sabre cuts, disabling him, and had succeeded in pinioning him, and now what he wanted was a vehicle to convey them to town. The story Schell told with great gravity to two peasants at the door of their house, when the elder of them, a man advanced in years, called the lieutenant by name, informing him that they were well known for deserters, as an officer, the evening previous, had been at the house of a farmer near by, and had given their names and a description of the clothes they wore, narrating, at the same time, all the circumstances of their flight.

But the old peasant, who had known Schell from having seen him often at the village when he was there in garrison, and who besides had a son in the lieutenant's company, had no thought of informing upon them, and though he begged hard for his horses, he yet permitted the runaways to take two from the stable.

And now behold them mounted upon frantic steeds, bareback, without their hats, which they had lost in leaving the castle, and flying across the country at full speed. Their garments, their bare heads, their whole appearance told what they were; but it was Christmas Day, and the inhabitants were all at church as they galloped along through the villages, and thus they escaped observation.

On the very confines of Bohemia they ran a narrow risk of capture by a corps of hussars stationed upon the frontier; but a friendly brother officer, recognizing Schell, warned him of their danger, and they turned off upon another road. It was not long before they passed the boundary, and Trenck was at last free. His courage and resolution had at last been rewarded.

But the baron was far from being a happy

man.

Pursued by the vengeance of Frederick, and sorely beset by Prussian spies, who tried to kidnap him, he wandered miserably about for many months, and subsequently took service in the Austrian army. Finally, after many wonderful adventures, he was basely given up by the governor and authorities of the town of Danzig to the Prussian king. This sad mischance completely demoralized Trenck. Though many opportunities were afforded him to get away from the escort that convoyed him to Prussia, he had not the spirit to do so. Again he was consigned to prison. This time they took him to Magdeburg and locked him up in the citadel.

His subsequent life in the fortress of Magdeburg was but a repetition of his previous unremitting efforts at escape; but he never

again left the prison until he was released by order of the king. He lived many years after his liberation, and was guillotined at Paris in the Revolution, at the same time with André Chenier.

J. R. THOMPSON.

THE PRISONER OF CHILLON.

[Lord Byron wrote this poem at a small inn in the village of Ouchy, near Lausanne, where the weather detained him for a couple of days. François de Bonnivard, the subject of the poem, was born in 1496. He studied at Turin, and in 1510 his uncle resigned to him the priory of St. Victor, on the outskirts of Geneva. He became the defender of the independence of Geneva against the Duc de Savoye and the bishop. The duke descended upon the town with five hundred men; Bonnivard fled, but was betrayed and imprisoned at Grolée for two years.

His zeal was undaunted; he continued the struggle for liberty, and again in 1530 he was thrown into the prison of Chillon, where he remained for six years. He was then released by the victorious Bernois; the republic of Geneva heaped honours upon him as the defender of their liberties, and he died in 1570. During the latter and happier days of his life he established various important institutions; the college and library of Geneva are monuments to his memory; but Lord Byron's poem is the noblest monument that could be raised to a hero.2]

My hair is gray, but not with years, Nor grew it white

In a single night,

As men's have grown from sudden fears:
My limbs are bow'd, though not with toil.
But rusted with a vile repose,
For they have been a dungeon's spoil,

And mine has been the fate of those
To whom the goodly earth and air
Are bann'd, and barr'd-forbidden fare;

1 The information contained in these sketches is for

the most part obtained from a French work on the subject by M. F. Bernard.

2 The Chateau de Chillon is situated between Clarens and Villeneuve, which last is at one extremity of the

Lake of Geneva. On its left are the entrances of the Rhone, and opposite are the heights of Meillerie and the range of Alps above Boveret and St. Gingo. Near it, on a hill behind, is a torrent; below it, washing its

walls, the lake has been fathomed to the depth of 800 feet (French measure); within it are a range of dungeons, in which the early Reformers, and subsequently prisoners of state, were confined. Across one of the vaults is a beam black with age, on which, it is said, the condemned were formerly executed. In the cells are seven pillars, or rather eight, one being half merged in the wall; in some of these are rings for the fetters

and the fettered; in the pavement the steps of Bonnivard have left their traces-he was confined here several

years.

But this was for my father's faith
I suffer'd chains and courted death;
That father perish'd at the stake
For tenets he would not forsake;
And for the same his lineal race
In darkness found a dwelling-place;
We were seven-who now are one,
Six in youth, and one in age,
Finish'd as they had begun,

Proud of Persecution's rage;
One in fire, and two in field,

Their belief with blood have seal'd;
Dying as their father died,
For the God their foes denied;
Three were in a dungeon cast,

Of whom this wreck is left the last.

