were with the great caravan which had departed a few hours before for Aleppo, carrying with it no small portion of his fortune in the shape of diamonds and other precious stones, These he had entrusted to the care of his only son Yezid, who had received ample instructions how and where to dispose of them, and had sworn implicit obedience to his father's orders. He loved his son with no common affection; but Yezid was young and giddy, and as it now seemed to his anxious father, scarcely competent to undertake so import ant a charge. This misgiving thought had prevented his closing his eyes during the whole night: not a moment's peace had he known since the caravan had departed, and after taking two or three disconsolate turns in his gardens, he determined to pursue it instantly, that he might accompany Yezid, and assume the care and management of his own precious jewels.

Alfadhel possessed a fleet mare, called in the language of Oriental exaggeration, the Outstripper of the wind. Perhaps there was little hyperbole in the name, for many an Arabian horse-dealer would seriously maintain that when she threw the foam from her mouth, she had been known to gallop out of sight before it could reach the ground. It is not impossible, however, if these men were like their European brethren, that they might occasionally deviate in some trifling degree from the extreme rigour of truth. At all events, the mare was one of surpass ing fleetness, and Alfadhel having thrown himself upon her back, doubted not that he should soon overtake the caravan, His own anxiety being not less urgent than the fiery impatience of his barb, he suffered her to gallop forward for some hours with unchecked velocity, until by her exhaustion and panting the outstripper of the wind seemed indeed to have earned her name, and to have left behind her the very air which was required for her respiration. The rider, whose thoughts had gone after

the caravan still faster than his barb, no sooner perceived her distress than he reined in the generous animal, and for the sake of the grateful shade, drew up in a lane overhung with wild figs and tamarinds, interspersed with kopals and gum trees. It was customary with the Arabs at this period, as it had been with the ancient Hebrews, to manufacture và species of sackcloth from the hair of camels, which they wore at funerals and upon other occasions of sorrow. The numerous camels of the cara van that had lately passed through this narrow defile, having left a por tion of their hair on the hedges, the neighbouring peasants had sent their little children to gather it, and a troop of these half-naked gleaners, with black eyes and curly polls, were busily employed in collecting the spoil.

Sun-burnt and tawny, their scanty discoloured rags harmonised well with the red-ochreous bank of earth up which they were climbing, while their glee, their clamours, and their agility, found a marked contrast in the person of a venerable austere looking Dervise, who, having seated himself cross-legged at the bottom of the bank, retained his immovable position, blowing his horn whenever a traveller passed, and pointing to his turban upon the ground by way of soliciting charity. Alfadhel, hav. ing thrown a trifle into it, remained gazing upon the scene before him white his horse took breath, when he was startled by a tittering over-head, and upon looking up he beheld with amazement a group of long-bearded brats, perched upon the bough of a tree, gibbering and mocking and mowing at him. His amazement at this inexplicable apparition was, probably, visible in his countenance; for the urchins beneath, and the ju venile grey-beards above, set up a simultaneous shout of laughter; whereat the bewilderment of Alfadhel was beginning to kindle into wrath, when the Dervise, propitiat ed by the alms he had received, informed him that the frolicsome ur chins, after having satiated their ap

petites with some wild honey which they had discovered, had smeared their chins with it, and by applying to them the camels' hair they had been sent to collect, had presently provided themselves with most reverend-looking beards.

"How merry!" exclaimed Alfadhel, who perhaps thought it necessary to moralise in talking to a Dervise-"how merry are these little thoughtless varlets, never dreaming that what they are now gathering in joy and laughter shall be worn in sorrow, and steeped in tears, perhaps even by themselves."

"If we may call the man a sorry baker," replied the Dervise," who should dislike sweet honey because it makes sour bread, so I hold him to be a sour philosopher who sighs at the sight of present happiness, lest it may become future bitterness and

woe.

Grown up children with long beards sometimes employ themselves exactly like these youngsters, and gather and heap up in glee that which they shall wear in lamentation."

