taineers are swift-footed. You will reach him by the time he has done feasting with Captain Rousso."

The woman clasped her hands above her head with a terrible cry, and fell to the ground.

All the lavishness and revelry of a soldier's banquet signalized the feast of Rousso and Anagnosti; wine flowed in streams, and riotous music and laughter went up from the tents towards the still stars overhead. Melidori gave himself up to the enjoyment of the moment in perfect faith.

"A gay life is a soldier's!" Anagnosti cried. "Melidori, this is better than the olden olive-feasts on Mount Psiloriti.” A shadow came over the young captain's face-Rousso noticed it.

"Perhaps Antonio regrets having left that quiet, easy life on the mountains for such a one as this?" he said, with a smile that bordered on a sneer. On Rousso's face it was almost impossible to distinguish between the two.

Melidori was not easily provoked. "No, no," answered he, gayly; "I would be the last to regret those old times-all very well in their way; but glory-patriotism-"

"Both fine-sounding words; though some who fight, fight for other things more substantial."

"I do not understand you," said Melidori, rather coldly.

Oh, we all know the honours that await our young commander when the war is over: plenty of spoil-riches—a bride, for Affendouli's daughter is fair, and her father generous. But, perchance, there is some trifling impediment to that. A long time ago, on the mountains, people talked of a little damsel named Philota."

"Rousso," said Antonio, hurriedly, "this Cyprus wine is delicious. I pledge thee."

"With all my heart! And, as I was saying, there was to have been a wedding with the olive-feast."

"Ha-ha-ha!" laughed Melidori. "Thy thoughts run on fair damsels and wedding-feasts instead of warfare. Let us talk of something more soldier-like."

Presently; when I have drunk to thy health and that of Affendouli's daughter."

"Not united with mine," said Antonio, gravely. honour, but love not the lady, and do not choose jesting."

"I

"Then there is some truth in the tale about the little Sphakiote girl after all? Antonio, may be thou art a happy man; for I saw the other day, near thy house, a pretty face, that put me strongly in mind of one I knew on Psiloriti. Is it so ?"

Melidori's lips quivered with passion, but he restrained himself. "Rousso," he whispered, hoarsely, "speak as thou wilt in private-not here."

"What! conscience-stricken? Is Philota

"Utter that name again with thy cowardly tongue and

Rousso rose up from the table, and drew his short dagger. "Wilt thou fight? Then so will I" In a moment Melidori saw through the intent of all the torturing words which had come from that wily tongue. His anger cooled at once; he resolved to thwart the purpose of his enemy.

"None shall say that Antonio Melidori came to a friendly banquet, and there fought with his host," he answered, calmly. "Soldiers, and you my fellow-guests, bear witness that for this reason, and this only, I will not fight. What would our enemies say of this petty brawling over cups? It is unworthy of Greeks. I will end it."

So saying, Antonio gave the signal of departure to his suite, and prepared to mount his horse. Anagnosti followed him.

"Noble captain," he said, obsequiously, "do not let this feast of unity end in division. Rousso is so hasty; but he repents him now. I pray you return, and let all these

differences be reconciled."

Melidori answered courteously and frankly, as was his nature. "There is none who would rejoice in peace more than I; it was for this only that I came hither."

"Then let us seal our peace by a brotherly embrace," said

Rousso, coming forward. His eyes flashed; Antonio thought it was with wine; and his step was unsteady. The young Sphakiote felt an unaccountable repugnance; but he thought of Affendouli, and the earnest entreaties of the good old man that all private enmity might be forgotten for the sake of Greece.

"Be it so," answered Antonio, extending his arms. Rousso did the same. There was a moment of stillness, and the assassin's dagger was plunged into that noble and generous breast.

A cry, the terrible death-cry, burst forth; it was answered by another from without a woman's; and Philota fell on her knees beside Antonio!

She had followed him, league after league, with a speed and strength almost superhuman; so that, as she passed desolate houses and solitary travellers, they thought it was a spirit. And now she had come too late.

