The convoy stopped, Alexis got out of the third carriage. In spite of the darkness and of his ignoble garb, the Countess and her daughters recognized him. One of the latter was about to call out his name; but her mother placed her hand on her mouth in time to prevent the imprudence, and the Count entered the cottage.

The corporal commanding the escort began enquiring about horses, and on learning that they were scarce, he sent off his soldiers with orders to seize all they could find in the name of the Emperor. The men departed, and he remained alone with the prisoners. There was no danger of an attempt at escape. In the heart of the Czar's immense dominions, whither could a fugitive betake himself without a certainty of being overtaken, or of dying from hunger before he reached the frontier?

Corporal Ivan remained then walking up and down in front of the cottage, alternately whistling and floging his leathern overalls with his riding whip, and occasionally stopping to gaze at the Countess's travelling carriage, which was standing without horses in the road. Presently the door of the vehicle opened, three ladies alighted and advanced towards the corporal. Two of them remained a little behind, the third approached him with clasped hands.

"My friend," said the Countess, "my son is amongst the prisoners you are escorting; let me see him but for a moment, and name your own reward."

"It is impossible, madam," replied the corporal respectfully. "My orders are strict to allow no one to communicate with the prisoners, and the knout is the least I may expect if I transgress them."

"But who will know that you have transgressed them?" cried the Countess, her voice trembling with eagerness and suspense. Her daughters stepped forward, and joined their hands, as in supplication to the soldier.

"It is quite impossible, madam," repeated the man.

"My mother!" cried Alexis, pushing open the cottage door. He had heard her voice, and in an instant was clasped in her arms.

The corporal made a movement as though to seize his prisoner; but at the same moment the two young girls fell at his feet, and embracing his knees, pointed to the touching spectacle before them.

Corporal Ivan was a good fellow in the main. He uttered something between a sigh and a growl, and the sisters saw that their prayer was granted.

"Mamma," said one of them in a low tone, "he will allow us to embrace our brother." The Countess extricated herself from her son's arms, and held out a heavy purse to the corporal.

"You risk a punishment for our sakes, my friend, and it is fair you should be recompensed for it."

Ivan looked hard at the purse for a moment, then shaking his head and putting his hands behind his back, "No, your ladyship," said he, "I am committing a breach of duty, but it is not for gold. Here is the best excuse I can give my judges, and if they don't accept it, God will;" and he pointed to the two weeping girls. The Countess seized the soldier's rough hand and pressed it to her lips.

"The horses cannot be here yet;" continued Ivan, "get into your carriage and pull down the blinds. By that means nobody will see you, and I may perhaps avoid making acquaintance with the knout."

"Thank you, corporal," said Alexis; "but at least take this purse.

"Take it yourself, lieutenant," said Ivan in a low voice, from habit giving the Count a title to which he had no longer a right. "You will find the use of it at the end of your journey."

"But on arriving they will search me."

"You can give it to me before the search, and I will return it to you. But I hear the gallop of a horse; quick into the carriage!" The corporal pushed Alexis into the carriage; the ladies followed, and he shut the door upon them.

An hour elapsed, an hour of mingled joy and sorrow. At the expiration of that time, the door opened, and Ivan appeared. "You must separate," said he, "the horses are arriving."

"A few moments longer!" cried the ladies, with tearful voices.

"Not a second, or I am ruined. Go on to the next relay; it is dark, no one will see you, and I sha'n't be punished more for twice than once."

"Oh! you will not be punished at all," cried the ladies; "surely God will reward you."

"Hum," said the corporal doubtingly, and half pulling his prisoner out of the carriage.

At the next relay, things went equally well. A third interview was rendered impossible by the approach of day. The sad word farewell was pronounced, and the weeping women took the road to Moscow, having previously arranged a plan of correspondence, and carrying with them a few affectionate lines that Alexis had scrawled in pencil for Louise.

The Countess had ordered my servant to wait at Moscow till she returned, and on her arrival there immediately dispatched him to St Petersburg. He brought Louise the Count's note, and a letter from his mother, inviting her to go to Moscow, for that she was impatient to embrace her as her daughter.

Louise kissed her lover's note. She shook her head on reading the Countess's letter, and smiled one of those sad smiles that were peculiar to her. "I shall not go to Moscow," said she, "my place is elsewhere."

As I had suspected, Louise had resolved to join Count W—— at Tobolsk; but she could not set out till after her confinement, which was to take place in a couple of months. Meantime she busied herself with preparations. By turning every thing she possessed into money, she got together a sum of thirty thousand rubles. At her request, I applied to my kind friend, Monsieur de Gorgoli, to obtain from the Emperor permission for her to rejoin her lover. Her intentions had got wind in St Petersburg, and every body spoke with admiration of the devoted attachment of the young Frenchwoman. Many thought, however, that her courage would fail her when the moment of departure arrived; but I knew her better, and felt assured of the contrary.

At the commencement of September, she became the mother of a boy. I wished her to write to the mother of Alexis to announce this event; but she refused. The Countess heard of it, however, and wrote to Louise, to say that she was expecting her with her child.

Her recovery was slow, the various emotions she had undergone during her pregnancy having weakened her health. She would have left St Petersburg long before she was strong enough to do so; but the permission to join Count W—— was to come through me, and I refused to apply for it till her medical attendant gave her leave to travel.

One morning the door of my apartment opened and Louise entered, her face radiant with joy. "He will escape!" cried she.

"Who?"

"He—Alexis."

"How! Escape? It is impossible."

"Read that," she said and handed me a letter in the Count's hand-writing. It was as follows:—"Dearest Louise—Place all confidence in the bearer of this letter. He is more than my friend—he is my saviour.

"I fell ill upon the road, and was obliged to stop at Perm. The physicians declared I was not able to continue my journey, and it was decided I should pass the winter in the prison of that town. As good fortune would have it, the jailer's brother is an old servant of my family and willing to aid my escape. He and his brother fly with me; but I must have means of indemnifying them for what they give up on my account, and for the risk they run. Give the bearer all the money and jewels you possess. As soon as I am in safety I will write to you to come and join me. Adieu. W——."

"Well," said I after reading the letter twice over, "what have you done?"

"Can you ask the question?"

"What!" cried I. "You have given ...?"

"Every ruble I had," interrupted she.

"And if this letter were not from the Count? If it were a forgery?"

She changed colour, and snatched the paper from my hand.

"Oh, no!" said she. "I know his hand-writing. I cannot be mistaken." But, on reading the letter again, I observed that she grew still paler.

"I do not think," I observed, "that Alexis would have addressed such a demand to you."

"And why not? Who loves him better than I do?"

"Understand me rightly. For an act of friendship or devotion he would have applied to you, but for money to his mother. I tell you again, either I do not know Count W——'s character, or this letter is not written by him."

"But what will become of me? I have given every thing I possessed."

"How did the Count usually sign his letters?"

"Alexis always."

"You see this one is signed W——. It is evidently a forgery and we must immediately inform the police."

"And if we are mistaken? If it is not a forgery, by doing so I shall prevent his escape. Oh, no! Better lose the money. I can manage without. All that I am anxious to know is, whether he is at Perm."

It occurred to me, that I might easily ascertain this latter point through a lieutenant of gendarmerie to whom I gave lessons; and begging Louise to wait my return, I hastened to his quarters. I told him I had particular reasons for wishing to know whether my friend W—— had reached Tobolsk, and asked him if it were possible to ascertain. He immediately sent an orderly for the non-commissioned officer who had commanded the Count's division. Ten minutes afterwards, Corporal Ivan entered the room; and, although I was not then aware of the service he had rendered the Countess and her daughters, I was immediately prepossessed in his favour, by his frank open countenance and soldierly bearing.

"You commanded the sixth division of the prisoners lately sent to Siberia?" enquired I.

"I did so, your excellency."

"Count W—— was in your division?"

The corporal hesitated, and did not seem much to like the question.

"Fear nothing," said I, "you are speaking to a friend, who would sacrifice his own life for him. Tell me the truth, I beseech you. Was Count W—— ill on the road?"

"Not the least."

"Did he stop at Perm?"

"Not even to change horses. I left him at Koslowo, a pretty little village on the Irtich, twenty leagues from Tobolsk."

"You are sure of what you say?"

"Quite sure. I had a receipt from the authorities, which I delivered over to his excellency the grand-master of police."

I now hastened to Monsieur de Gorgoli, and related all that had passed. When I had finished—

"Is this young girl decided to go penniless, as she now is, to join her lover in Siberia?"

"Quite decided, your excellency; and I am persuaded nothing will alter her resolution."

"Then go, and tell her from me, that she shall have the permission."

I hurried back to Louise, and informed her of the result of my two interviews. She appeared indifferent to the loss of her little fortune, but overjoyed to learn that she would be allowed to join her lover. Her only anxiety now was to obtain the requisite permission as soon as possible.

Before leaving her, I placed at her disposal what money I had, which, unfortunately, was only two or three thousand rubles; for I had, a short time previously, remitted to France all that I had laid by during my residence at St Petersburg.

