Tausdorf returned a fitting compliment, while Schindel, who had got behind Althea's chair, whispered to her, "The bear does not seem in one of his worst bear-moods to-day. Heaven help us farther."

In the mean time the second course was served up. Francis ate little, but stuck so much the more diligently to the wine, and kept up a constant talk with Tausdorf, in a tone of frank importunity, which did not sit amiss upon him. Soon the conversation turned upon the Turkish war; and he was ready to leap out of his skin for joy on finding that Tausdorf had served against the infidels in Transylvania, at the very time he had been fighting with them in Hungary.

"Heaven confound me!" he cried, while his face glowed with drinking; and holding up the goblet--"Why, you please me better and better, comrade, and therefore we'll now pledge each other in a brave draught, and swear eternal friendship and brotherhood."

Tausdorf hesitated at this unexpected proposal, and was about to decline it courteously, when Althea pressed his hand under the table, and in low brief words requested him to accede for her sake; upon which he took up the crystal goblet, and Francis did the same to pledge him; but in the moment that the gla.s.ses touched, both rang hollowly, and burst with a sharp jarring sound, which echoed lamentably through the wide hall, while the n.o.ble wine poured down in streams upon the floor, to the indignation of the avaricious Christopher, who called out, "You are, and always will be, Frank the clumsy, and do nothing like rational people; all with noise and fury. You have broken now my beautiful crystal cups with your rough pledging."

"Yes, every thing is to be laid to me," growled Francis: "I pledged my goblet as neatly as possible; it was not till afterwards that both broke, and how that chanced, the devil only knows."

"It is not your brother's fault," said Tausdorf, drying the wine from his doublet. "I do not myself understand how it happened."

"We have examples," observed Schindel thoughtfully, "that empty gla.s.ses have broken upon people calling out loudly in the same key to which they were tuned; but these goblets were full, and all was still in the room. G.o.d grant that this accident may not prognosticate the rupture of your new-formed friendship as early as the gla.s.ses!"

"No fear of rupture," cried Francis, shaking Tausdorf's hand cordially.

"We must both agree to that first, but our hearts have been amalgamated and hardened together in the same war-fire, and will hold together for life and death."

"Gentlemen," said the butler, entering with a respectful bow, "there are some well-dressed personages--masks,--standing without, before the door, who would ask of the honourable company through me whether they may come in to amuse you with song and dance, and other allowable pleasantries."

"They are welcome," cried the restless Francis, starting up. "This tedious sitting at table has long been abominable to me."

He ran to the door and opened it. Three gipsies danced in, playing with pipe, triangle, and tambourine: these were followed by three females in black clothes, slashed with red, and wearing black masks.

"Trim wenches, brother," said Francis, with eager look, to Tausdorf, upon whose chair he was leaning. "So slim, and at the same time so full! By heavens! it makes one wish to become a gipsy for the pleasure of possessing them."

"This masking is not to my taste," replied Tausdorf. "The burning eyes that sparkle from the fixed black faces have to me something almost supernatural. The open brow, and an open heart whether in joy or grief, are what I love."

"I understand you, my poor knight," said Francis mockingly. "You are already in the cage, and dare no longer take any pleasure in a handsome face, at least not _show_ it, lest your lady wife should be angry, and hold a criminal court upon her faithless shepherd."

"Do you know any of the party?" asked Althea, to interrupt this conversation.

"Not I," answered Francis. "The devil knows where stupid Kit has picked up the handsome wenches; but my acquaintance with them shall soon be made, and then I'll let you know more about them."

With this he would have forced himself upon the masks, but the gipsy with the triangle, an old gray-beard, waved him back, and gave the women a sign to begin their revels. The music immediately struck up, and the three gipsies commenced a wild fantastic dance, in which the twines of their round well-formed arms, the turnings and bendings of their slim, delicate figures, the springing and agility of their feet, were shown off in full perfection. One of them, whose auburn hair was adorned with coloured ribbons and Bohemian stones, particularly distinguished herself by the gracefulness of her movements; and Francis, after having looked on for some time, tore open his doublet, exclaiming, "Zounds! what a figure! It warms an honest fellow who has got a few bottles of Tokay in him."

"This mad springing may please you," said Althea contemptuously; "it is just calculated for the taste of a drunkard; but to me it seems like the wild dance of fiends about a lost soul. It grates me to see that a woman can so far forget the female dignity as to expose herself thus."

"Heaven deliver me from a tribunal where you preside," said Francis laughing; "why, it must be worse than that of the emperor at Prague.

Your virtue is of so fierce a nature, there's no reasoning with it.

