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is given, and safely, surely, she shall be returned to her home, were she as lovely as the moon. But with you, Greek, with your companions, Maximin, Priscus, and Vigilius, the king has still to deal, and, after what has befallen this day, expect nothing more than justice." As he spoke, he rolled his dark eyes fearfully around, then suddenly raised his hand, exclaiming, "Now, warriors! now!" and before he could strike a blow, Menenius, unprepared, was seized on all sides, and bound tight in every limb, together with the envoys from Theodosius.

All, for an instant, was wild confusion. Honoria, with the other women, were hurried from the hall; and Menenius found himself ranged with Priscus and Maximin before the throne of Attila; while, in the deathlike, ashy, quivering countenance of Vigilius, the interpreter, who stood beside him, he read detected guilt and certain death.

"Hired murderers, sent by an imperial slave to slay his conqueror and master," exclaimed Attila, after he had gazed for some minutes upon the Greeks, "do ye not tremble to find your baseness exposed in the eyes of all the universe? Stand forth, Edecon, and tell the warriors of Attila, how these men came here, under the garb of ambassadors, to slay by treachery, in peace, the king that, by battle, they could not vanquish in war. And you, warriors, lay not your hands upon your swords-Attila will do justice to Attila."

At the command of the king, Edecon, who had been ambassador for Attila at Constantinople, stood forth, and declared, that in an interview with the Eunuch Chrysaphius, that favourite of the weak Monarch of the East had proposed to him the assassination of his master, and of fered him an immense reward. He had affected to consent, and had that very day received a purse of gold and jewels from Vigilius, the interpreter, who was privy to the whole. The plot he had instantly communicated to Attila, and the purse he now produced. Maximin and Priscus, he doubted not, were cunning men, sent to accomplish the scheme with art; and Menenius, beyond question, was the daring murderer to strike the final blow.

Maximin spoke loudly in his own defence, and Priscus learnedly on the improbability of the tale, while the mouth of Vigilius opened, and his lips quivered, but no sound found utterance. Menenius was silent, but he fixed his bold eye upon Attila, who glared upon them all like a tiger crouching for the spring.

"Maximin and Priscus," said the King at length, " Ye are innocent! Let them be freed. As for yon trembling traitor, guilt is in his eye and on his cheek; but the sword that should smite Vigilius would be disgraced for ever, and find no blood in his coward heart. Let him buy his life, and pay two hundred pounds weight of gold to him he sought to bribe.-As for thee, Chief of Azimantium”.

"Thou knowest I am guiltless, Hun!" replied Menenius, “and bonds such as these have pressed upon my arms too long."

"Of thy guilt or innocence I know nought," replied the King; "but this I know, that I will guard thee safely till thine Emperor send me the head of Chrysaphius, the murdering slave who first sought to tempt my subjects into treachery. Away with Vigilius, till he pay the purchase of his base life; and away with this Azimantine, till Orestes and Eslaw, my envoys, bring me the head of the eunuch from my slave the Emperor."

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In the solitude of a dark unlighted hut, stretched upon a bear's hide, which had been cast down for his bed, lay the young Chief of Azimantium, pondering his hard fate, while the sounds of many a gay and happy voice without, struck with painful discord upon his unattuned ear. Dark and melancholy, the fancies flitted across his brain like the visions of dead friends seen in the dim atmosphere of troubled sleep, and he revolved in his mind that bold cowardice of his ancestors, which taught them to fly from the sorrows and dangers of their fate, by the sure but gloomy passage of the tomb. Was it virtue, he asked himself, or vice? wisdom, or insanity, that allied the last despair to the last hope, and made self-murder the cure of other ills? And, as he thought, sorrow took arms against his better mind, and whispered like a fiend, " Die! Die, Menenius! Peace is in the grave!" A new

and painful struggle was added to the evils of his state, and still he thought of death as hours and days went by. Nor was this all; for, as the Dacians tame the lions for the imperial shows, the Huns strove to break his spirit, and subdue his high heart, by reiterated anxieties and cares. Now, he was told of wars with the Empire, and the fall of Greece: now, strange whispers were poured into his ear, of some direful fate reserved for himself: now, he heard of the great annual sacrifice offered at the altar of Mars, where a hundred captive maidens washed the platform with their blood. But still, like the great hero of the mighty founder of the Epic song, he rose above the waves that were poured upon his head, and still answered, "Never! Never!" when the name of Azimantium was connected with the dominion of the Huns.