The same evening I was at Louise's house, when one of the Emperor's aides-de-camp was announced. He brought her a letter of audience for the following day. Monsieur de Gorgoli had kept his word.

Early the following morning I called upon Louise, to accompany her to the palace. I found her waiting for me, dressed in deep mourning, and without a single ornament; but her pale, melancholy style of beauty, was rather improved than impaired by the simplicity and sombre colour of her attire.

At the palace gate we separated, and I awaited her return in the carriage. On presenting her letter of audience, an officer on duty conducted her to the Emperor's private cabinet, and desiring her to wait there, left the room. She remained alone for about ten minutes, during which time, she afterwards told me, she was more than once near fainting away. At last a step was heard in the adjoining apartment; a door opened, and the Emperor appeared. On seeing him, she, by a spontaneous movement, fell upon her knees, and, unable to find words, clasped her hands together in mute supplication.

"Rise!" said the Emperor kindly, advancing towards her. "I have been already spoken to on the subject of your application. You wish for permission to join an exile?"

"Yes, sire, if such a favour may be granted."

"You are neither his sister nor his wife, I believe?"

"I am his—friend, sire," replied poor Louise, a tinge of pink over-spreading her pale cheek. "He must sadly need a friend."

"You know that he is banished for life to a country where there are scarcely four months of spring, and the rest of the year is one dreary winter?"

"I know it, sire."

"Do you know, also, that he has neither rank, fortune, nor title to share with you—that he is poorer than the poorest mendicant in St Petersburg?"

"Yes, sire."

"You have doubtless some fortune, some resources of your own?"

"Alas, sire, I have nothing! Yesterday I had thirty thousand rubles, produced by the sale of all I possessed, but even that little fortune was stolen from me."

"I know it. By a forged letter. It was more than a theft, it was a sacrilege; and, should its perpetrator be detected, he shall be punished as though he had broken open the poor-box in a church. But there are means of repairing your loss?"

"How, sire?"

"Inform his family of the circumstance. They are rich, and will assist you."

"I thank your Majesty; but I desire no assistance save that of God."

"But without funds how can you travel? Have you no friends who would help you?"

"Pardon me, sire, but I am too proud to borrow what I could never repay. By selling what little property I have left, I shall raise two or three hundred rubles."

"Scarcely sufficient for a quarter of the journey. Do you know the distance from here to Tobolsk, my poor girl?"

"Yes, sire—about eight hundred French leagues."

"And how will you get over the five or six hundred leagues you will still have to travel when your last ruble is spent?"

"There are towns on the road, sire. When I reach a town I will work till I have enough to continue my journey to the next."

"That may do as far as Perm," replied the Emperor; "but after that you have the Ural mountains, and you are at the end of Europe. After that nothing but a few scattered villages; no inns upon the road; large rivers without bridges or ferries, and which must be traversed by dangerous fords, whence men and horses are frequently swept away."

"Sire, when I reach the rivers they will be frozen; for I am told that in those regions the winter begins earlier than at St Petersburg."

"What!" cried the Emperor, astonished, "do you think of setting out now—of performing such a journey in winter?"

"It is during the winter that his solitude must be most intolerable."

"It is impossible. You must be mad to think of it."

"Impossible if your Majesty so wills it. No one can disobey your Majesty."

"I shall not prevent it; but surely your own reason, and the immense difficulties of such an undertaking, will."

"Sire! I will set out to-morrow."

"But if you perish on the road?"

"If I perish, sire, he will have lost nothing, for I am neither his mother, his daughter, nor sister, but only his mistress—that is, a woman to whom society gives no rights, and who must consider herself fortunate if the world looks upon her with no harsher feeling than indifference. But if I am able to join him, I shall be every thing to him—mother, sister, family, and friends. We shall be two to suffer instead of one, and that fearful exile will lose half its terrors. You see, sire, I must rejoin him, and that as soon as possible."

"You are right," said the Emperor, looking fixedly at her, "and I no longer oppose your departure."

He rang; an aide-de-camp appeared.

"Is Corporal Ivan in attendance?"

"He waits your Majesty's orders."

"Let him come in."

The aide-de-camp bowed, and disappeared. Two minutes afterwards the door reopened, and Corporal Ivan stepped into the room, then halted, upright and motionless, one hand on the seam of his overalls, the other to the front of his schako.

"Draw near," said the Emperor, in a stern voice.

The corporal made four paces to the front, and relapsed into his former position.

"Nearer!"

Four more paces, and Ivan was close to the Emperor's writing-table.

"You are Corporal Ivan?"

"Yes, sire."

"You commanded the escort of the sixth division?"

"Yes, sire."

"You had orders to allow the prisoners to communicate with no one?"

This time the corporal's tongue seemed embarrassed by something, and his affirmative was uttered in a less steady tone than the preceding ones.

"Count Alexis W—— was one of the prisoners in your division, and in spite of your orders you allowed him to have two interviews with his mother and sisters. You knew the punishment you exposed yourself to by so doing?"

Ivan grew very pale, and was forced to support himself against the table.

"Pardon, sire!" gasped he.

Louise seemed about to speak, but a motion of the Emperor's hand warned her to remain quiet. After a moment's silence—

"You are pardoned," said the Emperor.

The soldier drew a deep breath. Louise uttered an exclamation of joy.

"Where did you leave Count W——?"

"At Koslowo, your Majesty."

"You will set off again, and escort this lady thither."

"Oh, sire!" exclaimed Louise, who began to understand the Emperor's feigned severity,

"You will obey her in all respects, consistently with her safety, for which you answer to me with your head; and if, on your return, you bring me a letter from her, saying that she is satisfied with your conduct, you shall be made sergeant."

"Thanks, father," said Ivan, forgetting for a moment his military stiffness, and falling upon his knees. The Emperor gave him his hand to kiss, as he was in the habit of doing to the lowest of his subjects. Louise was going to throw herself at his feet and kiss his other hand, but the Emperor stopped her.

"You are indeed a true and admirable woman," said he. "I have done all I can for you. May God bless and protect you!"

"Oh, sire!" exclaimed Louise, "how can I show my gratitude!"

"When you pray for your child," said the Emperor, "pray also for mine." And waving his hand kindly to her, he left the room.

When Louise returned home she found a small packet that had been sent from the Empress during her absence. It contained thirty thousand rubles.

It had been arranged that I should accompany Louise as far as Moscow, a city that I was desirous of visiting, and thence she would pursue her journey under Ivan's escort. The day after her interview with the Emperor, we started in a carriage that Ivan brought, and the combined strength and elegance of which surprised me, until I observed on a corner of the pannel the mark of the imperial stables. It was an excellent travelling berline, lined throughout with fur. Ivan was provided with an order, by virtue of which post-horses would be furnished us the whole of the journey, at the Emperor's expense. Louise got into the carriage with her child in her arms; I seated myself beside her, Ivan jumped on the box, and in a few minutes we were rattling along the Moscow road.

Louise was received with open arms by the Countess W—— and her daughters. The nature of her connexion with Alexis was lost sight of and forgotten in the devotion and disinterestedness of her attachment. A room was prepared for her in the Countess's house; and, however anxious the Count's mother and sisters were that he should have society and consolation in his exile, they nevertheless entreated her to pass the winter at Moscow, rather than run the risk of so long a journey during the bad season that was approaching. But Louise was inflexible. Two days were all she would consent to remain. She was forced, however, to leave her child in charge of its grandmother, for it would have been madness to have done otherwise.

I had been offered an apartment in the Countess's house, but preferred taking up my quarters at an hotel, in order to have liberty to spend my time in visiting whatever was remarkable at Moscow. On the evening of the second day I went to call upon the Countess. The ladies were making another effort to persuade Louise to defer her perilous journey till a more favourable season. But no arguments, no entreaties, could move her: she was determined to set off the following morning. I was invited to breakfast, and to witness her departure.

I had been for some days turning over in my mind a project that I now resolved to put in execution. I got up early the next morning and bought a fur coat and cap, thick furred boots, a carbine, and a brace of pistols, all of which I gave to Ivan, and desired him to place them in the carriage. I then hastened to the Countess W——'s.

Breakfast over, the carriage drove up to the door. Louise was alternately clasped in the arms of the Countess and her daughters. My turn came, and she held out her hand. I made a motion to assist her into the carriage. "Well," said she, astonished, "don't you bid me farewell?"

"Why should I?"

"I am going to set off."

"So am I."

"You!"

"Certainly. You recollect the Persian fable—the pebble that was not the rose, but had caught some of its fragrance by living near it."

"Well?"

"Well, I have caught some of your devotedness, and I shall go with you to Tobolsk. I will deliver you safe and sound to the Count, and then come back again."

Louise looked me earnestly in the face. "I have no right," said she, "to prevent your doing a good action—come."

The Countess and her daughters were in tears. "My child! my child!" cried Louise, who had remained firm up to this moment, but burst into a passion of weeping as she clasped her infant for the last time in her arms.

