman of Deva about the mosaic?"

"He won't part with it at any price. He said that none of his ancestors had ever carried their property to market. If only he would remove it from the place where he found it, it would be something. But he won't even do that, and now the cow-house stands over it, and the oxen make their beds on the prostrate figures of Venus and Cupid."

"I should very much like to confiscate that man's property, and so come into possession of that priceless curiosity," cried Apafi, with a scholar's zeal, and again he busied himself with the investigation of the enigmatical letters.

At that moment Teleki entered the room with a busy, important look, and drawing from his silken pocket a MS. roll, placed it open in Apafi's hand. The Prince made as though he were reading the document attentively, and wrinkled his brows. Suddenly he looked up and exclaimed joyfully—

"They are Dacian letters!"

"What!" cried Teleki, opening his eyes wide in his astonishment. He was at a loss to explain how the Prince could have found Dacian letters in the Latin MS. which he had just put into his hands.

"Yes; there can be no doubt about it," continued the Prince. "I recollect reading somewhere—in Dion Cassius, I think—that the Romans, after the fall of Decebalus,[25] had commemorative medallions struck off with Dacian inscriptions, and the figure of a decapitated man on the reverse. Don't you see the emblem?"

"But your Highness," interrupted Teleki impatiently, "the memorial which I have handed to you——"

And now for the first time Apafi perceived that a parchment was in his hand awaiting perusal. He returned it sulkily to Teleki.

"I have already told you that I can speak to no one to-day. In a month the session of the Diet will begin, and then the Hungarian gentlemen can ventilate their affairs to their hearts' content."

"I cry your Highness' pardon!" replied Teleki caustically; "this document is not from the Hungarian lords, but from his Excellency the Tartar Khan."

"And what does he want?" cried Apafi, throwing a glance upon the parchment, but when he perceived how long it was he laid it aside. "I will be brief with him. Who brought the letter?"

"An emir."

Apafi immediately threw his attila over his shoulders, girded on his sword, and stepped into the reception-room.

"Good-day! good-day!" he cried hastily to those assembled there. He wished to cut short their long ceremonious greetings, and looked about among them with inquiring eyes.

"Where is the emir?"

The Tartar envoy at once stepped forward. He was a truculent, swarthy fellow, with small sparkling eyes. A heron's plume as long as the shaft of a lance waved from his large turban. He wore a red, richly-fringed jacket, and the gold inlaid hilt of his scimitar peeped forth from his broad girdle. Defiantly he placed himself in front of the Prince and stuck out his chest.

"Salem alek! What do you want?" asked Apafi curtly.

The emir measured the Prince from head to foot twice or thrice with his piercing eyes, threw back his head, and said—

"My master, the gracious Kuban Khan, bids me say to thee, O Prince of the Giaours, that thou art a perjured, false, and faithless man. Thou didst swear by thy honour that we should be good neighbours, and how hast thou kept thy word? It chanced last year that we traversed the Saxon[26] land, and visited those towns whose names no true believer can pronounce, to collect the usual yearly tribute. They were ever good payers, but some among them chancing to lag behind with their contributions were, by the order of the most gracious Khan, instantly reduced to ashes that they might learn to behave better another time. And perchance thou dost fancy that they amended their evil ways? Not at all. For when we visited them again this year, we found the charred and naked walls as we had left them the year before: the unbelieving dogs had traitorously fled away. Wherefore my gracious master, the mighty Kuban Khan, bids me ask thee what manner of prince thou art that dost suffer these unbelieving dogs to so forsake their towns and make fools of us. When we came at other times, the hay was housed, the corn thrashed, the cattle stalled—and this time we find nought but weeds, and therein hares and other unclean beasts which ye unbelievers delight to eat, and none of the towns built up again, so that we could take no vengeance. Look to it, then, if thou wouldst not draw down upon thy head the wrath of the mighty Khan, look to it that thou commandest this runaway people to return to its towns that we may reckon with them; and in the meantime bid the remaining Saxon towns, which have faithlessly environed their houses with impregnable walls, that they open their gates to us, otherwise we will visit thee in Klausenburg itself with fire and sword, and will not leave thee one stone upon another."

