CAST TO THE DEEP.

227 mass of chains were hurled in a storm of iron to the bulwark, as precursory to the contemplated slaughter of their Christian victim. Now surrounded by his ferocious assailants, whose intention it seemed to be to hew him in pieces momentarily, on the planks as he stood, a first gash on the naked arm-which brought the quick-answering blood in a red ring-preluded but too surely the last fatal work. We will spare the reader and ourselves-the further stage of this horrible murderous scene. Combating like a lion in a ring of steel, but weaker and weaker from loss of blood as Barry grew at every turn and disabled by repeated cuts, the black monsters completed their work by hurling at last the body of the poor young sailorfar now beyond more than the faintest indication of life in the clutching at rope or even at swords which cut his hands-into the sunlit waters. There was a circle of blood-the size of a small shield gules—and that was all till the new water rolled over.

So perished the poor young mate of the "Blue Dolphin." So fell poor Peter Barry a sacrifice to the unappeasable malignity of the SILVER COIN.

And on silver wings it flew on to still further mischief, and to ruin and terror.

The summers wax and wane. Fifty years elapse before the Genius which worketh to men's understanding in the neuter-individuality of the SILVER PIECE becomes recognisable as an intelligible thing again.

IHS

an hour with, perchance, a single playmate. It was performed with the fingers of both hands; upon which thread, usually white, was extended. After being wound over the palm of either hand, the threads were lifted with the opposite forefinger, and contrariwise raised apart; upon a principle that constituted the skein as a diagonal, mathematical thread-skeleton, or an open figure forming a puzzle removable to and fro, from either uplifted hand of the players. This game was called "Cat's-cradle." The name in its German rendering supplied the denomination, (perhaps from the difficulty of getting-in, as equal to none but a cat) to a wild and gloomy castle, or rather a heap of towers, perched upon some sharp, high rocks amongst the Erzgebirge, or Mountains of Ore, between Saxony and Bohemia. The time of this phase of the history of the PIECE of SILVER is 1632, the year of the Battle of Lutzen, distinguished by the fall of Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, the head of the German Protestants.

The lord of this romantic, repellant-looking castle was a man of uncommon breadth of body, with a huge head and a fierce face; whose unamiable expression was not mitigated by a black beard which rolled down to his bosom, nor by his grey long hair streaked with sable. He lived the life of a hermit, shutting himself up with his books, his philosophic apparatus and his

THE WIZARD'S HOLD.

229

chemical machines; which the few peasants who lived scattered about the foot of his mountain, and the woodmen who made long exploring excursions into the neighbouring forests, with their huge axes like those of headsmen over their shoulders, declared were contrivances, traps and gins, to catch wandering beautiful spirits, and

stray, winged, wondrous creatures out of the devil's world of the invisible. Be this as it may, the Count Tubal Daduk-for this was the title of the humpbacked nobleman-was set down by all the trembling people in the neighbourhood as a man literally in league with the Dark

One.

The devil, indeed, was said to pay him occasional complimentary visits in a thunderstorm; and to be entertained in his ruinous great hall, not by the comfortable gleam of Christian candles, but in the baleful splendour of false phosphorus - flames, and in the flashes of lightning of growling mountain tempests,

that came when the Devil came, and shook all the country.

It happened late one evening that an old traveller arrived at this picturesque village of few houses, which crouched-for that is the true word for its appearanceat the foot of the Count Daduk's mountain. The new

ROCK OF THE “GIANT-FACE.”"

231

comer was a very reverend-looking man, who seemed like a pilgrim except for the battered corselet on his breast, and for the colours of the sash bound around his waist, which proclaimed him a fugitive from the great field of Lutzen, and a Protestant. A sort of cloth was wrapped about his head; and he wore a broadbrimmed hat wherein was a broken feather.

The sunset was thundrous and glaring-red and ominous. There were great black clouds in the sky. The air was stiflingly hot. And as the traveller looked up at the castle-from its great height amongst the mountains, seemingly just over his head;-certainly it looked, of all places, the most unpleasant and the least encouraging to approach. It literally frowned from its brown shelves of rock. It was lurid-looking throughout its entire length;-sanguine occasionally in the coppercoloured, sulphury tinges of the wild-nay, the savage landscape. The castle had all the appearance of a hold of robbers, with its grim grey towers and multitudinous rusty grates. Or it seemed as if it might be the castellated retiring place or hazum-gazum or gazebo of some princely sorcerer, to whom earthly crowns were as naught; the thunders alone being his festal music, and sulphur-feasts his banquet.

And

"And must I make-up that wild path-old, wounded, wearied as I am? And will none of you shelter for one night a pilgrim-soldier flying from battle, where he has fought valiantly for the truth ?" This was asked by the traveller of two or three wild-looking people who had gathered to examine him; and who scowled and frowned. “For what truth hast thou fought ?" said one. all gathered around. "Thou art a heretic. Thy colours proclaim thee so. Thou art a vile Swede; or, at least, a Protestant. Thou art one of the children of that devil of a Gustavus Adolphus. We have naught of thee. Go up, if thou darest, and ask lodging and entertainment of the great magic Count up yonder. As a man of learning, which thou sayest thou art-though a soldier-thou wilt be welcome to him if thou canst show him the way to the Grand Secret. For avarice is his passion, gold is his thirst. And if you can teach