"Adieu! Adieu!" The whip cracked; the wheels rattled over the pavement. We were off to Siberia. On we went, day and night. Pokrow, Vladimir, Nijni-Novogorod, Casan. "Pascare! Pascare!" Quicker! Quicker! was Ivan's cry to each new postilion. The snow had not yet begun to fall, and he was anxious, if possible, to cross the Ural mountains before it set in. The immense plains between Moscow and Perm were traversed with tremendous rapidity. On reaching the latter place, Louise was so much exhausted that I told Ivan we must halt one night. He hesitated a moment, then looking at the sky, which was dark and lowering, "It will be as well," said he; "we must soon have snow, and it is better it should fall before than during our journey." The next morning his prediction was verified. There were two feet of snow in the streets of Perm.

Ivan now wished to remain till the cold increased, so that the snow might become hard, and the rivers frozen. But all his arguments could only induce Louise to wait two days. On the third morning we set off, leaving our carriage, and packed into a sort of small vehicle without springs, called a telegue.

On reaching the foot of the Ural mountains, the cold had so much increased that it became advisable to substitute a sledge for our wheels. We stopped at a miserable village, composed of a score of hovels, in order to effect this exchange, and entered a wretched hut, which did duty both as posting-house and as the only inn in the place. Eight or nine men, carriers by trade, were crowded round a large fire, lighted in the centre of the room, and the smoke of which found a vent through a hole in the roof. They paid no attention to our entrance; but when I had taken off my cloak, my uniform at once obtained for us the best place at the hearth. The landlord of this wretched hostelry met my enquires about supper with a stare of astonishment, and offered me a huge loaf of hard black bread as the whole contents of his larder. Ivan, however, presently appeared, having managed to forage out a couple of fowls, which, in an inconceivably short space of time, were plucked, and one of them simmering in an iron pot over the fire, while the other hung suspended by a string in front of the blaze. Supper over, we wrapped ourselves in our furs, and lay down upon the floor, beds in such a place being of course out of the question.

Before daybreak, I awoke, and found Ivan and the carriers already afoot, and in consultation as to the practicability of continuing our journey. The question was at last decided in favour of the march; the waggoners hastened to harness their horses, and I went to inspect our carriage, which the village blacksmith had taken off its wheels and mounted upon a sledge. Ivan meantime was foraging for provisions, and shortly returned with a ham, some tolerable bread, and half a dozen bottles of a sort of reddish brandy, made, I believe, out of the bark of the birch-tree.

At length all was ready, and off we set, our sledge going first, followed by the carriers' waggons. Our new companions, according to a custom existing among them, had chosen one of their number as a chief, whose experience and judgment were to direct the movements of the party, and whose orders were to be obeyed in all things. Their choice had fallen on a man named George, whose age I should have guessed to be fifty, but who, I learned with astonishment, was upwards of seventy years old. He was a powerful and muscular man, with black piercing eyes, overhung by thick shaggy eyebrows, which, as well as his long beard, were of an iron grey. His dress consisted of a woollen shirt and trousers, a fur cap, and a sheepskin with the wool turned inside. To the leathern belt round his waist were suspended two or three horse-shoes, a metal fork and spoon, a long-bladed knife, a small hatchet, and a sort of wallet, in which he carried pipe, tobacco, flint, steel, nails, money, and a variety of other things useful or necessary in his mode of life. The garb and equipment of the other carriers were, with some small differences, the same.

The first day's journey passed without incident. Our march was slow and even dangerous, all trace of the road being obliterated, and we were obliged to feel our way, as it were, by sending men forward with long pikes to sound the depth of snow before us. At nightfall, however, we found ourselves in safety on a sort of platform surmounted by a few pine-trees. Here we established our bivouac. Branches were cut, and a sort of hut built; and, with the aid of enormous fires, the night passed in greater comfort than might have been expected on a mountain-side, and with snow many feet deep around us.

At daybreak we were again in movement. Our difficulties increased as we ascended the mountain: the snow lay in prodigious masses, and more than once we were delayed by having to rescue one or other of our advanced guard from some hole or ravine into which he had fallen. No serious accident, however, occurred, and we had at length the satisfaction of finding ourselves descending. We had passed the highest point of the road.

We had been going downhill for some three hours, the way zig-zaging among rocks and precipices, when suddenly we were startled by a loud cracking, followed by a noise that resembled a clap of thunder repeated by many echoes. At the same moment a sort of whirlwind swept by us, and the air was darkened by a cloud of snow-dust. "An avalanche!" cried George, stopping his waggon. Every body halted. In another instant the noise ceased, the air became clear, and the avalanche continued its downward course, breaking, as it passed, a couple of gigantic pines that grew upon a rock, some five hundred feet below us. The carriers gave a hurra of joy at their escape, nor was it without reason. Had we been only half a verst further on our road, our journey had been at an end.

The avalanche had not passed, however, without doing us some harm, for, on reaching the part of the road over which it had swept, we found it blocked up by a wall of snow thirty feet thick and of great height. There were several hours' work for all of us to clear it away; but unfortunately it was already nightfall, and we were obliged to make up our minds to remain where we were till morning.

No wood was to be had either for hut or fire. The want of the latter was most unfortunate; for independently of the cold rendering it very necessary, it was our chief protection against the wolves. Doing the best we could under such unfavourable circumstances, we drew up the carts in the form of a half circle, of which the two extremities rested against the wall of snow it our rear, and within the sort of fortification thus formed we placed the horses and our sledge. Our arrangements were scarcely completed when it became perfectly dark.

In the absence of fire Louise's supper and mine consisted of dry bread. The carriers, however, made a hearty meal on the flesh of a bear they had killed that morning, and which they seemed to consider as good raw as cooked.

I was regretting the want of any description of light in case of an attack from the wolves, when Louise suddenly recollected that Ivan had put the lanterns belonging to the travelling carriage into our telegue when we changed horses. On searching I found them under the seat, each furnished with a thick wax taper.

This was, indeed, a treasure. We could not hope to scare away the wolves by the light of our two candles; but it would enable us to see them coming, and to give them a proper reception. We tied the lanterns to the top of two poles fixed firmly in the snow, and saw with pleasure that they cast their clear pale light nearly fifty yards around our encampment.

We were ten men in all. Two stood sentry on the carts, while the remainder set to work to pierce through the obstacle left by the avalanche. The snow had already become slightly frozen, so that they were able to cut a passage through it. I joined the working party as being a warmer occupation than standing sentry. For three or four hours we toiled incessantly, and the birch-tree brandy, with which I had provided myself, and which we had carefully economized, was now found most useful in giving strength and courage to the labourers.

It was about eleven o'clock at night when a long howl was heard, which sounded so close and startling that with one accord we suspended our work. At the same moment old George, who was on sentry, called to us. We ran to the waggons and jumped upon them. A dozen enormous wolves were prowling about the outside edge of the bright circle thrown by our lanterns. Fear of the light kept them off; but each moment they were growing bolder, and it was easy to see that they would not be long without attacking us.

I looked to the priming of my carbine and pistols. Ivan was similarly armed; but the carriers had only their pikes, hatchets, and knives. With these weapons, however, they boldly awaited the attack.

Half an hour passed in this state of suspense, the wolves occasionally advancing a pace or two into the circle of light, but always retreating again. At length one of them approached so near that I asked George if it would not be advisable to reward his temerity with a bullet.

"Yes," was the answer, "if you are certain of hitting him."

"Why must I be certain?"

"Because if you kill him his companions will amuse themselves with eating him; to be sure," added he to himself, "if once they taste blood they will be mad for more."

"The mark is so good," said I, "I can hardly miss him."

"Fire, then, in God's name!" returned George; "all this must have an end one way or the other."

Before the words were out of his mouth I fired, and the wolf writhed in agony on the snow. In an instant half a dozen wolves darted forward, and, seizing their comrade, carried him off into the darkness.

The howlings now increased, and it was evident more wolves were arriving. At length there was a moment's silence.

"Do you hear the horses," said George, "how they neigh, and paw? It is a signal for us to be prepared."

"I thought the wolves were gone," replied I; "they have left off howling.

"No, they have finished their repast, and are preparing for an attack. Here they come."

And that moment eight or ten wolves, that in the imperfect flickering light looked as big as jackasses, rushed forward, and instead of endeavouring to pass under the waggons, bounded boldly upon them. By some chance, however, none of them attacked the waggon on which I was posted.

The cart on my right, defended by George, was escaladed by three wolves, one of which was immediately disabled by a thrust of the vigorous old man's pike. A ball from my carbine settled another, and seeing George's hatchet raised over the head of the third I knew he wanted no further aid, and looked to see what was going on to my left. Two wolves had attacked the waggon which was defended by one of George's sons, who received the first of his foes with a lance thrust. But apparently no vital part was touched, and the wolf had broken the pike with his teeth; so that for a moment the man opposed to him had nothing but the pole wherewith to defend himself. The second wolf was scrambling along the cart, and on the point of attacking him, when I sprang from one waggon to another, and fired one of my pistols into the animal's ear. He fell dead beside his companion, who was rolling in the snow, and making violent efforts to tear the broken lance from his wound.