Apafi, during the course of this speech, had frequently laid his hand on his sword, but he evidently thought better of it, for it was with the utmost tranquillity that he thus replied—

"Go back! Greet thy master, and say that we will give him satisfaction."

With that he turned his back upon the envoy, and would have returned to his cabinet had not Teleki barred the way.

"That is not enough, your Highness. Once for all we must make it impossible for any dog-headed Tartar to speak such brave words before the throne of the Prince of Transylvania."

"Speak to him then yourself!"

Teleki thereupon, with an earnest, dignified mien, stepped up to the emir, stared him out of countenance, and said with a firm voice—

"Thy master is doubtless the ruler of Tartary, but is not my master the Prince of Transylvania? And is not the sublime Sultan the protector of us both? Know then that the sublime Sultan did not make thy master Khan of Tartary that he might dwell in Transylvania, nor has he set my master on the throne of Transylvania to endure the insolence of thy master! Go back then to thine own land, and come not hither again to wonder why a town which is burnt down one year is not built up again the next. We will take good care that all such places are rebuilt, but we will also see that the bastions are high enough to keep thee out, and shouldst thou desire to visit us at Klausenburg next year, we will also take care that thou shalt not have thy journey for nothing, and will provide guns in abundance to salute thee at a respectful distance."

All this Teleki said to the emir with a perfectly serious countenance.

The emir snorted with fury. His eyes grew bloodshot. His hand played with the hilt of his scimitar, and he stammered with pallid lips—

"If any of my master's servants spoke thus in his presence, he would immediately have his head struck off."

But Apafi tapped Teleki on the shoulder, and murmured as he stroked his beard—

"It is well, Master Michael Teleki! You have spoken like a man."

The emir turned furiously upon his heel, and, shaking the dust from his feet, left the room.

This scene put Apafi in a good humour, especially with Teleki. The minister could read this change of mood in his master's face, and hastened to make use of it. Taking one of the many suitors by the hand, he presented him to Apafi with these words—

"My future son-in-law, your Highness."

Apafi would probably have escaped from a presentation made in any other way; but made in this form he could not possibly avoid it. He was compelled to cast a glance upon the young man.

The person so presented was a tall, handsome stripling with blooming red cheeks and no trace, as yet, of a beard. In his femininely beautiful features, it was pride alone which revealed the man.

The youth pleased Apafi.

"What is your son-in-law's name?" he asked Teleki.

With a peculiar smile Teleki said—

"Emerich, Stephen Tököly's son."

On hearing this name, Apafi suddenly became very grave, and said to the young man—

"Your father was a good friend to me"—and yet he did not extend his hand to the son.

"I know it," replied the youth, "and for that reason I have come to your Highness."

"But your late father—God rest him!—was an unruly spirit. It is well that you have not followed in his footsteps. He was never happy unless he was fighting. The thunder of artillery was a vital necessity to him, and the last hours of his life were spent at a siege. Well for you that you do not imitate him! You seem to me a very steady, quiet sort of young man."

"Oh! such praise as that I'm sure I don't deserve," replied Tököly proudly; "I also was at the siege you speak of, and defended the fortress till my father died."

Apafi did not like to be interrupted in this way, but, meaning to show his sympathy, he added, after a pause—

"And how then did you manage to escape, my son?"

Emerich blushed deeply and would not answer; but Teleki, by way of correcting his young kinsman's intemperate zeal, answered apologetically—

"The fact is, he was then very young, so they disguised him in woman's clothes, and he was thus able to elude the vigilance of the besiegers."

Apafi immediately recovered his good-humour. He playfully stroked the youth's blood-red cheeks, and signified to Teleki that he might now introduce the other gentlemen also.