There are seven pillars of Gothic mould,
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old,
There are seven columns, massy and gray,
Dim with a dull imprison'd ray,
A sunbeam which hath lost its way,
And through the crevice and the cleft
Of the thick wall is fallen and left;
Creeping o'er the floor so damp,
Like a marsh's meteor lamp:
And in each pillar there is a ring,

And in each ring there is a chain;
That iron is a cankering thing,

For in these limbs its teeth remain, With marks that will not wear away, Till I have done with this new day, Which now is painful to these eyes, Which have not seen the sun so rise For years-I cannot count them o'er, I lost their long and heavy score When my last brother droop'd and died, And I lay living by his side.

They chain'd us each to a column stone,
And we were three-yet, each alone:
We could not move a single pace,
We could not see each other's face,
But with that pale and livid light
That made us strangers in our sight:
And thus together--yet apart,
Fetter'd in hand, but joined in heart,
Twas still some solace, in the dearth
Of the pure elements of earth,
To hearken to each other's speech,
And each turn comforter to each
With some new hope, or legend old,
Or song heroically bold;

But even these at length grew cold.
Our voices took a dreary tone,
An echo of the dungeon-stone,

A grating sound-not full and free
As they of yore were wont to be:
It might be fancy-but to me
They never sounded like our own,

I was the eldest of the three,

And to uphold and cheer the rest I ought to do-and did my bestAnd each did well in his degree.

The youngest, whom my father loved,
Because our mother's brow was given
To him-with eyes as blue as heaven,

For him my soul was sorely moved:
And truly might it be distress'd
To see such bird in such a nest;
For he was beautiful as day-

(When day was beautiful to me
As to young eagles, being free) —
A polar day, which will not see
A sunset till its summer's gone,

Its sleepless summer of long light, The snow-clad offspring of the sun!

And thus he was as pure and bright, And in his natural spirit gay, With tears for nought but others' ills, And then they flow'd like mountain rills, Unless he could assuage the woe Which he abhorr'd to view below.

The other was as pure of mind,

But form'd to combat with his kind; Strong in his frame, and of a mood Which 'gainst the world in war had stood, And perish'd in the foremost rank

With joy-but not in chains to pine:
His spirit wither'd with their clank,
I saw it silently decline-

And so perchance in sooth did mine:
But yet I forced it on to cheer
Those relics of a home so dear.
He was a hunter of the hills,

Had follow'd there the deer and wolf:
To him this dungeon was a gulf,
And fetter'd feet the worst of ills.

Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls: A thousand feet in depth below Its massy waters meet and flow; Thus much the fathom-line was sent From Chillon's snow-white battlement, Which round about the wave enthralls: A double dungeon wall and wave Have made and like a living grave Below the surface of the lake The dark vault lies wherein we lay, We heard it ripple night and day;

Sounding o'er our heads it knock';
And I have felt the winter's spray
Wash through the bars when winds were high
And wanton in the happy sky;

And then the very rock hath rock'd,
And I have felt it shake, unshock'd,
Because I could have smil'd to see
The death that would have set me free.

I said my nearer brother pined,
I said his mighty heart declined,
He loathed and put away his food;
It was not that 'twas coarse and rude,
For we were used to hunter's fare,
And for the like had little care:

The milk drawn from the mountain goat
Was changed for water from the moat,
Our bread was such as captive's tears
Have moisten'd many a thousand years,
Since man first pent his fellow-men
Like brutes within an iron den:
But what were these to us or him?
These wasted not his heart or limb;
My brother's soul was of that mould
Which in a palace had grown cold,
Had his free breathing been denied
The range of the steep mountain's side;
But why delay the truth?-he died.
I saw, and could not hold his head,
Nor reach his dying hand-nor dead-
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain,
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain.
He died-and they unlock'd his chain,
And scoop'd for him a shallow grave
Even from the cold earth of our cave.
I begg'd them, as a boon, to lay
His corse in dust whereon the day
Might shine-it was a foolish thought,
But then within my brain it wrought,
That even in death his freeborn breast
In such a dungeon could not rest.

I might have spared my idle prayer—
They coldly laugh'd-and laid him there:
The flat and turfless earth above
The being we so much did love;
His empty chain above it leant,
Such murder's fitting monument!

