Bertram then compelled the lady to open the panel-door, and after ordering his men to remain for one hour in the house, and to suffer no one to enter or leave it, he accompanied Develour down to the street. When they reached the pavement, they saw a carriage just turn the Rue des Trois Labres, and a few loiterers looking after it. Bertram inquired of one of them if that carriage had passed the house? He replied that it had halted there for more than an hour; but that, a few minutes ago, two gentlemen came out with a lady and entered the carriage; that the elder of the two had shown a card to the coachman, and told him to drive ventre à terre to the Rue des Terres Fortes.
When Develour heard this, he said, hurriedly, to Bertram—
"I must leave you; my work here is accomplished; though I have but half succeeded. I must now fulfil another duty. Before morning dawns, I shall know where Louise is. Farewell, Bertram, but not for ever. When we meet again, I shall be better able to thank you."
"Nay, nay, we may meet again before to-morrow night. Fear not; all is well which Arabacca counsels; all ends well which he undertakes."
With these words, he turned and went into the house, and Develour hastened to the Rue de Burgoigne.
(To be continued.)
A SPRING CAROL.
BY MRS. A. A. BARNES.
Bright, balmy Spring! I greet thee now
With a hounding pulse and joyous brow;
Thy dewy breath, pure, soft, and bland,
Seems like a dream of a fairy land;
And open I throw the casement wide,
To inhale the dewy, delicious tide:
The fragrance soft of the budding trees
Is borne to me on the morning breeze;
The emerald turf is gemmed with dew,
That gleams like stars in the vault of blue;
The clouds are tinged with a rosy stain,
As the rising sun illumes the plain.
The early flowers, in their brightest bloom,
Have waked from their dark and cheerless tomb:
Sweet flowers! a halo and grace ye fling
Over the brow of the smiling spring;
Ye gladden the hearts in cottage homes
As freely as those in stateliest domes.
And the birds, the truants I watched for long,
Are greeting me now with carol and song;
From the "sunny south" they breathe to me,
In joyous chirp and wild song free,
The sweetest lays of a summer sky,
Where birds of glossiest plumage fly;
Where flowers are seen of the loveliest hue,
And the bending skies are softly blue;
Where the rippling waves of the dancing stream
Are kissed by the golden sunlight's gleam,
Whose banks are bright with the sheen of flowers
That rarely bloom in this clime of ours—
Blooms gorgeous enough to grace, I ween,
The brow of Oberon's fairy queen.
Sweet friend, I marvel, with skies like these,
Thou e'er shouldst tempt our northern breeze;
Yet welcome thou art as Spring's first green,
Pleasant to me as a bright "day-dream,"
That illumes for a while the sober sky,
And yet, like thee, too soon dost fly.