Meantime Ivan was hard at work, and I heard a carbine or two pistol shots, which told me that our adversaries were as warmly received on the left as on the right of the line. An instant later four wolves again crossed the circle of light, but this time in full retreat; and at the same moment, to our no small astonishment, three others, that we had thought dead or mortally wounded, raised themselves up and followed their companions, leaving large tracks of blood behind them. Three carcasses remained upon the field of battle.

"Load again, and quickly," cried George. "I know their ways; they will be back directly." And the old man pointed with his finger into the darkness. I listened, and heard distant howlings replying to the nearer ones. What we had as yet had was a mere skirmish. The general engagement was to come.

"Look behind you!" cried a voice. I turned and saw two fiery eyes gleaming on the top of the snow wall in our rear. Before I could draw a trigger the wolf gave a leap, and falling upon one of the horses struck his fangs into its throat. Three men left their waggons.

"There is but one wolf," cried George, "and one man is enough. Let the others remain at their posts."

Two of the men resumed their places. The third crept upon his hands and knees among the horses who, in their terror, were kicking and plunging violently, and throwing themselves against the carts by which they were surrounded. The next instant I saw the gleam of a knife blade, and the wolf let go the horse, which reared up on its hind-legs, the blood streaming from its throat. A dark mass was rolling and struggling on the ground. It was the man and the wolf.

At the end of a few seconds the man stood up. "David," said he to one of his comrades, "come and help me to carry away this carrion. The horses wont be quiet while it lies here."

They dragged the wolf towards George's waggon, and then raising it up from the ground, the old man took it by the hind-legs, as though it had been a hare, and threw it outside the line of carts.

"Well, Nicholas," said George to the successful combatant, "don't you take your place again."

"No," replied the other; "I have enough as it is."

"Are you wounded?" cried Louise, opening the door of the telegue.

"I believe I have killed my last wolf," answered the poor fellow in a faint voice.

I gave George my carbine, and hastened to the wounded man. A part of his jaw was torn away, and the blood flowed abundantly from a large wound in his neck. I for a moment feared that the carotid artery was opened, and scarcely knowing whether I did right or wrong, I seized a handful of snow and applied it to the wound. The sufferer uttered a cry and fainted away.

"O God!" cried Louise, "have mercy upon him!"

"To your posts," shouted George in a stentorian voice; "the wolves are upon us."

I left the wounded man in Louise's care, and jumped upon the cart.

I can give no details of the combat that followed. I had too much occupation myself to attend to what my companions were doing. We were attacked by at least twenty wolves at once. After discharging my two pistols, I armed myself with an axe that George gave me. The fight lasted nearly a quarter of an hour, and certainly the scene was one of the most terrible it is possible to imagine. At length, and just as I was splitting the skull of a wolf that hung on to one of the wheels of my waggon, a shout of victory resounded along our line, and again our enemies fled, but this time it was for good.

Three of our men were wounded, besides Nicholas, who was still alive, but in a desperate state. We were obliged to shoot the horse that had been torn by the wolf.

By daybreak, a passage was opened through the wall of snow, and we resumed our journey. The evening of the same day we reached a small village, where we found an inn, that, under any other circumstances, would have been pronounced abominable, but which appeared a palace after three such days as we had passed. The following morning we parted from our friends the carriers, leaving George five hundred rubles to divide among them.

All now went well. Thanks to the imperial order with which we were provided, the best horses were always for us, and, when necessary, escorts of ten or twelve men galloped on either side of our sledge. The country was flat and the pace good, and exactly a week after leaving the Ural mountains we entered Tobolsk.

We were dreadfully fatigued, but yet Louise would only remain long enough to take a bath; and at two in the morning we set out for the little town of Koslowo, which had been selected as the abode of twenty of the exiles, among whom was Alexis. On arriving, we hastened to the officer commanding there, and showing him the Emperor's order, which produced its usual effect, enquired after the Count. He was well, was the answer, and still at Koslowo.

It had been agreed between Louise and myself that I should go and see him first, and inform him of her arrival. I asked the governor for a pass, which he gave me without hesitation, and a Cossack conducted me to a part of the town composed of some twenty houses enclosed within high palisades, and guarded by sentries. We stopped before a door, and my guide knocked. "Come in!" said a voice which I recognized as that of Alexis.

When I opened the door, he was lying on his bed, dressed, and with a book on the floor near him. I stopped upon the threshold. He stared at me without speaking, and seemed hardly to believe his eyes.

"Well," said I, "have you forgotten me?"

At the sound of my voice, he sprang from his bed and threw his arms round me. But the next instant he started back. "Good heavens!" exclaimed he, "you are exiled, and I am probably the cause."

"No, indeed," I replied, "I come here as an amateur." He smiled bitterly.

"As an amateur! Into the heart of Siberia! Explain your meaning. But first—Louise—what of her?"

"I have just now left her."

"Just now? A month ago, you mean?"

"Five minutes ago."

"Good God! what do you mean?" cried Alexis, growing very pale.

"That Louise has accompanied me, and is now here."

"Oh woman! woman! Thy heart is ever the same," murmured Alexis, while tear after tear rolled down his cheek. He was then silent for a time, but his lips moved, and I doubt not in thanksgiving to God for such happiness.

"Where is she?" he at length exclaimed.

"At the governor's house."

He rushed towards the door. "I am mad," said he, pausing, "I forget that I cannot leave my cage without permission. My dearest friend, bring her here, I beseech you! Or stay, this man will go." He spoke in Russian to the Cossack, who went out.

In a few minutes, and before I could answer a tithe of the numerous questions Alexis asked me, the man returned, but alone.

"Well?" said the Count, changing countenance.

"The governor says you must be aware that the prisoners are not allowed to receive visits from women."

The Count struck his forehead with his clenched hand, and fell back upon a chair. His features were almost convulsed by the violence of his emotions. At last he turned to the Cossack.

"Beg the sergeant to come here." The soldier left the room.

"Can any thing be more horrible?" cried Alexis. "She has come nine hundred leagues to see me; she is not a hundred yards from me, and we are forbidden to meet!"

"There must surely be some blunder," said I; "an order misunderstood, or something of the kind."

Alexis shook his head doubtingly. There was a wild look of despair in his large dark eyes that alarmed me. At this moment, the sergeant who had charge of the prisoners entered.

"Sir," cried the Count with vehemence, "the woman I love has left St Petersburg to join me, and after a thousand dangers and hardships has arrived here. I am now told that I shall not be allowed to see her. It is doubtless a mistake?"

"No, sir," replied the sergeant coolly. "You know very well that the prisoners are not permitted to see women."

"But Prince Troubetskoy has that permission. Is it because he is a prince?"

"No, sir, it is because the princess is his wife."

"And if Louise were my wife, should I be allowed to see her?"

"Undoubtedly, sir!"

"Ha!" ejaculated the Count, as though a weight were removed from off his heart. "I should like to speak with the priest," said he to the sergeant, after a moment's pause.

"He shall be sent for immediately," was the reply.

"And now my friend," said Alexis, turning to me, and taking my hands in his, "you have been Louise's guardian and defender, will you for once act as her father?"

The following morning at ten o'clock, Louise, accompanied by the governor and myself, and Alexis by Prince Troubetskoy and the other exiles, entered the little church of Koslowa by two different doors. Their first meeting was at the altar, and the first word they exchanged was the yes that united them for ever.

The Emperor by a private letter to the governor, of which Ivan was the bearer, had ordered that the Count should only be allowed to see Louise as his wife. It has been seen how willingly my friend obeyed, I should rather say anticipated, the Emperor's commands. And rich was his reward for thus promptly acknowledging the just claims of this devoted and very admirable woman. She was one of "nature's own nobility"—refined and graceful, intelligent and high-minded—and would have graced higher rank than that to which she was raised by the gratitude of Count Alexis W——.

* * * * *



AMMALAT BEK.

A TRUE TALE OF THE CAUCASUS. FROM THE RUSSIAN OF MARLINSKI.

CHAPTER X.

"Will you hold your tongue, little serpent?" said an old Tartar woman to her grandson, who, having awakened before daylight, was crying for want of something better to do. "Be quiet, or I will kick you into the street."

This old woman was Ammalat's nurse: the hut in which she lived stood close to the tents of the Begs, and had been given to her by her foster-son, Ammalat. It was composed of two clean whitewashed rooms, the floor of both was strewed with coarse mats, (ghasil;) in niches close to each other, for the room was without windows, stood boxes bound with iron, and on them were arranged a feather-bed, blankets, and all the utensils. On the cornices, at half the height of the wall, were ranged porcelain cups for pillau, having tin covers in the form of helmets, and little plates hanging side by side on wires: the holes with which they were pierced showing that they served not for use, but for ornament. The face of the old woman was covered with wrinkles, and expressed a sort of malicious sorrow: the usual consequence of the lonely pleasureless life of a Mussulman woman. As a worthy representative of persons of her age and country, she never for a moment ceased scolding her grandson from under her blanket, and to grumble to herself. "Kess," (be quiet,) she cried at length, yet more angrily, "or I will give you to the ghaouls, (devils!) Do you hear how they are scratching at the roof, and knocking at the door for you?"

