no need of me; the shadow of thy soul has become a dream no longer. Rejoice, and go on thy way with a strong and earnest heart, for thou hast attained the poet's true ideal as near as earth can bestow."

Still vaguely comprehending the meaning, Hyas cried sadly

"Oh, beautiful image! shall I see thee no more? Where then shall I find my spirit's desire, its guiding strength, its inspiration?"

"Look once more in the waters, and thou shalt behold it." He looked, and reflected in the spring was no airy phantom, but a woman's face, the wild-thyme garland waving over the clear brow and loving eyes. Hyas turned, and felt round his neck the warm arms of Euthyma; and while he clasped his bride to his bosom, the young Athenian knew that the poet's best ideal on earth is a true-hearted woman's love.

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289

THE CROSS ON THE SNOW MOUNTAINS.

A SCANDINAVIAN TALE.

CHAPTER I.

A SHIP-a rude, pine-built vessel-lay tossing, heaving, tempest-driven, on a southern sea. Wild-looking Norsemen were on her deck, breasting the storm, and controlling the ship with a desperate strength and an almost ferocious energy, which in those early days stood in the place of skill. For it was the time of Europe's stormy, unfettered youth, when civilization was just dawning in those of its climes which were nearest the sun. But the ship came from the wild and savage North; her pine timbers had once rocked to the tempests in a Scandinavian forest, and afterwards, winter by winter, had struggled with the ice-bound waters of Scandinavian seas. It was the ship of a Viking.

The vessel wrestled between sea and sky. The leaden clouds almost rested on her topmost masts, as if to press her down into the boiling deep; the storm-spirits howled above her-the waves answered the roar from beneath. And in the ship there was one faint, wailing cry, which made that wild chorus the birth-hymn of a human soul.

The mother, the young mother of an hour, lay unconscious of all the turmoil around her. With the Angel of Birth came the Angel of Death; already the shadow of his wings was upon her. The Viking sat at her feet, stern, immoveable. Perhaps he now felt how it was that the fair southern flower, stolen and forcibly planted on a cold northern rock, had

U

withered so soon. He sat with his gray head resting on his rough, wrinkled hands, his blue eyes, beneath their shaggy brows, looking with an iron-bound, tearless, terrible grief, upon the death-white face of his young spouse.

The nurse laid the babe on a silken cushion at his feet.

"Let lord look my upon his day for the noble Jarl Hialmar.

a blessed day!"

son,

his heir. This is a joyful

Praise be to Odin! ah, it is

The Viking's eye turned to the child, then back again to the mother, and a slight quivering agitated the stern lips. "A blessed day, Ulva, sayest thou, and she

? "

A gesture half of scorn, and half of hatred, showed how the Norsewoman felt towards the desolate southern maid who had become the Viking's bride. Ulva expressed, in the metaphorical poetry of her country, what she dared not say in plain language.

"There was a poor, frail, southern flower, and under the shadow of its leaves sprang up a seedling pine. What mattered it that the flower withered, when the noble pine grew? Was it not glory enough to have sheltered the young seed, and then died? What was the weak southern plant, compared to the stately tree-the glory of the North? Let it perish! Why should my lord mourn?"

At this moment a low wail burst from the new-born babe. The sound seemed to pierce like an arrow of light through the mist of death-slumber that was fast shrouding the young mother. Her marble fingers fluttered, her eyes opened, and turned with an imploring gaze towards the nurse, who had taken in her arms the moaning child.

"She asks for the babe-give it," muttered the father. But the hard, rigid features of Ulva showed no pity. "I guard my lord's child," she said; "his young life must not be perilled by the touch of death."

The mother's eyes wandered towards her husband with a mute, agonized entreaty, that went to his heart.

"Give me the child," his strong voice thundered, unmindful of the terror which convulsed every limb of the dying

woman. He laid the babe on her breast, already cold, and guided the feeble hands, until they wrapped it round in a close embrace.

"Now, Clotilde, what wouldst thou?-speak!" he said, and his voice grew strangely gentle.

Then the strength of a mother's heart conquered even death for a time. The Jarl's wife looked in her lord's face, and spoke faintly.

"Ulva said truly-I die. It was not for me to see again my sunny land. But my lord was kind to bear me thither once more, though it is too late. I had rather sleep under the soft billows that wash against these shores, than lie beneath the northern snows; they have frozen my heart. Not even thou canst warm it, my babe, my little babe!"

The Viking listened without reply. His face was turned away, but his muscular hands were clenched until the blue veins rose up like knots. At that moment he saw before him in fancy a young captive maiden, who knelt at his feet, and clasped his robe, praying that he would send her back to her southern home. Then he beheld a pale woman, the wife of a noble Jarl, with the distinctive chain on her neck, a golden-fettered slave. Both wore the same face, though hardly so white and calm as the one that had drooped over the young babe, with the mournful lament—"They have frozen my heart! They have frozen my heart!"

And Hialmar felt that he had bestowed the Jarl's coronet and the nuptial ring with a hand little less guilty than if it had been a murderer's.

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Clotilde," whispered he, "thou and I shall never meet -in life or after. Thou goest to the Christian heaven— I shall drink mead in the Valhalla of my fathers. Before we part, forgive me if I did thee wrong, and say if there is any token by which I may prove that I repent."

The dying mother's eyes wandered from her child to its father, and there was in them less of fear, and more of love than he had ever seen.

"Hialmar," she murmured, "I forgive-forgive me, too.

Perhaps I might have striven more to love thee; but the dove could not live in the sea-eagle's nest. It is best to die. I have only one prayer-Take my babe with thee to my own land; let him stay there in his frail childhood, and betroth him there to some bride who will make his nature gentle, that he may not regard with the pride and scorn of his northern blood the mother to whom his birth was death."

"I promise," said the Viking; and he lifted his sword to swear by.

"Not that; not that!" cried the young mother, as with a desperate energy she half rose from her bed. "I see blood upon it-my father's and my brethren's. O God, not that!"

A superstitious fear seemed to strike like ice through the Jarl's iron frame. He laid down the sword, and took in his giant palm the tiny hand of the babe.

Clotilde,

"This child shall be a token between us," he said, hoarsely. "I swear by thy son and mine to do all thou askest. die in peace."

But the blessing was wafted after an already parted soul. Ulva started up from the corner where she had crouched and took the child. As she did so, she felt on its neck a little silver cross, which the expiring mother had secretly contrived to place there-the only baptism Clotilde could give her babe. Ulva snatched it away, and trampled on it.

"He is all Norse now, true son of the Vikingir. Great Odin! dry up in his young veins every drop of the accursed stranger's blood, and make him wholly the child of Hialmar!"

Another birth-scene.

*

It was among the vine-covered plains of France, where, at the foot of a feudal castle, the limpid Garonne flowed. All was mirth, and sunshine, and song, within and without. Of Charlemagne's knights, there was none braver than Sir Loys of Aveyran. And he was rich, too; his vineyards lay far and wide, outspread to the glowing sun of southern France-so that the minstrels who came to celebrate the approaching birth had good reason to hail the heir of Sir Loys of Aveyran. An heir it must be,

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