But he, the favourite and the flower,
Most cherish'd since his natal hour,
His mother's image in fair face,
The infant love of all his race,
His martyr'd father's dearest thought,
My latest care, for whom I sought
To hoard my life, that his might be
Less wretched now, and one day free;
He, too, who yet had held untired
A spirit natural or inspired-
He, too, was struck, and day by day
Was wither'd on the stalk away.
Oh God! it is a fearful thing
To see the human soul take wing
In

any shape, in any mood:

I've seen it rushing forth in blood,
I've seen it on the breaking ocean
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion,
I've seen the sick and ghastly bed
Of sin delirious with its dread:
But these were horrors-this was woe
Unmix'd with such-but sure and slow:

He faded, and so calm and meek,
So softly worn, so sweetly weak,
So tearless, yet so tender-kind,
And grieved for those he left behind;
With all the while a cheek whose bloom
Was as a mockery of the tomb,
Whose tints as gently sunk away
As a departing rainbow's ray-
An eye of most transparent light,
That almost made the dungeon bright,
And not a word of murmur-not
A groan o'er his untimely lot,-
A little talk of better days,
A little hope my own to raise,
For I was sunk in silence-lost
In this last loss, of all the most;
And then the sighs he would suppress
Of fainting nature's feebleness,
More slowly drawn, grew less and less:
I listen'd, but I could not hear-
I call'd, for I was wild with fear;
I knew 'twas hopeless, but my dread
Would not be thus admonished;
I call'd, and thought I heard a sound-
I burst my chain with one strong bound,
And rush'd to him :-I found him not,
I only stirr'd in this black spot,
I only lived-I only drew
The accursed breath of dungeon-dew;
The last the sole-the dearest link
Between me and the eternal brink,
Which bound me to my failing race,
Was broken in this fatal place.
One on the earth, and one beneath-
My brothers--both had ceased to breathe:
I took that hand which lay so still,
Alas! my own was full as chill;

I had not strength to stir, or strive,
But felt that I was still alive-
A frantic feeling, when we know
That what we love shall ne'er be so.
I know not why

I could not die,

I had no earthly hope but faith, And that forbade a selfish death.

What next befell me then and there
I know not well-I never knew
First came the loss of light, and air,
And then of darkness too:

I had no thought, no feeling-none--
Among the stones I stood a stone,
And was, scarce conscious what I wist,
As shrubless crags within the mist;
For all was blank, and bleak, and gray;
It was not night -it was not day;
It was not even the dungeon-light,
So hateful to my heavy sight,
But vacancy absorbing space,
And fixedness-without a place :

There were no stars--no earth-no time-
No check-no change - no good-no crime-
But silence, and a stirless breath
Which neither was of life nor death;
A sea of stagnant idleness,

Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless!

A light broke in upon my brain,——
It was the carol of a bird;
It ceased, and then it came again,

The sweetest song ear ever heard,
And mine was thankful till my eyes
Ran over with the glad surprise,
And they that moment could not see
I was the mate of misery;

But then by dull degrees came back
My senses to their wonted track;
I saw the dungeon walls and floor
Close slowly round me as before,
I saw the glimmer of the sun
Creeping as it before had done,
But through the crevice where it came
That bird was perch'd, as fond and tame,
And tamer than upon the tree;
A lovely bird, with azure wings,
And song that said a thousand things,
And seem'd to say them all for me!

I never saw its like before,

I ne'er shall see its likeness more:
It seem'd like me to want a mate,
But was not half so desolate,
And it was come to love me when
None lived to love me so again,
And cheering from my dungeon's brink,
Had brought me back to feel and think.
I know not if it late were free,

Or broke its cage to perch on mine,
But knowing well captivity,

Sweet bird! I could not wish for thine!
Or if it were, in winged guise,
A visitant from Paradise;
For-Heaven forgive that thought! the while
Which made me both to weep and smile;
I sometimes deem'd that it might be
My brother's soul come down to me;
But then at last away it flew,
And then 'twas mortal well I knew,
For he would never thus have flown,
And left me twice so doubly lone,-
Lone-as the corse within its shroud,
Lone-as a solitary cloud,

A single cloud on a sunny day,
While all the rest of heaven is clear,
A frown upon the atmosphere,
That hath no business to appear
When skies are blue, and earth is gay.