It was a stormy night; a thick rain pattering on the flat roof which served as a ceiling, and the roaring of the wind in the chimney, answered to her hoarse voice. The boy became quiet, and straining his eyes, hearkened in a fright. It really seemed as if some one was knocking at the door. The old woman became frightened in her turn: her inseparable companion, a dirty dog, lifted up his head from sleep, and began to bark in a most pitiful voice. But meanwhile the knocking at the door became louder, and an unknown voice cried sternly from without, "Atch kapini, akhirin akhirici!" (open the door for the end of ends.) The old woman turned pale. "Allah bismallah!" she exclaimed, now addressing heaven, then threatening the dog, and then quieting the crying child. "Sh, accursed beast! Hold your tongue, I say, kharamzada, (good-for-nothing son of shame!) Who is there? What honest man will enter, when it is neither day nor dawn, into the house of a poor old woman? If you are Shaitan, go to neighbour Kitchkina. It has been long time to show her the road to hell! If you are a tchaouth, (tax-gatherer,) who, to say the truth, is rather worse than Shaitan, then go about your business. My son-in-law is not at home; he serves as nouker at Ammalat Bek's; and the Bek has long ago freed me from taxes; and as for treating idle travellers, don't expect from me even an egg, much less a duck. Is it in vain, then, that I suckled Ammalat?"

"Will you open, you devil's distaff?" impatiently exclaimed the voice, "or I will not leave you a plank of this door for your coffin."

The feeble doors shook on their hinges.

"Enter, pray enter," said the old woman, undoing the iron hasp with a trembling hand. The door flew open, and there entered a man of a middling stature, and of a handsome but melancholy countenance. He was clad in the Circassian dress: the water trickled down his bourka and bashlik.[22] Without any apologies, he threw it on the feather-bed, and began to untie the lopasti of his bashlik which half covered his face—Fatma, having in the mean time lighted a candle, stood before him with fear and trembling. The long-whiskered dog, with his tail between his legs, pressed himself into a corner, and the child, in a fright, climbed into the fire-place—which, used only for ornaments, was never heated.

[22] Bashlik—a bonnet worn in bad weather.

"Well, Fatma, you are grown proud," said the unknown; "you do not recognize old friends."

Fatma gazed at the new-comer's features, and her heart grew light within her. She recognized Sultan Akhmet Khan, who had ridden in one night from Kiafir Kounik to Bouinaki.

"May the sand fill my eyes that did not recognize their old master!" she replied, respectfully crossing her arms on her breast. "To say truth, they are blinded by tears, for her country—for Avar! Forgive an old woman, Khan!"

"What old age is yours, Fatma? I remember you a little girl, when I myself could hardly reach the young crows from their nests."

"A strange land makes every one old, Khan. In my native mountains I should still have been fresh as an apple, and here am I like a snowball fallen from the hill into the valley. Pray come hither, Khan, here it is more comfortable. What shall I entertain my precious guest with? Is there nothing the Khan's soul can wish for?"

"The Khan's soul wishes that you should entertain him with your goodwill."

"I am at your will; speak, command!"

"Listen to me, Fatma! I have no time to waste in words. This is why I am come here: render me a service with your tongue, and you shall have wherewithal to comfort your old teeth. I will make you a present of ten sheep; I will dress you in silk from top to toe."

"Ten sheep and a gown!—a silk gown! O gracious Aga! O kind Khan! I have not seen such a lord here since the accursed Tartars carried me away, and made me marry a hateful ... I am ready to do every thing, Khan, that you wish. Cut my ears off even, if you will!"

"What would be the good of that? They must be kept sharp. This is the business. Ammalat will come to you to-day with the Colonel. The Shamkhal of Tarki will arrive also. This Colonel has attached your young Bek to him by witchcraft; and having taught him to eat swine's flesh, wants to make a Christian of him: from which Mahomet preserve him!"

The old woman spat around her, and lifted her eyes to heaven.

"To save Ammalat, we must make him quarrel with the Colonel. For this purpose you must go to him, throw yourself at his feet, and fall a-weeping as if at a funeral. As to tears, you will have no need to go and borrow them of your neighbours. Swear like a shopkeeper of Derbend; remember that each oath of yours will bring you a dozen sheep; and at last tell him that you have heard a conversation between the Colonel and the Shamkhal: that the Shamkhal complained of his sending back his daughter: that he hates him out of fear that he should take possession of the crown of his Shamkhalat: that he implored the Colonel to allow him to kill him in an ambuscade, or to poison him in his food; but that the other consented only to send him to Siberia, beyond the end of the world. In one word, invent and describe every thing cleverly. You were formerly famous for your tales. Do not eat dirt now. And, above all, insist that the Colonel, who is going on a furlough, will take him with him to Georgieffsk, to separate him from his kinsmen and faithful noukers; and from thence will dispatch him in chains to the devil."

Sultan Akhmet added to this all the particulars necessary to give the story the most probable form; and once or twice instructed the old woman how to introduce them more skilfully.

"Well, recollect every thing accurately, Fatma," said he, putting on his bourka; "forget not, likewise, with whom you have to do."

"Vallah, billah! let me have ashes instead of salt; may a beggar's tchourek close my eyes; may" ...

"Do not feed the Shaitans with your oaths; but serve me with your words. I know that Ammalat trusts you completely; and if, for his good, you will arrange this—he will come over to me, and bring you with him. You shall live, singing, under my wing. But I repeat, if, by chance or on purpose, you betray me, or injure me by your gossiping, I will make of your old flesh a kibab for the Shaitans!"

"Be easy, Khan! They have nothing to do either for me or with me. I will keep the secret like the grave, and I will put my sarotchka[23] on Ammalat."

[23] Give him her feelings—a Tartar phrase.

"Well, be it so, old woman. Here is a golden seal for your lips. Take pains!"

"Bathousta, ghez-ousta!"[24] exclaimed the old woman, seizing the ducat with greediness, and kissing the Khan's hand for his present. The Sultan Akhmet Khan looked contemptuously at the base creature, whilst he quitted the sakla.

[24] Willingly, if you please? Literally, "on my head, on my eyes."

"Reptile!" he grumbled to himself, "for a sheep, for a piece of cloth of gold, thou wouldst be ready to sell thy daughter's body, thy son's soul, and thy foster-son's happiness!"

He did not reflect upon what name he deserved himself, entangling his friend in deceit, and hiring such vile creatures for low slander and for villanous intentions.

Fragment of a Letter from Colonel Verkhoffsky to his Betrothed.

Camp near the Village of Kiafir Koumik, August.

... Ammalat loves, and how he loves! Never, not even in the hottest fire of my youth, did my love rise to such a frenzy. I burned, like a censer lighted by a sunbeam; he flames, like a ship set on fire by lightning on the stormy sea. With you, my Maria, I have read more than once Shakspeare's Othello; and only the frantic Othello can give an idea of the tropical passion of Ammalat. He loves to speak long and often of his Seltanetta, and I love to hear his volcanic eloquence. At times it is a turbid cataract thrown out by a profound abyss—at times a fiery fountain of the naphtha of Bakou. What stars his eyes scatter at that moment—what light plays on his cheeks—how handsome he is! There is nothing ideal in him: but then the earthly is grand, is captivating. I myself, carried away and deeply moved, receive on my breast the youth fainting from rapture: he breathes long, with slow sighs, and then casting down his eyes, lowering his head as if ashamed to look at the light—not only on me—presses my hand, and walks away with an uncertain step; and after that one cannot extract a word from him for the rest of the day.

Since the time of his return from Khounzakh, he is become still more melancholy than before; particularly the last few days. He hides the grandest, the noblest feeling which brings man near to divinity, as carefully as if it were a shameful weakness or a dreadful crime. He imploringly asked me to let him go once more to Khounzakh, to sigh at the feet of his fair one; and I refused him—refused him for his own good. I wrote long ago about my favourite to Alexei Petrovitch, and he desired me to bring him with me to the waters, where he will be himself. He wishes to give him some message to Sultan Akhmet Khan, which will bring undoubted advantage to him and to Ammalat. Oh, how happy I shall be in his happiness! To me, to me, he will owe the bliss of his life—not only empty life. I will force him on his knees before you, and will make him say—"Adore her as a deity!" If my heart were not filled with love to Maria, thou wouldst not take possession of Seltanetta. Yesterday I received an express from the commander-in-chief—a noble-minded man! He gives wings to happy news. All is arranged; my darling, I go to meet you at the waters. I shall only lead the regiment to Derbend—and then to the saddle! I shall know neither fatigue by day nor drowsiness by night, till I repose myself in your embrace. Oh, who will give me wings to fly to you! Who will give me strength to bear my—our—bliss! ... I, in delicious agitation, pressed my bosom, that my heart might not burst forth. For a long time I could not sleep: imagination painted our meeting in a thousand forms, and in the intervals appeared the most trivial but delightful cares, about wedding trifles, dresses, presents. You will be clad in my favourite colour, green. ... Is it not true, my soul? My fancies kept me from sleeping, like a strong perfume of roses; but the sweeter, the more brilliant was my sleep. I saw you by the light of dawn, and every time different, every time more lovely than before. My dreams were twined together like a wreath of flowers; but no! there was no connexion between them. They were wonderful phantoms, falling like colours from the kaleidoscope, and as impossible to retain. Notwithstanding all this, I awoke sorrowful this morning; my awakening took from my childish soul its favourite toy.... I went into Ammalat's tent; he was still asleep. His face was pale and angry—let him be angry with me! I taste beforehand the gratitude of the ardent youth. I, like fate, am preparing his happiness in secret....

