THE NECROMANCER. 313 



power they had acquired over him but, alas ! they had found a ready 

 echo within his breast al ways ready to repeat them. 



The house was inhabited by an old couple and their daughter, the 

 idolized child of their old age : she was truly beautiful. She had 

 one of those Madonna heads that an ideal style of beauty, such as 

 genius in its happiest moments of inspiration conceives black hair 

 plaited across her forehead lustrous dark eyes, and a complexion 

 pale and transparent as the finest alabaster. Such was this young 

 maiden, who, with her parents, lived like Mande in a state of utter se- 

 clusion from the world. No one even knew their names once he 

 heard the old father address his daughter by the name of Nicole. 

 Nicole became for him a beloved name, that at times could make him 

 forget his cherished sorrow. Love dawned in his bosom, and every 

 sombre idea was eclipsed by its dazzling rays. Nicole, the beautiful 

 Nicole she haunted him in his dreams, in his meditations, even in 

 his prayers, and if he could only catch a glimpse of her as she crossed 

 like a spirit before him, it was for him a day of happiness. He then 

 thought himself delivered, and oh ! how dearly he loved the object 

 who had dissipated the horrid phantoms and gloomy terrors of his 

 imagination ; often did he steal towards tier and bless her in the soft 

 language of love. 



One Sunday morning he met her in the church of the Abbey of 

 Montmartre ; she was on her knees and praying so fervently, that he 

 felt she must possess a confiding a loving heart ; and when she raised 

 her head and met his earnest gaze, her pale cheek was slightly tinged 

 with a blush, and in that timid look there was so much piety and 

 tenderness, that he said to himself, " surely that is love !" Nor was 

 he mistaken, she did indeed love Mande she had loved him long 

 and in secret, and she revealed it in her glance. He passed that 

 night revelling on the delicious belief, that he was not alone in the 

 world, that he was beloved; and in the joy of the moment it seemed 

 to him, that he had only to ask her in marriage of her parents, and 

 obtain her. He therefore resolved to take this step in the morning ; 

 he could dread no refusal ; and he pictured to himself the paradise of 

 a home of the joys of love of felicity ! " If happiness is to be 

 found in this world," he mentally exclaimed, " surely this is happi- 

 ness." But suddenly these golden reveries were dissipated by the 

 recollection of the fatal words of the sorcerer ! They came like a damp 

 upon his heart, and froze his very blood. " Happiness !" he sighed 

 forth, "happiness! did I say?" he bitterly exclaimed! "No, no, 

 not for me, not for the doomed ! never shall I taste of happiness." 

 His bright hopes deserted him, and he relapsed into his former 

 gloomy imaginings, which the enchantment of two months' love had 

 partially banished from his mind. The dreadful words of the necro- 

 mancer appeared to him more inevitable than ever his wife then 

 would press to her bosom one cursed by heaven one already branded 



by fate, and doomed to his very soul shrunk within him as the 



word rushed with tenfold force upon his recollection, and he raved 

 in his anguish, and denounced the Almighty, which he fancied had 

 cast him to irrevocable doom. 



That very morning he disappeared ; evening came, but he returned 

 not ; day after day passed, and month after month, but Mande came 



MM. No. 3. 28 