long ere my eyes rested on your loveliness, Honoria was bound to my heart by ties of old affection; and, as your soul is generous and noble, fancy all the gratitude that your blessed words waken in my bosom. Oh! let the thought of having raised me from despair-of having freed me from bonds of having crowned me with happiness, find responsive joy in your bosom, and let the blessing that you give, return and bless you also."

Iërnë pressed her hand firm upon her forehead, and gazed upon Menenius while he spoke, with eyes whose bright but unsteady beams seemed borrowed from the shifting meteors of the night. The graceful arch of her full coral lip quivered; but she spoke not; and, waving with her hand, the attendants loosened the chains from the hands of the Azimantine, and, starting on his feet, Menenius was free.

In the brightness and the blaze of a thousand torches, the Chief of Azimantium stood in the halls of Attila, with the hand of Honoria clasped in his own. Sorrow and anxiety had touched, but not stolen, her beauty

charm. Every glance was softened

It was one night when a darker melancholy than ever oppressed his mind, and despondency sat most heavy on his soul, that the door was cast open, and a blaze of light burst upon his sight. His eyes, familiar with the darkness, refused at first to scan the broad glare; but when at length they did their office, he be--had changed, but not withered, a held, in the midst of her slaves, that fair girl lërnë, whose offered hand he had refused. Her cheek, which had been as warm as the last cloud of the summer evening, was now as pale as the same cloud when, spirit-like, it flits across the risen moon. But her eye had lost none of its lustre; and it seemed, in truth, as if her whole soul had concentrated there to give fuller effulgence to its living light.

every feature had a deeper interest-and joy shone the brighter for the sorrow that was gone, like the mighty glory of the sun when the clouds and the tempests roll away.

The dark Monarch of the barbarians gazed on the work he had wrought, and the joy that he had given; and a triumphant splendour, more glorious than the beams of bat"Chief of Azimantium," said the tle, radiated from his brow. "Chief maiden," it is my father's will that of Azimantium," he said, " thou art you be freed, and I-that the gene- gold tried in the fire, and Attila adrosity of Attila should know no pe- mires thee though a Greek-Not for nury-I have prayed, that though the beauty of thy form at all-let Menenius slighted Iërnë, he should girls and pitiful limners think of that! wed the woman of his love even in -not for thy strength and daring lërnë's father's halls. My prayer alone-such qualities are for soldiers has been granted-the banquet is and gladiators; but for thy dauntless, prepared-the maiden is warned, and unshrinking, unalterable resolution the blushes are on her cheek-a-the virtue of kings, the attribute priest of thine own God is ready.- of gods-Were Attila not Attila, he Rise, then, Chief of Azimantium, and would be Menenius. Thou hast change a prison for thy bridal bed. robbed me of a bride! Thou hast Rise, and follow the slighted lerne." taken a husband from my daughter; "Oh, lady!" answered Menenius, but Attila can conquer-even himself. "call not thyself by so unkind a Sound the hymeneal! Advance to name. Write on your memory, that, the altar! Yon priest has long been

a captive among us, but his blessing on Honoria and Menenius shall bring down freedom on his own head."