"Nay, did not our holy Prophet," resumed Alfadhel, "pass his whole life in collecting the materials of sackcloth, when he declared upon his death-bed that all his days had been sorrow and vexation ?”

"Let us not the less enjoy our happiness when it comes," resumed the Dervise, “but receive it as the earth does the refreshing showers, when she instantly sparkles in brighter colours, throws up a thousand grateful odours to heaven, and wears a countenance of gladness, as if drought and wintry weather were never to visit her again.”

"It is pleasanter to hear the words of truth from the mouth of the wise," said Alfadhel, "than to catch the sound of the rivulet when crossing the parched wilderness.”—But pleasant as it was, he seemed to think it still more delightful to overtake his jewels; wherefore, observing that his mare had in some degree recovered her breath, he resumed his journey, and passing through the dofile, presently emerged into a vast

plain. At its extremity, upon the very verge of the horizon, he could distinguish a great cloud of dust, which, interposing between the sun's rays and himself, rolled up to heaven like the red smoke of a conflagration. Not doubting that it was occasioned by the caravan of which he was in pursuit, he struck out of the high road into the wilderness on his right, trusting that the well-known speed and vigour of his horse would enable him to reach his object much sooner than if he followed the beaten track, which described a considerable circuit. Swiftly and gallantly did his noble steed bear him onwards, making way through the tangled overgrowth or the sterile champaign of the wilderness, as if she gathered up strength from the ground as she gal loped over it; but Alfadhel soon discovered that he had widely miscal culated the distance, for though the dust that he was following still remained in sight, he plunged deeper and deeper into the waste without appearing to gain upon it, and his own strength, for in the hurry of his departure he had neglected to provide himself with sustenance of any kind, began to prove inadequate to the vehemence of his exertions. To add to his distress, the fierce rays a Syrian sun darted incessantly upon his head, and he was tormented with an almost intolerable thirst. Still he pressed on, seeing no human being, nor even a single beast or bird in his progress, until, to his infinite amazement, he beheld, at some distance before him, what appeared to be an old man washing his scythe in a pool of water. The prospect of appeasing his thirst was so delightful that he scarcely bestowed a second glance at the figure, who, having thrown his scythe over his shoulder, had now resumed his way across the wilderness. On reaching the brink of the pool Alfadhel dismounted, when he ob served that the water was turbid and of a sanguine hue, and that his mare, after smelling it for a second, turned away and refused to taste it. His own sufferings, however, would not

of

allow him to be so squeamish; he threw himself upon the ground and quaffed eagerly; but no sooner was his immediate agony appeased than he hastily arose, filled with sickness and loathing at the indescribably nauseous taste of what he had been drinking. Still it had removed his more distressing sensations, he felt refreshed for the moment, and again mounting his mare, pursued his journey, confident that he should now be able to overtake the caravan, without needing any farther sustenance. His course being the same as that taken by the old man, he observed, as he drew nearer to him, that what had before seemed to be an enveloping cloak assumed the appearance of a shroud or winding sheet, and that the figure in its progress did not move its legs, but floated along the surface of the ground, like a vapour or an apparition. Undaunted as he was by nature, an unaccountable awe took possession of Alfadhel's faculties, his blood thrilled and ran cold through his veins, and even the mare, sharing her rider's perturbation, shook violently as she started into a furious gallop, sidling away from the old man and passing him with every look of terror. As the wind blew aside from the figure part of its lower garments, Alfadhel beheld two skeleton legs, ditting steadily for ward, but not moving as in the action of walking; and at the same moment the head being slowly turned towards him, the sharp lipless fangs, and the eyeless sockets of a skull grinned, and gnashed, and glared hideously upon him.