To-day I bid adieu to these mountains for long—I hope for ever. I am very glad to quit Asia, the cradle of mankind, in which the understanding has remained till now in its swaddling-clothes. Astonishing is the immobility of Asiatic life, in the course of so many centuries. Against Asia all attempts of improvement and civilization have broken like waves; it seems not to belong to time, but to place. The Indian Brahmin, the Chinese Mandarin, the Persian Bek, the mountain Ouzden, are unchanged—the same as they were two thousand years ago. A sad truth! They represent, in themselves, a monotonous though varied, a lively though soulless nature. The sword and the lash of the conqueror have left on them, as on the water, no trace. Books, and the examples of missionaries, have produced on them no influence. Sometimes, however, they have made an exchange of vices; but never have they learned the thoughts or the virtues of others. I quit the land of fruit to transport myself to the land of labour—that great inventor of every thing useful, that suggester of every thing great, that awakener of the soul of man, which has fallen asleep here, and sleeps in weakness on the bosom of the seducer—nature.

And truly, how seducing is nature here! Having ridden up the high mountain to the left of Kiafir Koumik, I gazed with delight on the gradually lighted summit of the Caucasus. I looked, and could not look enough at them. What a wondrous beauty decks them as with a crown! Another thin veil, woven of light and shadow, lay on the lower hill, but the distant snows basked in the sky; and the sky, like a caressing mother, bending over them its immeasurable bosom, fed them with the milk of the clouds, carefully enfolding them with its swathe of mist, and refreshing them with its gently-breathing wind. Oh, with what a flight would my soul soar there, where a holy cold has stretched itself like a boundary between the earthly and the heavenly! My heart prays and thirsts to breathe the air of the inhabitants of the sky. I feel a wish to wander over the snows, on which man has never printed the seal of his blood-stained footsteps—which have never been darkened by the eagle's shadow—which the thunder has never reached—which the war spirits have never polluted; and on the ever-young summits where time, the continuation of eternity, has left no trace.

Time! A strange thought has come into my head. How many fractional names has the weak sense of man invented for the description of an infinitely small particle of time out of the infinitely large circle of eternity! Years, months, days, hours, minutes! God has nothing of all this: he has not even evening nor morrow. With him all this has united itself into one eternal now!... Shall we ever behold this ocean in which we have hitherto been drowning? But I ask, to what end will all this serve man? Can it be for the satisfaction of an idle curiosity? No! the knowledge of truth, i.e. the All-knowing Goodness, does the soul of the reflecting man thirst after. It wishes to draw a full cup from the fountain of light which falls on it from time to time in a fine dew!

And I shall imbibe it. The secret fear of death melts like snow before the beam of such a hope. I shall draw from it. My real love for my fellow-creatures is a security for it. The leaden ways of error will fall asunder before a few tears of repentance, and I shall lay down my heart as an expiating sacrifice before the judgment-seat which will have no terrors for me!

It is wonderful, my beloved—hardly do I look at the mountains, the sea, the sky, ... but a solemn but inexpressibly sweet feeling o'er-burthens and expands my heart. Thoughts of you mingle with it; and, as in dreams, your form flits before me. Is this a foretaste of earthly bliss, which I have only known by name, or a foreboding of ... etern ...? O dearest, best, angelic soul, one look of yours and I am cured of dreaming! How happy am I that I can now say with assurance—au revoir!



CHAPTER XI.

The poison of calumny burnt into the soul of Ammalat. By the instructions of the Khan, his nurse Fatma related, with every appearance of disinterested affection, the story which had been arranged beforehand, on the same evening that he came with Verkhoffsky to Bouinaki, where they were met by the Shamkhal in obedience to the Colonel's request. The envenomed shaft struck deep; now doubt would have been welcomed by Ammalat, but conviction, it seemed, cast over all his former ties of friendship and blood, a bright but funereal light. In a frenzy of passion, he burned to drown his revenge in the blood of both; but respect for the rites of hospitality quenched his thirst for vengeance. He deferred his intention for a time—but could he forget it? Every moment of delay fell, like a drop of melted copper, on his heart. Memory, conviction, jealousy, love, tore his heart by turns; and this state of feeling was to him so new, so strange, so dreadful, that he fell into a species of delirium, the more dreadful that he was obliged to conceal his internal sensations from his former friend. Thus passed twenty-four hours; the detachment pitched their tents near the village Bougden, the gate of which, built in a ravine, and which is closed at the will of the inhabitants of Bougden, serves as a passage to Akoush. The following was written by Ammalat, to divert the agony of his soul while preparing itself for the commission of a black crime.... ——

MIDNIGHT.

... Why, O Sultan Akhmet! have you cast lightning into my breast? A brother's friendship, a brother's treachery, and a brother's murder!... What dreadful extremes! And between them there is but a step, but a twinkling of the eye. I cannot sleep, I can think of nothing else. I am chained to this thought, like a criminal to his stake. A bloody sea swells, surges, and roars around me, and above gleams, instead of stars, the lightning-flash. My soul is like a naked peak, where only birds of prey and evil spirits assemble, to share their plunder, or to prepare misfortune. Verkhoffsky, Verkhoffsky! what have I done to you? Why would you tear from heaven the star of my liberty? Is it because I loved you so tenderly? And why do you approach me stealthily and thief-like? why do you slander—why do you betray me, by hypocrisy? You should say plainly, "I wish your life," and I would give it freely, without a murmur; would have laid it down a sacrifice like the son of Ibrahim, (Abraham!) I would have forgiven you, if you had but attempted my life, but to sell my freedom, to steal my Seltanetta from me, by burying me alive! Villain—and you still live!

But sometimes like a dove, whose wings have been scorched in the smoke of a fire, appears thy form to me, Seltanetta. How is it, then, that I am no longer gay when I dream of you, as of old?...

They would part us, my love—they would give you to another, to marry me on the grave-stone. But I will go to you—I will go to you over a bloody carpet—I will fulfil a bloody promise, in order to possess you. Invite not only your maiden friends to your marriage feast—invite also the vultures and the ravens, they shall all be regaled abundantly. I will pay a rich dower. On the pillow of my bride I will lay a heart which once I reckoned more precious than the throne-cushion[25] of the Persian Padishah. Wonderful destiny!... Innocent girl!... You will be the cause of an unheard of deed. Kindest of beings, for you friends will tear each other like ferocious beasts—for you and through you—and is it really for you alone—with ferocity—with ferocity only! Verkhoffsky said, that to kill an enemy by stealth, is base and cowardly. But if I cannot do it otherwise? But can he be believed?... Hypocrite! He wished to entangle me beforehand; not my hands alone, but even my conscience. It was in vain.

[25] This cushion is embroidered with jewels, and is invaluable.

... I have loaded my rifle. What a fine round barrel—what admirable ornaments! The rifle I received from my father—my father got it from my grandfather. I have heard of many celebrated shots made with it—and not one, not one was fired by stealth.... Always in battle—always before the whole army, it sent death; but wrong, but treachery, but you, Seltanetta!... My hand will not tremble to level a shot at him, whose name it is afraid even to write. One loading, one fire, and all is over!...

One loading! How light, but how heavy will be each grain of powder in the scales of Allah! How far—how immeasurably will this load bear a man's soul? Accursed thou, the inventor of the grey dust, which delivers a hero into the hand of the vilest craven, which kills from afar the foe, who, with a glance, could have disarmed the hand raised against him! So, this shot will tear asunder all my former ties, but it will clear a road to new ones. In the cool Caucasus—on the bosom of Seltanetta, will my faded heart be refreshed. Like a swallow will I build myself a nest in a stranger land—like a swallow, the spring shall be my country. I will cast from me old sorrows, as the bird sheds its feathers.... But the reproaches of conscience, can they fade?... The meanest Lezghin, when he sees in battle the man with whom he has shared bread and salt, turns aside his horse, and fires his gun in the air. It is true he deceives me; but have I been the less happy? Oh, if with these tears I could weep away my grief—drown with them the thirst for vengeance—buy with them Seltenetta! Why comes on the dawn of day so slowly? Let it come! I will look, without blushing, at the sun—without turning pale, into the eyes of Verkhoffsky. My heart is like iron—it is locked against mercy; treachery calls for treachery ... I am resolved ... Quick, quick!