They were all fugitives from Hungary, and the Prince did his best to appear gracious towards them; but, in the meantime, one of the court ushers entered and announced with a loud voice—

"His Excellency Monsieur l'Abbé Reverend, the French Envoy, desires an audience."

This announcement again filled Apafi with embarrassment. He drew Teleki aside and whispered in his ear—

"I will not, I cannot receive him. Go out and speak to him yourself, and explain how matters stand." And with that he hastily quitted the reception-room, delighted at having this time shifted the difficulty on to Teleki's shoulders; but he remained listening at the door to find out whether there would be any violent explosion behind his back.

And an explosion there certainly was, though not of a particularly terrifying character.

The Prince heard Teleki burst into a jovial peal of laughter, whereupon all the gentlemen present with one accord followed his example, just as if they were taking part in some intensely amusing diversion.

"It must indeed be a very peculiar phenomenon which extorts such extravagant merriment from these sour-faced gentry," thought Apafi, and he half opened the door—he could not quite open it, because learned Master Passai, ordinarily a miracle of gravity, had so given himself up to mirth that he was forced to lean back against the Prince's cabinet.

"Let me come in, Master Passai!" cried the inquisitive Prince, and succeeding shortly afterwards in opening the door, the cause of the general mirth was immediately obvious to him.

The Abbé Reverend stood in the centre of the room in full Hungarian costume. A more comical figure was scarcely conceivable.

The worthy gentleman, who rejoiced in the possession of a really redoubtable corporation, standing there, clean shaven and benignly smiling, presented an amiably ludicrous figure, of which only an Hungarian, or one who knows what a severe criterion of the human figure the tight-fitting Magyar costume really is, can form any idea. Add to this that the worthy Frenchman, in his stiff hose and spurred jack-boots, moved about as gingerly as if he feared every moment to fall on his nose. He had also forgotten to buckle on his girdle, which lent a peculiar quaintness to his general get-up, and his long bag-wig, in which he looked like a lion, was surmounted by a tiny round cap from which waved a gigantic heron plume.

Apafi did not see why he too should not smile when the others laughed.

Monsieur Reverend, with that facility peculiar to Frenchmen of coupling gaiety with solemnity, tripped at once up to the Prince and said—

"Your Highness's persistent refusal to receive me made me assume that perchance I did not present myself becomingly attired, and my present good-fortune demonstrates the correctness of my assumption, for the moment I present myself in Magyar costume I am lucky enough to behold you."

"Parbleu, Monsieur!" returned Apafi, repressing his merriment with difficulty, "I am always glad to see you on condition that politics are banished from our discourse. But you have not fastened on your scarf, and without the scarf a person in the Magyar dress looks for all the world like a Frenchman who has forgotten to put on his breeches."

With these words the Prince produced a scarf adorned with gems, and tied it with his own hands round the respectable waist of Monsieur Reverend.

"And what's this? Who taught you to stuff your pocket-handkerchief into your trousers pocket? Only heydukes do that. What the deuce! A nobleman always keeps his pocket-handkerchief in his kalpag. So! Hem! What a beautiful pocket-handkerchief you've got!"

"Splendid, is it not?"

"Indeed it is! A garland pattern in silk thread, with gold and silver embroideries at the corners. Only Paris can produce the like of this."

"And yet it was manufactured in Transylvania."

"You don't say so?"

"Yes; and what is more, in this very place, in Ebesfalva."

Apafi looked at Monsieur Reverend with amazement.

"And I not to know the artistic hands which work such beautiful things!"

"But your Highness does know them. The name of the fair artist will be found embroidered in gorgeous Gothic letters on the hem of the handkerchief."

Apafi carefully examined all the corners of the handkerchief one after the other. Each had a different device embroidered on it—here a wreath of oak-leaves, there a trophy, in the third a Turkish scimitar, an Hungarian sabre, and a French sword bound together by a ribbon. At last he came to the fourth corner, where, beneath a princely coronet, was embroidered the word Apafiné.[27]