Almost withered at the sight, and filled with an unutterable dismay and horror, then first did he recollect to have heard that Death was in the habit of frequenting the pool in the wilderness to wash his polluted scythe after any great mortality, and that those who subsequently tasted the pestiferous water became infected with all the complicated diseases of his recent victims. The blood-stained hue-the empoisoned feculence-the loathsome taste of the pool, were now

all explained; he had been swallowng the most revolting maladies at every mouthful; he had at that moment a hundred horrible deaths within him! As this conviction flashed upon his maddened mind, he shivered all over, his teeth chattered audibly in his head, his hair bristled up, his heart seemed to be frozen within him; and, immediately after the arrested blood again bursting into its chan nels, his veins swelled, he was cover ed with a profuse perspiration, clammy drops oozed from every pore, his eyes became distended and red. A dizziness and universal abandon ment, or rather perversion of his senses, succeeded. Hollow mur

murs rang in his ears, which, though they could no longer distinguish the noise of his horse's hoofs, were ap palled with imaginary groans, and shrieks of anguish, and maniac yells, and all the various cries of agony, which, in the dismal purlieus of a Lazar-house, make the very echoes shudder. The taste of death was in his mouth, and the sepulchral smell of it within his nostrils, for the free air of the wilderness was converted into the noisome stench of a char nel-house. But amid all the trials that he was fated to endure, his distorted vision proved to be his keen est curse. At first, as a thick film spread itself before his eyes and gra dually shut out every external object, he was merely condemned to the misery of galloping along, he knew not whither, in total blindness; but shortly he discovered that, by some inexplicable process, his optics, although they no longer took cugnizance of the world without, had ac quired the fearful power of gazing inwards upon his own frame. He be held revealed to his unwilling and revolted gaze all the mysterious func tions and movements of his inner man; he could trace the previously inscrutable connexion between vo lition and muscular movement, he could penetrate the arcana of the nervous system, he could discern and develope all the hidden laws of our corporeal being. But that which

filled him at once with terror and disgust was the observation that all the organs of his frame were wither ing, morbid, or deranged. The poisonous waters of the pool had been frightfully rapid in their operation. The languid heart panted slowly and with difficulty, the discoloured liver struggled in vain to perform its functions, thick and turbid the blood crawled sluggishly through the veins, livid spots here and there indicated that disease had assumed a mortal character; it was manifest that the mysterious organization which coustitutes life was about to be decomposed and resolved into its first elements. Alfadhel counted the pulsa tions of his own heart as he gazed upon it with a thrilling intentness, for he began to think that every throb of his bosom would be the last.

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For a moment all was dark-he saw nothing, his faculties were suspended, and when their perverted power returned, it seemed as if his eye had revolved upon its axis, and that he was looking inwards upon his own brain. All the inscrutable mysteries of that exquisite membrane were laid bare to his piercing vision, which was enabled to separate the physical from the moral, to detect how mind and matter acted and reacted upon each other, how thought, sense, and motion sprang from various combinations of medu lary matter. The separate birthplaces of the judgment, the memory, and the inagination, and the process of their occasional fusion into one another, sometimes total and indistinguishable, sometimes allowing the predominance of one or other of the constituent elements, were visibly displayed before him. But that which amazed and interested him the most was to see the different passions of the human mind, each inhabiting a separate cell of the brain, and each personified and enlarged to his distempered eye, until it assumed the human size and form. Love sat at the entrance of his grotto painting every thing that he gazed upon in

the brightest and most flattering colours, although when Jealousy, who occupied the next recess, turned his green eyes towards him, they cast such a hideous hue upon his drawing, that he shook his wings, and more than once threatened to fly to the opposite cell, whence Hatred looked out with a scowling aud malignant visage. Rage stood at the door of his dwelling raving like a maniac, and striking at random with his weapon, which fortunately did little injury, since, by his hasty and inju dicious management of it, he had blinded himself at the outset. Revenge lurked amid the gloomier caverns gnawing his own heart, and looking wistfully at Despair, who was lifting a bowl of poison to her lips, although Pity with tears and supplications implored her to desist, and Hope, pointing to the figure of Happiness in a distant cell, endea voured to dazzle the eyes of the sufferer by continually turning towards her the bright side of a reflecting glass. Fear ran and hid herself at the appalling sight, Joy threw down his goblet and ceased his jocund roundelay, and all seemed to be effected by the spectacle except Religion, who, on her knees apart, with eyes fixed on heaven, and thoughts outpoured in prayer, appeared in her communion with the skies to find a solace for every touch of woe.

