CHAPTER XXI.
THE CASTLE FALLS.
The unfortunate Lady Aliva was in despair.
The cup of happiness had been rudely dashed from her lips. After all her perils and anxieties of the last few weeks, her lover had been suddenly restored to her; once more she had heard his voice, had listened to his vows and caressing words, but only to see him slain, as she imagined, by his rival before her very eyes. From the summit of unexpected joy she was plunged into a depth of misery tenfold harder to bear than that which had gone before. All hope seemed over.
But within some twenty-four hours she was rudely awakened from her grief by the horrible din of the assault, which at dawn of day commenced against the old tower and the inner bailey.
"Hark how the hall, resounding to the strain,
Shakes with the martial music's novel din!
The heralds of a warrior's haughty reign,
High-crested banners wave thy walls within.
Of changing sentinels, the distant hum,
The mirth of feasts, the clang of burnished arms,
The braying trumpets, and the hoarser drum
Unite in concert with increased alarms."
"The wall is rent, the ruins yawn,
And, with to-morrow's earliest dawn,
O'er the disjointed mass shall vault
The foremost of the fierce assault."
The storm of war reached nearer to the ladies in the keep than it had ever yet done. Through the crack of the closely-shuttered windows they could watch the fray below, and catch the sound of angry voices borne up to them, and mingling with the crash of falling masonry.
The Lady Margaret, whose shattered nerves could ill bear such tumult, betook herself to the little chapel in the angle of the wall, and passed the time upon her knees in prayer. But Aliva and Beatrice, impelled by the curiosity of youth, could not forbear to see what was to be seen.
The point of interest was the old tower. The girls knew it to be undermined, and watched anxiously to see it totter to its fall.
"I see a mass of soldiers gathering under the outer wall and halting as if for a signal," cried Aliva.