In the confusion the murderer and his accomplice fled. Antonio's few soldiers carried their dying leader from the tent, and no one opposed them. There, on the roadside, beneath the peaceful stars, the young commander breathed his life away. It was not a sad ending, for his pillow was the breast of the faithful woman whose love had been the joy and brightness of his youth. Clouds had come over that brightness, but death swept them all away. From his few vague words, Philota knew that his thoughts were not of war, nor of the false glory which had dazzled him, but of that old peaceful time when love was all in all. In the wanderings of his brain, the dying soldier fancied himself again on Mount Psiloriti, and murmured of Philota, of the olive-feast, and the bridal.

*

"We will stay here," he whispered. "I had a dream : it haunts me yet; but it is over. We will never leave our own mountain, Philota; never, never!" His head sunk on her shoulder; the dream of which he spoke the troubled dream of life-was over, for eternity.

The Governor Affendouli lamented with the sincerity of a

worthy heart over his lost friend. He would have honoured the dead by magnificent obsequies, and with that intent he called together his officers and the chief men of Sphakia ; but in the midst of the assembly a woman appeared, and claimed the body of Antonio Melidori. The Governor questioned her right, since he knew that Antonio had no surviving kindred.

"It cannot humble the dead," the woman murmured; and then said aloud, "Antonio Melidori was my plighted husband: here is the betrothal ring. Give me his body, that I may bury him in the peaceful mountains where he was born. He would not rest with your guns booming over his grave. You possessed him, soul and body, in life; he is now mine only. Give me my husband, and let me go.”

"Poor wretch!" murmured the compassionate Governor, as he looked on the wild gestures and frenzied air of the Sphakiote woman. "O Greece, thy liberty is dearly bought!"

On the summit of Mount Ida, on the very spot where the whole island lies stretched below, there is a cross of white stone, with the name- "Antonio Melidori." The soldier rests where no murmur of battle can ever reach his grave. The island is at peace; there is no warfare now. The mountaineers have their honey-gatherings, their olive-harvests, their vine-feasts; and no one remembers the dark days of old. For a time, many a Sphakiote soldier came to say his prayers beside the white cross, and talk of the young patriot who had died for his country's sake; but as war-time ceased, this far shrine was forgotten; and now it is rarely visited, except by two, who live together on the mountainside—a woman of middle-age, and a youth, a neophyte in the Greek church. He calls her mother; and she is indeed a mother to him, though not his own. These two are the only pilgrims who pray by the tomb of the victorious commander whose name once rang through Candia like a trumpet sound. It has died away now, as all such glory dies, and will ever die. Love only can survive the grave.

THE STORY OF ELISABETTA SIRANI.

"ELISABETTA mia, I have lost pencils-colours; come, child, and aid me too look for them. What! thou art idling away all the day in that corner, instead of taking care of thy little sisters. Hark! there is Barbara crying, and la bambino Anna too; and the pencils are lost: and Il Signor Montenegro is waiting for the picture. I shall never finish it."

The speaker-Giovanni Andrea Sirani, one of the secondrate artists of Bologna-hurriedly tossed about brushes, palette, and oils, making the studio all confusion; then, loudly called on Elisabetta for assistance. She came forward from the sunny nook in the window, where she had been hidden, and addressing her angry father in a voice remarkable for its soothing and sweet tones, put into his hands the pencils he required, arranged his palette, and stood behind him while he again continued his work.

Elisabetta was a girl of about twelve years, tall and wellformed, though still childlike in proportions, and too angular to be graceful. But her face was too striking to be passed unnoticed even by a stranger. Not through its beauty, for the features were irregular, and the long and rather aquiline nose would have given a character too masculine to the countenance, had it not been for the exquisitely sweet expression of the mouth, and the dimpled chin. Again, too, the harshness given by the strongly marked eyebrows was softened by the dreamy languor of the dark eyes and drooping eyelids. In short, the whole face of Elisabetta Sirani showed a combination of masculine powers and womanly sweetness, united with that flexibility of feature and ever-changing expression, which almost always denote great sensitiveness of mind.