She arose at arose at sun-rise, and had descended into the garden, to breathe the bleak, but, to her feverish spirits the refreshing air of a December morning; when, at noon, Quartezzani rushed in; he was deadly pale, and his hair seemed to stand on end with fear.

‘Holy saints! what has happened?’ cried Euthanasia.

‘We are all lost! dead, or worse than dead! We are betrayed!’

‘Tripalda has betrayed us?’

‘He has.’

‘And there is no escape?’

‘None. The gates are shut, nor will they be opened, until we are all seized.’

‘Then most certainly we die?’

As sure as that Christ died upon the cross! so surely shall we perish.’

‘Then courage, my friend, and let us cast aside, with all mortal hopes, all mortal fear. I have the start of you, Ugo; I was prepared for this; but you would not believe me, until now my predictions are sealed by the event. Let us die, as we would have lived, for the cause of freedom; and let no trembling dismay, no coward fear, make us the mock of our enemies.

‘Other men in various ages have died by untimely death, and we will dare to imitate them. Others have sustained their fate with fortitude; and let faith and submission to the will of heaven be to us, instead of that dauntless spirit of inbred virtue that supported the heroes of antiquity.’

Euthanasia raised her own spirits as she spoke; and fearless expectation, and something like triumph, illuminated her countenance, as she cast her eyes upward, and with her hand clasped that of her friend. He received no warmth from the pressure; chilly fear possessed him; and he stood utterly dejected before her—he wept.

‘Aye, weep,’ she continued, ‘and I also, did not the tempest of my soul bear all clouds far away, I also might shed tears. You weep to leave those whom you love,——that is a bitter pang. You weep to see your associates suffer; but each must relieve the other from that sorrow by cheerfulness and courage. But,’ she continued, seeing him entirely subdued by fear, ‘is there no hope of escape? Exert your ingenuity; once past the gates, you would soon be out of the territory of Lucca. And Castruccio——’

‘Oh, that most hated name! Bloody, execrable tyrant! Curse him! May the fiends——’

‘Cease! know you not that a dying man’s curse falls more on himself, than on him against whom he imprecates the wrath of heaven? This is childish; Ugo, collect yourself; you have a wife;— woman’s wit is ready; consult with her; she may devise some plan for your safety.’

‘You are an angel of consolation, Euthanasia. Heaven bless you! and do you also reflect on your own danger.’

He left her: and she (without giving a thought to vain regret; her moments were too precious) sat down and wrote a long letter to Bondelmonti. It was calm and affectionate: she felt raised above mortality; and her words expressed the exceeding serenity of her soul. She gave a last farewel to her friends. ‘It may seem strange to you,’ she wrote, ‘that I express myself thus: and indeed, when I reason with myself, methinks I ought not to expect death from the hands of Antelminelli. Nor do I; and yet I expect some solemn termination to this scene, some catastrophe which will divide me from you for ever. Nor is it