* * * * *

Thus incoherently, thus wildly wrote Ammalat, in order to cheat time and to divert his soul. Thus he tried to cheat himself, rousing himself to revenge, whilst the real cause of his bloody intentions, viz. the desire of possessing Seltanetta, broke through every word.

In order to embolden himself for his crime, he drank deeply of wine, and maddened, threw himself, with his gun, into the Colonel's tent; but perceiving sentinels at the door, he changed his intention. The natural feeling of self-preservation did not abandon him, even in his madness. Ammalat put off till the morning the consummation of the murder; but he could neither sleep nor distract his thoughts ... and re-entering his tent, he seized Saphir Ali by the throat, who was lying fast asleep, and shaking him roughly: "Get up, sleepy rascal!"; he cried to him, "it is already dawn."

Saphir Ali raised his head in a discontented mood, and yawning, answered: "I see only the dawn of wine on your cheek—good-night, Ammalat!"

"Up, I tell you! The dead must quit their graves to meet the new-comer whom I have promised to send to keep them company!"

"Why, brother, am I dead?... Even the forty Imaums[26] may get up from the burial-ground of Derbend—but I will sleep."

[26] The Mussulmans believe, that in the northern burial-ground of Derbend, are buried the forty first true believers, who were martyred by the idolaters.

"But you love to drink, Giaour, and you must drink with me."

"That is quite another affair. Pour fuller, Allah verdi![27] I am always ready to drink and to make love."

[27] God gave—Much good may it do you.

"And to kill an enemy!... Come, some more! A health to the devil!—who changes friends into mortal enemies."

"So be it! Here goes, then, to the devil's health! The poor fellow wants health. We will drive him into a consumption out of spite, because he cannot make us quarrel!"

"True, true, he is always ready for mischief. If he had seen Verkhoffsky and me, he would have thrown down his cards. But you, too, will not, I hope, part from me?"

"Ammalat, I have not only quaffed wine from the same bottle with thee, but I have drained milk from the same breast. I am thine, even if you take it into your head to build yourself, like a vulture, a nest on the rock of Khounzakh.... However, my advice would be"——

"No advice, Saphir Ali—no remonstrances.... It is now too late!"

"They would be drowned like flies in wine. But it is now time to sleep."

"Sleep, say you! Sleep, to me! No, I have bidden farewell to sleep. It is time for me to awaken. Have you examined the gun, Saphir Ali—is the flint good? Has not the powder on the shelf become damp with blood?"

"What is the matter with you, Ammalat? What leaden secret weighs upon your heart? Your face is terrible—your speech is yet more frightful."

"And my deeds shall be yet more dreadful. Is it not true, Saphir Ali, my Seltanetta—is she not beautiful? Observe! my Seltanetta. Is it possible that these are the wedding songs, Saphir Ali? Yes, yes, yes! I understand. 'Tis the jackals demanding their prey. Spirits and wild beasts, be patient awhile—I will content you! Ho, wine—more wine! more blood!... I tell you!"

Ammalat fell on his bed in a drunken insensibility. Foam oozed out of his mouth: convulsive movements shook his whole body. He uttered unintelligible words, mingled with groans. Saphir Ali carefully undressed him, laid him in the bed, enveloped him in the coverings, and sat up the rest of the night watching over his foster-brother, in vain seeking in his head the explanation of the, to him, enigmatical speech and conduct of Ammalat.



CHAPTER XII.

In the morning, before the departure of the detachment, the captain on duty came to Colonel Verkhoffsky to present his report, and to receive the orders for the day. After the customary exchange of words, he said, with an alarmed countenance: "Colonel, I have to communicate a most important thing: our yesterday's signal-man, a soldier of my company, Hamitoff, heard the conversation of Ammalat Bek with his nurse in Bouinaki. He is a Tartar of Kazan, and understands pretty well the dialect of this country. As far as he could hear and understand, the nurse assured the Bek that you, with the Shamkhal, are preparing to send him off to the galleys. Ammalat flew into a passion; said, that he knew all this from the Khan, and swore to kill you with his own hand. Not trusting his ears, however, the soldier determined to tell you nothing, but to watch all his steps. Yesterday evening, he says, Ammalat spoke with a horseman arrived from afar. On taking leave, he said: 'Tell the Khan, that to-morrow, by sunrise, all will be over. Let him be ready: I shall soon see him.'"

"And is this all, Captain?" demanded Verkhoffsky.

"I have nothing else to say; but I am much alarmed. I have passed my life among the Tartars, Colonel, and I am convinced that it is madness to trust the best of them. A born brother is not safe, while resting in the arms of a brother."

"This is envy, Captain. Cain has left it as an eternal heirloom to all men, and particularly to the neighbours of Ararat. Besides, there is no difference between Ammalat and myself. I have done nothing for him but good. I intend nothing but kindness. Be easy, Captain: I believe the zeal of the signal-man, but I distrust his knowledge of the Tartar language. Some similarity of words has led him into error, and when once suspicion was awakened in his mind, every thing seemed an additional proof. Really, I am not so important a person that Khans and Beks should lay plots for my life. I know Ammalat well. He is passionate, but he has a good heart, and could not conceal a bad intention two hours together."

"Take care you be not mistaken, Colonel. Ammalat is, after all, an Asiatic; and that name is always a proof. Here words hide thoughts—the face, the soul. Look at one of them—he seems innocence itself; have any thing to do with him, he is an abyss of meanness, treachery and ferocity."

"You have a full right to think so, my dear Captain, from experience: Sultan Akhmet Khan gave you a memorable proof in Ammalat's house, at Bouinaki. But for me, I have no reason to suspect any mischief in Ammalat; and besides, what would he gain by murdering me? On me depends all his hope, all his happiness. He is wild, perhaps, but not a madman. Besides, you see the sun is high; and I am alive and well. I am grateful, Captain, for the interest you have taken in me; but I entreat you, do not suspect Ammalat: and, knowing how much I prize an old friendship, be assured that I shall as highly value a new one. Order them to beat the march."

The captain departed, gloomily shaking his head. The drums rattled, and the detachment, in marching order, moved on from its night-quarters. The morning was fresh and bright; the road lay through the green ramparts of the mountains of the Caucasus, crowned here and there with forests and underwood. The detachment, like a stream of steel, flowed now down the hills, and now crept up the declivities. The mist still rested on the valleys, and Verkhoffsky, riding to the elevated points, looked round frequently to feast his eyes with the ever-changing landscape. Descending the mountain, the detachment seemed to be swallowed up in the steaming river, like the army of Pharaoh, and anon, with a dull sound, the bayonets glittered again from the misty waves. Then appeared heads, shoulders; the men seemed to grow up, and then leaping up the rocks, were lost anew in the fog.

Ammalat, pale and stern, rode next to the sharpshooters. It appeared that he wished to deafen his conscience in the noise of the drums. The colonel called him to his side, and said kindly: "You must be scolded, Ammalat; you have begun to follow too closely the precepts of Hafiz: recollect that wine is a good servant but a bad master: but a headache and the bile expressed in your face, will surely do you more good than a lecture. You have passed a stormy night, Ammalat."

"A stormy, a torturing night, Colonel! God grant that such a night be the last! I dreamed dreadful things."

"Aha, my friend! You see what it is to transgress Mahomet's commandments. The conscience of the true believer torments you like a shadow."

"It is well for him whose conscience quarrels only with wine."

"That depends on what sort of conscience it is. And fortunately it is as much subject to prejudice as reason itself. Every country, every nation, has its own conscience; and the voice of immortal, unchangeable truth is silent before a would-be truth. Thus it is, thus it ever was. What yesterday we counted a mortal sin, to-morrow we adore. What on this bank is just and meritorious, on the other side of a brook leads to the halter."

"I think, however, that treachery was never, and in no place, considered a virtue."

"I will not say even that. We live at a time when success alone determines whether the means employed were good or bad; where the most conscientious persons have invented for themselves a very convenient rule—that the end sanctifies the means."

Ammalat, lost in his reflections, repeated these words, because he approved of them. The poison of selfishness began anew to work within him; and the words of Verkhoffsky, which he looked on as treacherous, poured like oil on flame. "Hypocrite!" said he to himself; "your hour is at hand!"

And meanwhile Verkhoffsky, like a victim suspecting nothing, rode side by side with his executioner. At about eight versts from Kiekent the Caspian Sea discovered itself to them from a hill; and the thoughts of Verkhoffsky soared above it like a swan. "Mirror of eternity!" said he, sinking into a reverie, "why does not your aspect gladden me to-day? As of old, the sun plays on you; and your bosom breathes, as sublimely as of old, eternal life; but that life is not of this world. You seem to me to-day a mournful waste; not a boat, not a sail, not a sign of man's existence. All is desolate!

