1 S27.J T&c Adceniures of Prince Hassan. 377 



wandered at hazard. She found herself, without thinking, on the sea-shore, 

 and at the very spot where she left the bark which had brought her from 

 the Dark Tower. Her first movement was to embark, and go to invite 

 the prince to come to the court of the king her father. She entered the 

 boat, and following a cable, which was fastened from the shore to the 

 tower, she soon arrived at it. She then heard the voice of the prince, who 

 was complaining aloud of what he had suffered for love. " What injury 

 has love done you ?" replied the princess. ** I am come to hear the rest of 

 your adventures. Relate them, 1 pray you. The winds and sea are calm 

 and still ; as if, like me, they listened to your misfortunes." 



The prince was charmed at her return ; for the idea had struck him 

 that she might be the same princess the magician had shewn him. He 

 thus continued his story : " I was seated on a rock, when, with trembling 

 hands, I opened the box my father had given me. I there found a paper, 

 where 1 read these cruel words which my father had written." [The 

 jprince then repeated to her what was written in the letter. He informed 

 her of the cruel penalty that the fairy Noirjabarbe, to be revenged on his 

 father, had imposed on him, and that he was fated to kill all who regarded 

 him.J " I cannot express my ideas on reading this paper. My first 

 impulse was to precipitate myself from the rock, where 1 was sitting, into 

 the waves. But, alas \ to add to my woes, an invisible hand retained 

 nae^ and I perceived that I was constrained to live. I was no longer asto- 

 nished that the savages had fallen victims on beholding me : I even thanked 

 the gods for having made me the instrument of purging the earth of such 

 inhuman monsters. I wandered all over the island, which I found full of 

 horrors, I chose for my abode a grotto, formed out of a rock ; there I 

 lived on the wild beasts I killed in the chase, and the fish I caught. I 

 rambled along the shore. The only moments of pleasure I enjoyed were 

 in contemplating the portrait, which I admired more every time I looked 

 at it. I frequently passed over to a neighbouring island, planted with 

 oranges. I lay down one day to sleep there : a tempest arose during my 

 slumbers. I had the imprudence to endeavour to gain the other island. 

 The wind, which increased every moment, blew me away out to sea ; and 

 I was cast against this tower, where you saved my life." 



" Ah, prince !" cried the princess, " I can then never behold you with- 

 out Us costing me my life !" " I would willingly resign mine, for the pri- 

 vilege of seeing you for a moment," replied the prince. " The charming 

 remembrance of her whom I beheld at the bottom of the sea is graven on 

 my heart too deeply ever to be effaced by time. I love her, and a certain 

 presentiment assures me that you are that lovely personage. Oh ! ye gods, 

 to what punishment am I condemned? I love, and I cannot see her 

 whom I love, without depriving her of life !" " You are not the only one 

 to complain in t\us world," said the princess ; " and not to know whom 

 you love is not so tormenting as to know, and to love, without being able 

 to see the pbject." These words were an enigma to the prince : he could 

 not penetrate the thoughts of the princess; and the words which had 

 escaped her appeared to him to have been spoken at random. He entreated 

 her to inform him the reason why she had passed her life in that tower. 

 The princess told him that a fairy, the Protectrice of her father's island, 

 had been summoned at her birth; and, having predicted that she was 

 menaced by some dreadful misfortune, she had ordered her to dwell in that 

 tower, until the monster, who killed all on beholding him, should como 



MM. New Serbs. VOL. IV. No. 22. 3C 