The solemnity was over-the barbarian guests were gone, and through the flower-strewed passages of the palace, Honoria and Menenius were led to their bridal chamber; while a thousand thrilling feelings of joy, and hope, and thankfulness, blended into one tide of delight, poured from their mutual hearts through all their frames, like the dazzling sunshine of the glorious noon streaming down some fair valley amidst the mountains, and investing every object round in misty splendour, and dreamlike light. The fruition of long delayed hope, the gratification of early and passionate love, was not all; but it seemed as if the dark cloudy veil between the present and the future had been rent for them by some divine hand, and that a long vista of happy years lay before their eyes in bright perspective to the very horizon of being. Such were the feelings of both their bosoms, as, with linked hands and beating hearts, they approached the chamber assigned to them; but their lips were silent, and it was only the love-lighted eye of Menenius, as it rested on the form of his bride, and the timid, downcast, but not unhappy glance of Honoria, that spoke the world of thoughts that crowded in their breasts.

A band of young girls, with the pale Iërnë at their head, met them singing at the door of their chamber. The maidens strewed their couch with flowers, and Iërnë gave the marriage cup to the hand of Honoria; but as she did so, there was a wild uncertain light in her eye, and a quivering eagerness on her lip, that made Menenius hold Honoria's arm as she was about to raise the chalice to her mouth. "Ha! I had forgot," said the Princess, taking back the goblet with a placid smile, " I must drink first, and then, before the moon be eleven times renewed, I too shall be a bride.-Menenius the brave! Honoria the fair! Happy lovers, I drink to your good rest! May your sleep be sound! May your repose be unbroken!" and with calm and graceful dignity, she drank a third part of the mead. Honoria drank also, according to the custom; Me

nenius drained the cup, and the maidens withdrawing, left the lovers to their couch. Honoria hid her eyes upon the bosom of Menenius, and the warrior, pressing her to his bosom, spoke gentle words of kind assurance, but in a moment her hand grew deathly cold. "Menenius, I am faint," she cried: "What is it that I feel? My heart seems as it were suddenly frozen, and my blood changed into snow. Oh, Menenius! Oh, my beloved! we are poisoned; I am dying! That cup of mead— that frantic girl-she has doomed us and herself to death."

As she spoke, through his own frame the same chill and icy feelings spread. A weight was upon his heart, his warm and fiery blood grew cold, the strong sinews lost their power, the courageous soul was quelled, and he gazed in speechless, unnerved horror on Honoria, while shade by shade, the living rose left her cheek, and the "pale standard" of life's great enemy marked his fresh conquest on her brow. Her eyes which, in the hour of joy and expectation, had been bent to the earth, now fixed on his with a long, deep, earnest, imploring gaze of last affection. Her arms, no longer timid, circled his form, and the last beatings of her heart throbbed against his bosom. "Thou too art dying!" she said, as she saw the potent hemlock spread death over his countenance, "thou too art dying! Menenius will not leave Honoria even in this last long journey.-We go-we go together;" and faintly she raised her hand, and pointed to the sky, where, through the casement, the bright autumn moon poured her melancholy splendour over the Hungarian hills. A film came over her eyes-a dark unspeakable grey shadow! and oh, it was horrible to see the bright angel part from its clay tabernacle !

In the athletic frame of the lover, the poison did not its cruel office so rapidly. He saw her fade away before his eyes-he saw her pass like a flower that had lived its summer day, in perfume and beauty, and faded with the falling of the night. He could not-he would not so lose her.-He would call for aid-some precious antidote should give her

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back to life. He unclasped the faint arms that still clung upon his neck. He rose upon his feet, with limbs reduced to infant weakness. His brain reeled. His heart seemed crushed beneath a mountain: but still he staggered forth. He heard voices before him. 'Help! Help!" he cried, "Help, ere Honoria die!" With the last effort of existence, he rushed forward, tore open the curtain before him, reeled forward to the throne on which Attila held his midnight council-stretched forth his arms-but power-voice-sense -being-passed away, and Menenius fell dead at the Monarch's feet. "Who has done this?" exclaimed the King, in a voice of thunder. "Who has done this? By the god of battles, if it be my own children, they shall die! Is this the fate of Menenius? Is this the death that the hero of Azimantium should have known?-No! No! No! red on the battle-field-gilded with the blood of enemies-the last of a slain, but not a conquered host-so should the chief have died.-Menenius! Kinsman in glory! Attila weeps for the fate of his enemy!"