A kind of change came in my fate, My keepers grew compassionate;

I know not what had made them so,
They were inured to sights of woe,
But so it was:-my broken chain
With links unfasten'd did remain,
And it was liberty to stride
Along my cell from side to side,
And up and down, and then athwart,
And tread it over every part;
And round the pillars one by one,
Returning where my walk begun,
Avoiding only, as I trod,

My brothers' graves without a sod;
For if I thought with heedless tread
My step profaned their lowly bed,
My breath came gaspingly and thick,
And my crush'd heart fell blind and sick.

I made a footing in the wall,

It was not therefrom to escape,

For I had buried one and all

Who loved me in a human shape;

And the whole earth would henceforth be

A wider prison unto me:

No child-no sire-no kin had I,
No partner in my misery;

I thought of this, and I was glad,
For thought of them had made me mad;
But I was curious to ascend

To my barr'd windows, and to bend
Once more, upon the mountains high,
The quiet of a loving eye.

I saw them-and they were the same,
They were not changed like me in frame;
I saw their thousand years of snow
On high-their wide long lake below,
And the blue Rhone in fullest flow;
I heard the torrents leap and gush
O'er channell'd rock and broken bush;
I saw the white-wall'd distant town,
And whiter sails go skimming down;
And then there was a little isle,
Which in my very face did smile,
The only one in view;

A small green isle, it seem'd no more,
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor,
But in it there were three tall trees,
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze,
And by it there were waters flowing,
And on it there were young flowers growing,
Of gentle breath and hue.

The fish swam by the castle wall,
And they seem'd joyous each and all;
The eagle rode the rising blast,
Methought he never flew so fast
As then to me he seem'd to fly,
And then new tears came in my eye,
And I felt troubled-and would fain
I had not left my recent chain;
And when I did descend again,

It might be months, or years, or days,
I kept no count-I took no note,
I had no hope my eyes to raise,

And clear them of their dreary mote; At last men came to set me free,

I ask'd not why, and reck'd not where, It was at length the same to me, Fetter'd or fetterless to be,

I learn'd to love despair.

And thus when they appear'd at last,
And all my bonds aside were cast,
These heavy walls to me had grown
A hermitage-and all my own!
And half I felt as they were come
To tear me from a second home:
With spiders I had friendship made,
And watch'd them in their sullen trade,
Had seen the mice by moonlight play,
And why should I feel less than they?
We were all inmates of one place,
And I, the monarch of each race,
Had power to kill-yet, strange to tell!
In quiet we had learn'd to dwell-
My very chains and I grew friends,
So much a long communion tends
To make us what we are:-even I
Regain'd my freedom with a sigh.

THE BAG OF GOLD.

There lived in the fourteenth century, near Bologna, a widow lady of the Lambertini family called Madonna Lucrezia, who in a revolution of the state had known the bitterness of poverty, and had even begged her bread, kneeling day after day like a statue at the gate of the cathedral, her rosary in her left hand, and her right held out for charity, her long black veil concealing a face that had once adorned a court, and had received the homage of as many sonnets as Petrarch has written on Laura.

But fortune had at last relented. A legacy from a distant relation had come to her relief; and she was now the mistress of a small inn at the foot of the Apennines, where she entertained as well as she could, and where those only stopped who were contented with a little. The house was still standing when in my youth I passed that way, though the sign of the White Cross, the Cross of the Hospitallers, was no longer to be seen over the door-a sign which she had taken up, if we may believe the tradition there, in honour of a maternal uncle, a grand-master of that order, whose achievements in Palestine she would sometimes relate. A mountain stream ran through the garden; and at no great distance, where the road turned on its way to Bologna, stood a little chapel, in which a lamp was always burning before a picture of the Virgin—a picture of great antiquity, the work of some Greek artist.

Here she was dwelling, respected by all who knew her, when an event took place which threw her into the deepest affliction. It was at noonday in September that three foot-travellers arrived, and seating themselves on a bench under her vine-trellis, were supplied with a flagon of Aleatico by a lovely girl, her only child, the image of her former self. The eldest spoke like a Venetian, and his beard was short and pointed after the fashion of Venice. In his demeanour he affected great courtesy, but his look inspired little confidence, for when he smiled, which he did continually, it was with his lips only, not with his eyes; and they were always turned from yours. His companions were bluff and frank in their manner, and on their tongues had many a soldier's oath. In their hats they wore a medal, such as in that age was often distributed in war: and they were evidently subalterns in one of those Free Bands which were always ready to serve in any quarrel, if 39