much to fear if you enter the castle!" It is impossible to paint the frightful disorder which these words and the tears of Alice excited in the mind of the unfortunate youth. Scarcely has he strength to ask the cause of the dreadful evil which is announced to him. Alice is ignorant of it, but she has witnessed the anger of her father; and fears from it the most melancholy effects. Berenger recovers his spirits, his conscience reproaches him with nothing, and honor made it a duty to justify himself in the eyes of his benefactor. Alice presses him in vain to depart; at least for some hours, but he refuses to leave her.

During this painful debate, the day began to close; the cry of the bird of night was heard mingling with the distant song of the returning labourer. The lady Bertha, who had accompanied Alice, reminded her that the sound of the horn had been heard three times, and that the gates of the castle were about to be closed. Alice took the path towards the park, and Berenger remounting his steed, crossed the drawbridge at the moment when it began to tremble.

No servant presented himself at the steps to take his horse, which he left in the court. He repaired to the hall of arms, where he found the count who was talking with the prior of Rieux, and who received him with a terrible look.

Without permitting him to say a word, he showed him the satire in his own hand writing, which had fallen from his pocket while he was at the royal hotel Saint Pol. The duke of Berri had transmitted it to the lord of Neuville, leaving to him the punishment of the culprit. At the sight of this paper, of which he instantly discovered the crime and importance, the unfortunate youth grew pale, blushed, and turning his eyes filled with tears towards the prior, who sought to avoid them, he contented himself with protesting his innocence. Of what avail was a simple denial, opposed to written proofs!

The count, after having addressed him with the most bitter reproaches, ordered him instantly to leave the castle for ever. Stricken down by this last blow, Berenger, fell at the feet of the prior, and pronounced only these words "ah! Monsieur Prior." He had the meanness to preserve a silence which his victim was

too generous to break. It was in vain that the countess, alarmed by the grief of her daughter, interceded for the young master of horse. The count was inexorable.

The castle clock was striking twelve, and the moon in all her splendour, shed a sweet lustre over the country, when the youth recrossed the moat. Berenger, with despair and death in his thoughts, paused a few steps from the fosse, and as he contemplated these walls from which he was banished, burning tears rolled from his eyes. He kept them fixed upon the window of the chamber where the tender Alice had gone to pass a night of pain.

The sentinel who was walking on the inner parapet, perceived him and compelled him to depart. Uncertain of the part he was to act, Berenger wandered some time at random, and finally took the road to the castle of Presles, where he might find, near his good mother, the consolation of which his heart had so much need.

The emotion which he felt, on beholding once more, the spot where the years of his childhood had flitted away, on dreaming that he was going to embrace his mother after a separation of four years occupied his whole heart. He followed a path of the forest, which he remembered to have traversed, the first time that he rode on horseback. This path conducted him to the outer court, where he found a great number of peasants assembled. Their mournful and silent countenances at first excited only surprize; but he felt some uneasiness when he perceived the aged Raymond in tears, as he distributed alms to the crowd of poor, who surrounded him.

Berenger alighted from his horse and called him. Raymond recognised his young master, uttered a mournful cry and fell at his feet. The unfortunate young cavalier had lost his mother! She yielded after two days to a cruel disease, against which her youth contended for many years.

At this dreadful intelligence Berenger lost his senses. During eight days that this melancholy continued, the names of Alice, and of his mother, were the only words which he was heard to pronounce. The care bestowed upon him was not without success; his life at the moment when it was nearly extinguished was restored. As soon as he had recovered sufficient strength he repaired to the tomb of his mother. She reposed near her husband

in the centre of the church, and at that sacred spot he passed the whole day in meditation and tears.

This duty fulfilled, Berenger committed to the chaplain of the castle the care of his estate. He directed him to endow, in his name, four of the most virtuous young women of the village, whose first children should take the name of Alice or Berenger, and prepared the second time to leave his paternal roof. The morning of his departure, he shut himself up in the chapel, where he wrote a letter to Alice, which he charged Raymond to carry to her, and to bring him the answer to Dijon, where he was going to pass some time at the court of Burgundy.

During a visit which the duke of Burgundy had made to the lord of Neuville, young Berenger had attracted his attention.

Ideas of grandeur and ambition, were far from his mind; but he saw in glory the only means of again approaching Alice, and he hoped to find at the court of Philip some opportunity of distinguishing himself and attaining the honour of knighthood; it was in this hope that he directed his course to Dijon.