"Lord of the world! Lord of the world!" exclaimed a voice that hurried forward from the chambers beyond, "thy daughter is dead in the arms of her maidens; and dying, she sent thee word, that sooner than forbear to slay her enemies, she had drunk of the cup which she had mingled for them."

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was, indeed, my daughter! But let her die, for she has brought a stain upon the hospitality of her father; and the world will say that Attila, though bold, was faithless."

There was woe in Azimantium, while, with slow and solemn pomp, the ashes of Honoria and Menenius were borne into the city. In the face of the assembled people, the deputies of Attila, by oath and imprecation, purified their lord from the fate of the lovers. The tale was simple, and soon told, and the children of Azimantium believed.

Days, and years, and centuries, rolled by, and a race of weak and effeminate monarchs, living alone by the feebleness and barbarism of their enemies, took care that Azimantium should not long remain as a monument of reproach to their degenerate baseness. Nation followed nation; dynasty succeeded dynasty; a change came over the earth and its inhabitants, and Azimantium was no more. Still, however, the rock on which it stood bears its bold front towards the stormy sky, with the same aspect of courageous daring with which its children encountered the tempest of the Huns.

A few ruins, too-rifted walls, and dark fragments of fallen fanesthe pavement of some sweet domestic hearth long cold-a graceful capital, or a broken statue, still tell that a city has been there; and through the country round about, the wild and scattered peasantry, still in the song, and the tale, and the vague tradition, preserve in various shapes The Story of Azimantium!

THE PROCESSION.

BY MRS HEMANS.

"The peace which passeth all understanding," disclosed itself in her looks and movements. It lay on her countenance like a steady unshadowed moonlight.

THERE were trampling sounds of many feet,
And music rush'd through the crowded street;
Proud music, such as tells the sky,
Of a chief returned from victory.

There were banners to the winds unroll'd,
With haughty words on each blazon'd fold;
High battle-names, which had rung of yore,
When lances clash'd on the Syrian shore.

COLERIDGE.

Borne from their dwellings, green and lone,

There were flowers of the woods on the pathway strown; And wheels that crush'd as they swept along

Oh! what doth the violet amidst the throng?

I saw where a bright Procession pass'd
The gates of a Minster, old and vast;
And a king to his crowning place was led,
Through a sculptur'd line of the warrior dead.

I saw, far gleaming, the long array

Of trophies, on those high tombs that lay,
And the coloured light, that wrapp'd them all,
Rich, deep, and sad, as a royal pall.

But a lowlier grave soon won mine eye
Away from th' ancestral pageantry:
A grave by the lordly Minster's gate,
Unhonour'd, and yet not desolate.

It was but a dewy greensward bed,
Meet for the rest of a peasant head;
But Love-Oh! lovelier than all beside!-
That lone place guarded and glorified.

For a gentle form stood watching there,
Young-but how sorrowfully fair!
Keeping the flowers of the holy spot,
That reckless feet might profane them not.

Clear, pale and clear, was the tender cheek,
And her eye, though tearful, serenely meek;
And I deem'd, by its lifted gaze of love,
That her sad heart's treasure was all above.

For alone she seem'd midst the throng to be,
Like a bird of the waves far away at sea;
Alone, in a mourner's vest array'd,
And with folded hands, e'en as if she pray'd.

It faded before me, that masque of pride,
The haughty swell of the music died;
Banner, and armour, and tossing plume,
All melted away in the twilight's gloom.

But that orphan form, with its willowy grace,
And the speaking prayer in that pale, calm face,
Still, still o'er my thoughts in the night-hour glide-
-Oh! Love is lovelier than all beside.

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