The Last Of The Barons, Volume 4.

. The mathematician, the philosopher, had descended to the alchemist. The nature of the TIME had conquered the nature of a GENIUS meant to subdue time. Thos

pplied, when the labour but rolls the stone up the mo

to conspiracy,-simply as a means to his darling end. But by rapid degrees the fascination which all the elder sages experienced in the grand secret exercised its witchery over his mind. If Roger Bacon, though catching the notion of the steam-engine, devoted himself to the philosopher's stone; if even in so much more enlightened an age Newton had wasted some precious hours in the transmutation of metals,

tering the student's chamber, "methinks you scarcel

when they proposed to put me to the brake. [the old word for r

ked of for a free-born Englishman, let alone a scholar. And where is your fair daughter, Mas

rom which might be seen in the court below a gay group of lords and courtiers, with the plain, dark dress of Hastings, contrasting their gaudy surco

and the young man and the girl were as much

re in a court, where love is rare, than in the h

m overbold and presuming; for his eye now took in the great change of which Marmaduke had spoken. Sibyll's dress beseemed the new rank which she held: the corset, fringed with gold, and made of the finest thread, showed the exquisite c

robe n'es

e a demo

and the bearing. She looked as if born to the airs of courts; still modest indeed, and simple, but with a consciousness of dignity, and almost of power; and in fact the woman had been taught the power that womanhood possesses. She had been admired, followed, flattered; she had learned the authority of beauty. Her accomplishments, uncommon in that age among her sex, had aided her charm

of Sibyll, Nicholas Alwyn recoiled and turned pale; he no longer marvelled at her rejection of Marm

at the young m

y, "unless it be mean indeed. Thou rememberest, Master Alwyn, th

king that the great have their trials too; and, as our homely adage hath it, 'That is not always good i

in which my lady duchess needs me not are spent here. Oh, my f

ou from time to time, if it be only to consult this worshipful master touching certain improvements in the horologe

Sibyll, changing colour; "she i

not on her,-rare praise for a court dame. Few Houses can have the boast of Lord

that my Lord Hastings once much affectioned th

Edward's exemplar, dines with the citizen to-day, that he may borrow gold from the citizen to-mo

ale? Be seated,

d, Duke of York, he lifted his eyes to the Lady Katherine Nevile, sister to the E

he Lady Katherine

e devil.' Had some old Hastings been a robber and extortioner, and left to brave William the heirship of his wickedness in lordships and lands, Lord Warwick had not called him 'a new man.' Master Hastings was dragged, like a serf's son, before the earl on his dais; and be sure he was rated soundly, for his bold blood was up, and he defied the earl, as a gentleman born, to single battle. Then the

ought? Brav

; but Duke Richard sent Hastings to Ireland, and, a month after, the Lady Katherine married Lord Bonville's son and heir,-so, at least, tell

," answered Sibyll, in a low voic

d Hastings himself entered. He came in with t

this dark chamber than outshining all in the galliard. Ha! Master Alwyn, I owe thee many thanks

pang shot through his heart. It was not jealousy alone; it was anxiety, compassion, terror. The powerful Hastings, the ambi

ed Hastings, "thou art still

The goldmaker must not speak of his craft before the goldsmith.

ombre brow, mov

"I have overtarried,

me; for she is of

begone!" said Hastings, with un

lords! They reap, we sow; they trifle, we toil; they steal with soft words into the hearts which-Oh, Marmaduke, thou art right-right!-Stout men sit not down to w