"Yes, Ammalat," he added; "I am tired of your ever-angry, lonely sea—of your country peopled with diseases, and with men who are worse than all maladies in the world. I am weary of the war itself, of invisible enemies, of the service shared with unfriendly comrades. It is not enough that they impeded me in my proceedings—they spoiled what I ordered to be done—they found fault with what I intended, and misrepresented what I had effected. I have served my sovereign with truth and fidelity, my country and this region with disinterestedness; I have renounced, a voluntary exile, all the conveniences of life, all the charms of society; have condemned my intellect to torpidity, being deprived of books; have buried my heart in solitude; have abandoned my beloved; and what is my reward? When will that moment arrive, when I throw myself into the arms of my bride; when I, wearied with service, shall repose myself under my native cottage-roof, on the green shore of the Dnieper; when a peaceful villager, and a tender father, surrounded by my relations and my good peasants, I shall fear only the hail of heaven for my harvests; fight only with wild-beasts? My heart yearns for that hour. My leave of absence is in my pocket, my dismission is promised me.... Oh, that I could fly to my bride!... And in five days I shall for certain be in Georgieffsk. Yet it seems as if the sands of Libya, a sea of ice——as if the eternity of the grave itself, separated us!"

Verkhoffsky was silent. Tears ran down his cheeks; his horse, feeling the slackened rein, quickened his pace—and thus the pair alone, advanced to some distance from the detachment.... It seemed as if destiny itself surrendered the colonel into the hands of the assassin.

But pity penetrated the heart of Ammalat, maddened as he was, and burning with wine—like a sunbeam falling in a robber's cave. He beheld the sorrow, the tears of the man whom he had so long considered as his friend, and hesitated. "No!" he thought, "to such a degree as that it is impossible to dissimulate...."

At this moment Verkhoffsky started from his reverie, lifted up his head, and spoke to Ammalat. "Prepare yourself: you are to go with me!"

Unlucky words! Every thing good, every thing noble, which had arisen anew in Ammalat's breast, was crushed in a moment by them. The thought of treachery—of exile—rushed like a torrent through his whole being "With you!" he replied, with a malicious smile—"with you, and into Russia?—undoubtedly: if you go yourself!" and in a passion of rage he urged his horse into a gallop, in order to have time to prepare his arms; suddenly turned back to meet him; flew by him, and began to ride rapidly in a circle around him. At each stride of his horse, the flame of rage burned more fiercely within him: it seemed as if the wind, as it whistled past him, kept whispering "Kill, kill! he is your enemy. Remember Seltanetta!" He brought his rifle forward from his shoulder, cocked it, and encouraging himself with a cry, he galloped with blood-thirsty decision to his doomed victim. Verkhoffsky, meanwhile, not cherishing the least suspicion, looked quietly at Ammalat as he galloped round, thinking that he was preparing, after the Asiatic manner, for the djigitering (equestrian exercises.)

"Fire at your mark, Ammalat Bek!" he exclaimed to the murderer who was rushing towards him.

"What mark can be better than the breast of a foe?" answered Ammalat Bek, riding up, and at ten paces' distance pulling the trigger!... the gun went off: and slowly, without a groan, the colonel sank out of his saddle. His affrighted horse, with expanded nostrils and streaming mane, smelt at his rider, in whose hands the reins that had so lately guided him began to stiffen: and the steed of Ammalat stopped abruptly before the corpse, setting his legs straight before him. Ammalat leaped from his horse, and, resting his arms on his yet smoking gun, looked for several moments steadfastly in the face of the murdered man; as if endeavouring to prove to himself that he feared not that fixed gaze, those fast-dimming eyes—that fast-freezing blood. It would be difficult to understand—'twere impossible to express the thoughts which rolled like a whirlwind through his breast. Saphir Ali rode up at full gallop; and fell on his knees by the colonel—he laid his ear to the dying man's mouth—he breathed not—he felt his heart—it beat not! "He is dead!" cried Saphir Ali in a tone of despair. "Dead! quite dead!"

"So much the better ... My happiness is complete!..." exclaimed Ammalat, as if awakening from a dream.

"Happiness for you—for you, fratricide! If you meet happiness, the world will take to Shaitan instead of Allah."

"Saphir Ali, remember that you are not my judge!" said Ammalat fiercely, as he put his foot into the stirrup: "follow me!"

"May remorse alone accompany you, like your shadow! From this hour I am not your companion."

Pierced to the very bottom of his heart by this reproach from a man to whom he had been from infancy bound by the closest ties, Ammalat uttered not a word, but pointing to his astounded noukers in the ravine, and perceiving the pursuit begun, dashed into the mountains like an arrow.

The alarm soon spread through the advanced guard of the detachment: the officers, who were in front, and the Don Kazaks, flew to the shot, but they came too late. They could neither prevent the crime nor seize the flying assassin. In five minutes the bloody corpse of the treacherously murdered colonel was surrounded by a crowd of officers and soldiers. Doubt, pity, indignation were written on all their faces. The grenadiers, leaning on their bayonets, shed tears, and sobbed aloud: unflattering drops poured above the brave and much-loved chief.



CHAPTER XIII.

For three days and nights did Ammalat wander about the mountains of Daghestan. As a Mussulman, even in the villages subject to the Russian dominion, he was safe from all pursuit among people for whom robbery and murder are virtues. But could he escape from the consciousness of his own crime? Neither his heart nor his reason could find an excuse for his bloody deed; and the image of Verkhoffsky falling from his horse, presented itself unceasingly before his eyes, though closed. This recollection infuriated him yet more, yet more tortured him. The Asiatic, once turned aside from the right road, travels rapidly over the career of villany. The Khan's command, not to appear before him but with the head of Verkhoffsky, rang in his ears. Without daring to communicate such an intention to his noukers, and still less relying on their bravery, he resolved upon travelling to Derbend alone. A darksome and gloomy night had already expanded it ebon wings over the mountains of Caucasus which skirt the sea, when Ammalat passed the ravine which lay behind the fortress of Narin-Kali, which served as a citadel to Derbend. He mounted to the ruined turret, which once formed the limit to the Caucasian war that had extended through the mountains, and tied his horse at the foot of that hill from which Yermoloff had thundered on Derbend when but a lieutenant of artillery. Knowing where the Russian officers were buried, he came out upon the upper burial-ground. But how to find the new-made grave of Verkhoffsky in the darkness of the night? Not a star glimmered in the sky: the clouds lay stretched on the hills, the mountain-wind, like a night-bird, lashed the forest with its wing: an involuntary shudder crept over Ammalat, in the midst of the region of the dead, whose repose he dared to interrupt. He listens: the sea murmurs hoarsely against the rocks, tumbling back from them into the deep with a sullen sound. The prolonged "sloushai" of the sentinels floated round the walls of the town, and when it was silent there rose the yell of the jackals; and at last all again was still—every sound mingling and losing itself in the rushing of the wind. How often had he not sat awake on such nights with Verkhoffsky—and where is he now! And who plunged him into the grave! And the murderer was now come to behead the corpse of his former friend—to do sacrilege to his remains—like a grave-robber to plunder the tomb—to dispute with the jackal his prey!

"Human feeling!" cried Ammalat, as he wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, "why visitest thou a heart which has torn itself from humanity? Away, away! Is it for me to fear to take off the head of a dead man, whom I have robbed of life! For him 'twill be no loss—to me a treasure. Dust is insensible!"

Ammalat struck a light with a trembling hand, blew up into a flame some dry bourian, (a dry grass of South Russia,) and went with it to search for the new-made grave. The loosened earth, and a large cross, pointed out the last habitation of the colonel. He tore up the cross, and began to dig up the mound with it; he broke through the arch of brickwork, which had not yet become hardened, and finally tore the lead from the coffin. The bourian, flaring up, threw an uncertain bloody-bluish tinge on all around. Leaning over the dead, the murderer, paler than the corpse itself, gazed unmovingly on his work; he forgot why he had come—he turned away his head from the reek of rottenness—his gorge rose within him when he saw the bloody-headed worms that crawled from under the clothes. Interrupted in their loathsome work, they, scared by the light, crept into a mass, and hid themselves beneath each other. At length, steeling himself to the deed, he brandished his dagger, and each time his erring hand missed its aim. Nor revenge, nor ambition, nor love—in a word, not one of those passions which had urged him to the frenzied crime, now encouraged him to the nameless horror. Turning away his head, in a sort of insensibility he began to hew at the neck of Verkhoffsky—at the fifth blow the head parted from the trunk. Shuddering with disgust, he threw it into a bag which he had prepared, and hastened from the grave. Hitherto he had remained master of himself; but when, with his dreadful treasure, he was scrambling up, when the stones crumbling noisily under his feet, and he, covered with sand, fell backwards on Verkhoffsky's corpse, then presence of mind left the sacrilegious. It seemed as if a flame had seized him, and spirits of hell, dancing and grinning, had surrounded him. With a heavy groan he tore himself away, crawled half senseless out of the suffocating grave, and hurried off, dreading to look back. Leaping on his horse, he urged it on, over rocks and ravines, and each bush that caught his dress seemed to him the hand of a corpse; the cracking of every branch, the shriek of every jackal, sounded like the cry of his twice-murdered friend.