A period of blank oblivion succeeded to this mental phantasmagoria; on his recovery from which Alfadhel found himself stretched upon the ground, without knowing when or how he had fallen from his mare, which was no longer visible. Probably his insensibility had continued for some time, for the sun was now setting, and the diseases with which the waters of the pool had impreg nated his whole system had made terrific progress in the interval. His agonies were of a contradictory na ture, and became more acute from their sudden contrast and apparent incompatibility. From the sensation of a raging fever, burning in his very

bones, and sending liquid fire through every vein, he would change to the torments of cold, acute rheumatism, while his whole frame shivered, and bis teeth rattled in his head, as if his heart's blood were frozen. Cholic and acute inflammations of the most sensitive organs were in stantly succeeded by the pangs of agne, dropsy, asthma, and palsy. Paralysis and apoplexy, torturing cramps, cancers, convulsions, aches and epilepsy, nausea and swoonings, inflicted their separate anguish just long enough to be individualised, when they were supplanted by some new and still more wringing torment; while nightmare, hypochondria, and all the ghostly and spectral abomina tions of delirium haunted his imagination, as if it were decreed that the sufferings of his mind should equal, if possible, those of his writhing body.

The wretched Alfadhel casting his eyes despairingly around him, beheld at a little distance a rained building, towards which he crawled, in the hope of protecting himself from the wild beasts, at least until his death, which he now considered to be rapidly approaching. Not with out difficulty, and many groans and screams of pain, did he succeed in ensconcing himself, with his drawn scymetar in his hand, behind a heap of rubbish in one corner of the dilapidated structure, where he had scarcely remained five minutes when, to his utter amazement and consternation, he saw two armed men enter the place, leading between them his son Yezid, blindfolded and pinioned. From their conversation he gathered that they formed part of a band of robbers, who, having attacked and overmastered the caravan, had spared the life of his son upon his promise of giving up to them the valuable jewels carefully concealed about his person, and had brought him to the ruin to disburden him of his hidden treasures. One by one, as their prisoner told them where to search, did they make the most rare and costly gems emerge from the folds of

his innermost garments, and deposit them in a small leather bag, Alfad hel feeling all the while that, in aðdition to his other miseries, they were thus reducing him to a compa rative state of poverty; although, even if his sore sickness had allowed him to interfere, his doing so would only have been the signal of death both to himself and Yezid. Well convinced of this, he continued to watch their proceedings in a transfixed silence, until the robbers having despoiled their prisoner of all that he possessed, retired to the back of the cave, and seating themselves on the pile of rubbish immediately before Alfadhel, began to conversé in a low whisper. One suggested to the other, that as their prisoner, in spite of his solemn protestations, probably still retained about his person the most valuable of his gems, the only way to secure their prize was to murder him, leave his body in the rain, and carry off his clothes, that they might rip them open at their leisure. To this atrocious proposition his companion yielding an immediate assent, they drew their daggers, and began to steal slowly towards the blind folded Yezid. Danger, and even death itself, no longer possessed a particle of terror for the affectionate and agonized father; he tried to brandish his sword, to rush forward, to scream out, but, stiffened and transfixed, either with the horror of the scene, or from the effect of the waters of the pool, his faculties refused to act; his tongue clave to the roof of his mouth; not a muscle of his body would move. ра roxysm enchained him until he saw them raising their daggers, when his suspended energies returning to him in one concentrated rush, he uttered an unearthly shriek that echoed for miles around, and springing into the air like a tiger, descended with his naked scymetar in his hand between the assassins and his beloved son. The fiercest tiger would not have been half so terrible to them as this appalling apparition, at sight of which they burst out of the ruin with