A Romance in Action.

59

I will slay those wicked men and release your lady.'

With that the pair set off for the lake ; and having found the boat, got into it with the intention of seeking the enchanted island.

'Stay,' said the damsel. There is one thing, Sir Knight, to which you must submit ere we venture on this mission. You must consent to my binding your eyes.'

'Why so, gentle damsel?' asked the Knight.

'That you may not behold the hideous objects which people the water and air, and that are sent by the wicked robbers to scare away people from the island, and thus keep themselves secure.'

'But how is it, fair damsel,' inquired Sir Gerald, 'that you can bear their sight, and yet I may not have courage to look on them? '

'The talisman,' answered Hetty, showing a locket suspended to her neck by a ribbon. 'When I hold this in my hand, my ears cannot hear the horrid sounds, my eyes do not see the frightful sights, and I can pass on unmoved.'

Sir Gerald hesitated a moment, for a thought of treachery on the part of his conductress crossed his brain; but collecting himself, he resolved to undertake the adventure, and submitted his eyes to be bound. Then clutching his good sword in one hand, while he steadied himself with his lance, he felt the boat gradually draw away from the shore, under the vigorous strokes of the courageous damsel.

Truly, if the creatures that uttered the sounds

were as horrible as the noises they made, they must have been startling indeed. (We need scarcely tell our readers that it was Miss Hetty that made them, and she was an adept.) The cries were of every conceivable kind. There were sounds like the crowing of a cock, the mewing and spitting of cats, the barking and growling of dogs, and every now and then there would be a shriek, and a something would come flapping about Gerald's face as he stood, as if it were a huge vampire bat that struck him with its wings. Once, indeed, so vigorous a blow fell upon his ear, that he nearly toppled overboard, and—but that a monster could not use such language-he fancied a voice exclaimed, 'I beg your pardon, I didn't mean to hit you so hard.'

At length there was a shock, as if the boat had reached the land. The damsel Hetty undid the kerchief which bound his eyes, and he beheld before him the enchanted island.

'Take this talisman, Sir Knight,' exclaimed the damsel, 'it will enable you to step ashore.'

Sir Gerald did so, and as he leaped from the boat he cried out aloud :

'Where hide these caitiffs? Where do these wretched dogs, unworthy the name of men, conceal their miserable bodies? Let them come forth and try conclusions with me.'

A sound as of the growling of wild beasts came from a castle hard by, and presently a voice was heard to exclaim:

'Rash man, who hath dared to venture hither, fly,

-fly ere it be too late. Seek safety where only it can be obtained-in rapid flight. Advance one step farther, and the most horrid torments will await you!' 'I fear neither your words nor your acts, whoever you may be,' replied the brave Sir Gerald. 'I have not faced so many dangers to turn back now. Deliver up the lady you have so basely taken away, and deliver up yourselves as prisoners, or abide the result.'

With this the knight advanced boldly towards the castle, but was met at the entrance by two stalwart figures, who, each armed with a club, attacked him together, while a fair lady in white-it was the Princess Lucinda-wrung her hands in distress, and prayed for the success of her champion.

Long the fight continued, and it is difficult to say how the fate of fortune might have turned, when one of the robbers, stepping back rather hastily from a brave blow aimed at him by Sir Gerald, missed his footing, and fell into the water.

This untoward accident, which should have secured the bold knight's victory, was too like right down earnest to be pleasant. The various actors forgot their parts as if by magic. Lucy screamed in the most natural style imaginable. Gerald rushed forward up to his knees in the water to catch hold of his brother's jacket (for it was Fred to whom the mishap occurred), and by the aid of George and Hetty drew him ashore, without a dry thread about him, whilst Lucy with a face as pale as her frock was profuse in her regrets.

'Hulloa!' exclaimed Gerald all of a sudden; 'there goes the boat.'

And there it was going truly enough, and was already half a dozen yards away, when Fred, before any one could stop him, again rushed into the water from which he had just been dragged-he was a capital swimmer-and captured the punt before it had got too far.

'I couldn't be wetter than I was,' he explained as he came up the steps like a Newfoundland dog, the wet pouring from his hair and the ends of his jacket, and leaping out in little fountains from his boots.

No time was lost in paddling to the shore, and Gerald and George taking Fred, between them, ran him off to the house with as much speed as the saturated and heavy state of his clothing would allow ; and making their way into the kitchen unperceived by Mrs. Sutton, explained matters to the goodnatured cook, who undertook to dry Fred's clothes after he had exchanged them for his other suit: so that the kind host and hostess only heard of the accident when Gerald, in his liveliest tone and manner, related at tea amid much laughter the entire story, and its unromantic end.

HE day after the events narrated in the last chapter proved so wet and stormy, that the young people were confined to the house, and compelled to seek different amusements to while away the time.

After George's books had been turned over and rejected as containing little but what the boys had read before, that ingenuous youth drew from a capacious cupboard, sacred to his own particular use, a good-sized stage, bearing in large letters beneath the Royal Arms, Theatre Royal, Haymarket,' and from a square box produced the necessary scenes and characters for the performance of 'The Miller and his Men.'

The figures, all highly coloured, and the ladies even furnished with real silk dresses and a profusion of spangles, were inserted into little pieces of wood grooved to receive them, and by the aid of long wires they could be pushed on to and pulled off the stage by an unseen operator, while with the aid of an