On the eighth day from his leaving the castle, he crossed a forest, some leagues from Auxerre. The heat was excessive, his horse as well as himself required some repose. He dismounted, and throwing the bridle over his arm, he seated himself at the foot of a tree, abandoning himself to reflections, in which the remembrance of Alice was mingled with sweet hopes, his eyes gradually closed, and without change of object his thoughts were converted into dreams. He slept profoundly, until he was awakened by a clashing of swords.

The first impulse of the young squire, was to leap upon his horse, and to hasten to the place, whence the noise proceeded. He found three men attacking a fourth, who was ready to fall under their blows. Berenger flew to his succour. His sudden appearance, and the vigour of his attack, alarmed the assailants, who dispersed and sought refuge in the depth of the forest. The knight to whom the youth had rendered this service, was the brave marshal de Loigny, who had been surprised in the neighbourhood of his castle by some of the armed brigands with which France was then overrun. Berenger thought he ought to conceal his name,

but the marshal required no less than that he should remain some days with him. This noble warrior having retired from the court, enjoyed in his honourable retreat, the happiness of private life, to which his love of letters added a new charm.

His castle was the resort of the troubadours, and every day witnessed some new festival. These pleasures, in which Berenger at any other time, would have indulged with so much delight, could not alienate his thoughts from the remembrance of his disgrace, the loss of his mother, and the adored image of Alice.

This deep melancholy at so tender an age, made the marshal desirous of knowing the cause; and his entreaties became so pressing, and so affectionate, that Berenger was obliged to yield to them. He employed some concealment in his recital, that he might not place the conduct of the prior of Rieux in an unfavourable light, but the marshal was convinced of his innocence, and offered to conduct him to the court, to justify himself in the eyes of the prince. Berenger declined this offer, declaring to his illustri ous protector that honour imposed silence on him, and on the morning of the fourth day from his arrival at Loigny, full of impatience to meet his faithful servant at Dijon, he took leave of the marshal who gave him, at parting, testimonies of the most lively affection. He arrived at Dijon; Raymond had been waiting there two days; he brought him a leaf of Alice's tablets, upon which the lovely girl had traced some words in haste:

"The anger of my father is still great," said she, "but he will not fail to be pleased with the glory which you will gain. Adieu.” These two lines, which made no change in the destiny of Berenger, were to him a source of inexpressible joy, and revived his courage and his hope. He suspended to the chain which his mother had given him, and which he bore on his neck, this talisman of love.

He loaded Raymond with presents, and sent him back to the castle of Presles, with a billet in which he contented himself with writing these words:

"You shall never see or hear any thing unworthy of me."

The next day he presented himself at the castle of the duke of Burgundy, where he found that entrance was refused to simple esquires. After eight days, more mortified than fatigued with the

journey which he had made to no purpose, as he was preparing to leave Dijon, he understood, that troops were levying to march against the duke of Guilders, and he immediately joined, as a volunteer, the army which the king commanded in person. The campaign was not so long, as it was bloody. Berenger covered himself with glory, and many brilliant deeds of arms would have gained for him honourable distinctions, had not the presence of the duke of Berri obliged him to conceal his name.

The duke of Guilders finished the war by doing homage to the king of France, and Berenger resolved to appear at the public games, which were about to be celebrated.

These games, recently instituted on a new plan, by Clemence Isaure, engaged the attention of the whole nation, and the names of the victors were proclaimed throughout France.

As Berenger excelled in the Chant Royal, he wrote a poem on the happy auspices of the new reign, which he sent to the assembly. It was superior to those of Cartel and Jean de Fontaine, the most famous poets of the time, and accordingly the prize was unanimously decreed to him. It was at the castle of Loigny, that he heard of his success, to which happiness the good marshal wished to put a finishing stroke by making him a knight. Alice and this dignity! Berenger thought of no greater happiness upon earth.

The chapel of the castle was arranged for the august ceremony. Many of the marshals companions in arms were invited to it, and came completely armed. After divine service, the chaplain having blessed the armour of the candidate, the marshal delivered to him the spurs, the mail, the cuirass, and gauntlet. Thus furnished, he girded him with his sword, saying:

Berenger, I give you this sword and commit it to your hands, praying God to bestow on you such and so good a heart that you may be as brave a knight as was formerly your father of valorous memory."

Then having given him the salute, and struck him three times on the neck with his sword, he added:

C

"In the name of God, of Saint Michael and Saint George, I make thee knight, be worthy, brave and loyal.”

The rest of the day was spent in festivities.