Illustrated Article.

THE CASTLE OF CLAIRMARAIS;

OR, THE FIEND OUTDONE.

A Tale of Diablerie,- From the French.

THE Sire of Clairmarais was a great hunter, and his lady the most beautiful in the province of Artois; but she was proud, and little beloved by her servants and vassals. One evening, towards the close of the autumn, she sat in her chamber embroidering a scarf destined to adorn the altar of the blessed St. Bertin. Her waiting-women were placed around her in silence; for she was too haughty to converse with them, or permit them to speak, unbidden, in her presence.

The Curfew had tolled from the belfry of St. Omer, and her husband had been at the chase since the gray of the morning. Suddenly a horn sounded at the gate of her castle. There was something So wild and strange in its tone, that it made the lady and her women start from their seats. A page went to inquire the cause of this interruption, and returned 11-VOL. V.

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saying, that a knight of noble mein, calling himself the Sire of. Brudemer, demanded hospitality. If some poor wretched traveller in danger of his life had stood beside the castle moat, it would have been long ere the drawbridge had descended to afford him refuge; but here was a noble and high-born cavalier,and the lady gave orders iustantly that he should be received and brought into her preseuce. According to the custom of the time, she employed herself in preparing the cup of wine, offered to all guests, as a mark of welcome; and she had scarcely filled it when the page announced and introduced the Sire of Brudemer in person. He advanced, and thanked her for the reception given to him, with that prepossessing courtesy then only to be found in the manners of men of noble lineage.

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"The swiftness of my horse," said he, separated me from my companions in the chase. Having lost my way, I wandered among the marshes and ravines of yonder forest, until a light which I saw at a distance led me hither. The fatigue and danger to which I have been exposed

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I shall never regret, since they have terminated in conducting me to the presence of a lady so noble and so fair."

There was something severe and extraordinary in the appearance of the stranger; but the grace and gallantry of his manner soon made it pass off unremarked. The waiting-women, who, according to the fashion of those days, had retired to the extremity of the chamber, where all might be seen, yet not all heard, failed not to remark the richness of his dress, the elegance of his form, the regularity of his features, and, above all, the wild and fiery expression of his eyes. If the lady felt an inexpressible charm in the society of her guest, it was not to be wondered at; for she was accustomed to converse chiefly with persons who could amuse her with little else than the fifty-times-told feats of their old lord, her husband, whom mature had formed rather for the field of battle than for a lady's bower.

Profiting by the advantages of his situation, Brudemer hesitated not to throw into his conversation more of flattery than even the chivalrous manners of the period permitted. The lady, commonly so proud

and disdainful, was subdued by an unknown power, and listened to him with out anger, and with a continually increasing emotion. Placing himself in a posi tion that hid the lady of Clairmarais from her women, he possessed himself of her hand, and pressed it ardently to his lips. It would be difficult to express her sensations. A fierce and supernatural fire circulated painfully through her veins She felt nothing of that soft languor-of that unspeakable delirium-which are so often the symptoms of an unfortunate attachment; it was rather the mental anguish-the cold sweat and shudderingof a conscious sinner. In her agitation she let fall the scarf which she was embroidering.

"Oh, if it were my lot to possess such a scarf!" said Brudemer. If the lady by whose fair hands it was wrought would but accept me as her knight, what store of lances would I break in her honour, at tourney and in battle!"

With a convulsive movement she lifted it up and placed it in his hands. Brudemer pressed the gift to his lips, to conceal a horrible smile, which he could not re

press; then suddenly let it fall with a start of pain and terror, like that of a man touched by fire. The chaplain had examined it that very evening, before the holy water had dried on his hands. Conquering his emotion, Brudemer approached close to the lady, and said in a low tone of voice,

"An old man conducted me to your castle. He was in great haste to meet with the Sire of Clairmarais, and waits even now at the postern, to reveal to him an important secret in which you are much concerned."

The lady grew pale. "He told me,' continued Brudemer, "the motives which led him to seek your husband with so much eagerness. It is,' said he,' that I may discover to him a mystery-a mystery, too, that will work a wondrous change in the manor of Clairmarais. She who calls herself mistress of it has chased me ignominiously from her castle; she has threatened to drown me in the moat should I return to it. The thankless wretch !-I will spoil her of her very titles and riches of which she is so proud!' As I hesitated to believe him, he told me further, that his wife had been foster-mother to the Count d'Erin; that the infant died unknown to any one but himself, and that he had placed you, his own daughter, in the cradle of the young deceased countess; and that you had been educated and married as the child of the count her father. He furnished me with numerous and unanswerable proofs of his frand. Let this mystery be once known to the Sire of Clairmarais, and he will not delay to repudiate a vassal whom he will regard merely as the daughter of a serf by whom he had been duped."

The lady wrung her hands in despair. "Listen," cried Brudemer, in a low tone of voice, but yet so that not one word he said was lost; listen!-the old man is still at the postern; take this poniard

come.

"But my father!"

