A BRILLIANT APPARITION. 375 



letta, in her terror, it looked something like it, and she thought 

 even that she saw the points of the horrible tusks she had once 

 seen so hideously employed. Then all her courage deserted her, 

 and she fell senseless to the ground. 



The lookers-on above shrank backwards in dismay ; and, as 

 if they had beheld the Ogre himself striding up the sides of his 

 den, broke up their circle huddled together in confusion 

 and rapidly retreated. 



Presently, however, as if ashamed of their cowardice, they 

 stood still, and again turned their faces towards the quarter of 

 apprehended danger. Not a thing was visible on the smooth 

 sandy plain around the mouth of the pitfall ; nor, for awhile, 

 above it; but then, rising suddenly from the centre of the 

 hollow, a winged form shot upwards, like a sky-rocket. It 

 approached, glittering in the morning sun, then hovered high 

 above the wondering and admiring crowd. " A genius ! a 

 genius ! " they exclaimed ; " a good genius, who has killed the 

 Ogre, and saved us from destruction ! " 



Even as they spoke, the brilliant apparition descended slowly 

 from its aerian height, and, on four resplendent wings of im- 

 mense expansion, again hung suspended now close above their 

 heads. But not long did it thus hover its brooding was as 

 that of a kite over a flock of doves, and presently, kite-like, 

 it siezed its victim, lifting it from amidst the deluded multitude 

 by help of sharp talons and a pair of crooked tusks, terrible as 

 those of the dreaded Ogre. 



Their former fears swallowed up by this new alarm, the 

 discomfited force of Monticello hastened in confusion towards 

 their city; but, before they reached it, one more of their 

 number was carried of by the same winged assailant, or another 

 resembling it, and rising, in like manner, from another of the 

 ogre pitfalls. 



What had become, meanwhile, of Piccoletta ? This was an 

 inquiry which, after they were safe within the walls of their 

 capital, suggested itself for the first time to those who had left 



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