That which is to please must be a little free: your decorum and modesty are the most tedious things on the face of the earth."

The trio was at an end. The gipsies fanned themselves with their motley-coloured handkerchiefs, but they would not move their masks, and on that account rejected the wine which was proffered to them by the master of the feast.

"These girls seem to be b.u.t.toned up to their chins," said Francis, "but for all that I'll have a peep behind their black masks, or die for it.

Above all, I must try the fair-haired witch." And in the delirium of the moment, he dashed his goblet through the window, and leaped upon a chair, shouting "Huzza! huzza! away with the tables; we have had enough of eating, and will dance you one till the floor shakes, and the rafters crack again."

"Man! are you alone here?" exclaimed Tausdorf indignantly; but in his frenzy, Francis heard him not, and, springing from the chair over the table with a neck-breaking leap, alighted again just before the mask with the auburn hair.

"Take away," said Christopher with vexation. "When once he breaks out, there is no managing with him."

The tables were removed, the seats placed close to the walls, and the guests made room for the dancers. Pa.s.sing over the usual forms of courtesy, Francis seized his chosen one with a rude grasp, and shouted to the musicians, "A waltz! a waltz! but quick! quick!"

The music began, and the feet of the dancers kept pace with its rapidity. The s.p.a.ce about them grew wider and wider, for the spectators could hardly get their feet out of the way in time from the stamping of the intoxicated Francis, who kept clapping his hands, and shouting, "Faster! faster! I can stand it, and so can she." At last the piper stopped from want of breath; in a little time too the triangle was unable to follow; and now only the tambourine gave a fit measure to this baccha.n.a.lian revel.

"And this is called pleasure?" said Althea to Tausdorf, who had retreated to a bow-window.

"Where the soul is incapable of enjoyment," he replied, "pleasure must be sensual, or the vulgar mind would have no joy on earth whatever."

At last the sprightly baccha.n.a.l was exhausted, and danced off with his female into the next room. There he threw himself into a chair, forced his companion into the seat beside him, and panted out, "You dance as gracefully as lightly, and only so much the more stimulate my desire to see your face. It certainly won't have to be ashamed of the feet. Come, take off the d.a.m.nable Moor's visor."

"It is not yet time," replied the gipsy in a low tone, that sounded still more hollowly from the mask.

"Not yet?" said Francis, with a rough grasp of her hand; "but soon?

to-day?"

"If all goes as it should, perhaps," was the answer.

"Then I must have patience, however little I am used to it; so let us, in the mean time, have a friendly chat together. You are so sparing of words. I only wish your tongue had half the nimbleness of your feet."

"I am not fond of talking," replied the gipsy with cutting coldness; "there is little pleasure in it."

"And yet you are a woman," cried Francis, merrily. "For Heaven's sake, how could you have so degenerated? Only think, if every one were to be as you are, what a poor sort of entertainment we should have in the world."

"The world would gain by it," retorted the mask. "How much foolish, how much evil, talk would be spared! How much falsehood and deceit! How much perjury!"

"Oh, this is dull gossip," exclaimed Francis, struck by her words.

"Rather tell me my fortune; you have visited us as a gipsy, and should keep up the character."

"Do not ask it," she replied, in a warning tone: "you might hear something that would not please you."

"Yes, if I were fool enough to believe such nonsense. Prophesy away, and be it at my peril. Here is my hand."

The gipsy hastily seized it. Her bosom heaved violently, and her eyes darted piercing looks from out the mask.--At length she said, "These lines do not please me; you are like to use your sword this very day."

"That would be the devil," cried Francis; and looked about with an air of defiance, as if seeking for his adversary.--"But I have no objection: to my mind the best of a feast is wanting if there is not something of a row to wind it up."

"So much for the future," said the gipsy, releasing his hand. "The past you will be contented to leave alone."

"By no means," exclaimed Francis. "Of the future you can lie as much as you please, because no one can peep behind the curtain; but in the past your art is put to the proof of fire, and if it does not come well out of it, I shall mock you soundly."

Again the gipsy took his hand, examined it; but shuddered and retreated, saying, "For the last time I warn you."

"That, by my troth, sounds like earnest," cried Francis, mockingly.--"But go on, at my peril."

"You have murder on your soul!" said a voice hollowly from beneath the mask.

Francis drew back, shuddering, but in the next moment he collected himself, as he replied, "In the Turkish war I helped more than one infidel to h.e.l.l; but I pride myself upon it, and do not reckon it for a murder."

"I speak of that which happened four years since, and of which you were acquitted at the royal tribune of Prague."