" who

"No, you are right," said Brudemer, with a cold and cutting irony; knows they may not take pity on you, and admit you among the waiting-women of the new lady of Clairmarais? At the very worst, they can but shave your head and shut you up in a convent." The lady rose up, motioned to her women not to follow, and, giving her hand to Brude mer, went with him towards the postern.

The Sire of Clairmaraise, after having hunted all the day, returned fatigued to his manor, longing to find himself before a good fire by the side of his beautiful wife. He made such haste to gain his home, that he arrived there before any

of his huntsmen ; when all at once his horse stopped short at the gate of his castle, refused to go on, and began to shew signs of great terror. The rider was obliged to dismount. What was his surprise and grief to find the foster-father of his wife motionless on the ground, and deeply wounded in the breast. The attendants of the old seigneur at length arrived, and assisted him in trying to restore his vassal. Their attentions were not wholly useless. The wounded man made a dying effort to rise, and inclining his lips towards the ear of his master, whispered something which made him spring back with horror. Without losing a moment, or speaking a word, the Sire of Clairmarais went directly to the chamber of his lady. There she sat pale as death, before a narrow table; and, to disguise her agitation, pretended to play at chess with Brudemer. The latter, at the sight of the master of the castle, uttered a triumphant burst of laughter. The lady joined in it, but her's was the laugh of despair. To hear it was enough to convince the husband of his misfortunes, and of the truth of what he had heard from his dying serf.

"Satan," cried he, in a paroxysm of horror and indignation, "take thou the parricide-the adulterous wife; to thee 1 abandon her, and the castle which she pollutes with her presence."

"I accept them," said Brudemer; and at the same moment a crown of fire sparkled around his temples, and he stretched forth on the shoulders of the lady two terrible hands, which suddenly became armed with the talons of a demon. The Sire of Clairmarais entered into a religious house, and died in the odour of sanctity at the abbey of St. Bertin, More than two hundred years afterwards, a monk of the order of St. Bennet asked a citizen of St. Omar what castle it was, the towers of which he saw rising in the midst of a neighbouring wood, surrounded by an immense marsh.

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May our Lady and the saints protect us!" said the citizen, crossing himself with devotion; "that is the castle of Clairmarais; the place is accursed→→→ haunted by the evil one! Every night it is illuminated by a sudden glare of light; and the devil, and I know not how many spectres, appear there in chariots of fire. If one may believe the old people of the country, the demon who dwells in that castle is called Brudemer; and he forces all those who are bold enough to enter his habitation to play at chess with him, and stake their souls against the castle and the treasure it contains. Up to the present time the devil

has been constantly victorious, so that no one has returned from Clairmarais."

The monk listened to the citizen in silence, bade him adieu, and after some moments of reflection walked towards the castle. He entered it without obstacle, and at length found himself in a splendidly furnished chamber. In the middle of it stood a narrow table, and on it a chessboard and men, ready for play. Whilst he examined these objects, which the increasing obscurity of the evening began to render indistinct, a brilliant light spread itself suddenly through the apartment, which was at the same moment crowded with ladies in waiting, pages, and servants, all dressed after a fashion long since gone by. A knight richly clad now slowly entered the room. On his doublet was blazoned a shield bearing two tridents sable, with this deviceBrudemer. He supported on his arm a lady young and beautiful, but pale as a corpse. These were followed by eight pages, bending under the weight of four heavy coffers filled with gold. Brudemer placed himself at the chess-board, and made a sign that the monk should do the same. The monk obeyed, and both began to play without speaking a word. -By a skilful combination the monk thought that he had mated his adversary, when the pale lady who stood behind Brudemer, leaning on the back of his chair, bent towards him, and pointed with her finger to a particular pawn. The move she indicated was made, the face of the game changed, and the monk found himself on the point of being mated. Brudemer and the lady broke out into a triumphant fit of laughter, and all the attendants grouped themselves around the players, and took part in this infernal merriment. The monk now began to repent of his boldness; cold perspiration dropped from his forehead, and he would have given the world at that moment to have been safe in his convent. But he did not resign himself to despair. He saw that a miracle alone could save him, and so he prayed mentally to his patron, St. Bennet, for assistance. Suddenly, and as if by heavenly inspiration, a new combination suggested itself to his mind. He moved forward the piece on which it depended. The laugh which rung around him was changed into howlings, and the moment afterwards all was dark and silent as the grave. The monk passed the night in prayer, and saw the day break with a joy that may easily be conceived. In the place where the lady had stood on the preceding evening was a skeleton, clad in the rich but tattered vestments of a woman of quality. Possessor of the

SIR, AS Monsieur Chabert, by his recent experiments, has in some measure proved the efficacy of his antidote to prussic acid, and is likely to hold up his head again and excite the curiosity of both the learned and unwise of our metropolis, I take the liberty to forward you an account of the "Strange Doings" of another wonderful "Fire King,' which I met with in overlooking a volume of the Monthly Magazine for 1803. The following particulars were communicated to the editor of that periodical in the No. for September, by a correspondent residing at Paris, who was an eye witness to the facts which he states. To me, the performance appears equally astonishing as that of the hero of the present day. Should you think it possesses sufficient interest to merit an insertion in the columns of your unique