upposed would have stupefied and astounded everybody if made
public all at once."

"Strange--most strange," thought Wagner within himself, "that I should
never have gleaned all these details before, eager as my inquiries and
researches in the pursuit of knowledge have been. But Heaven has willed
everything for the best; and it is doubtless intended that my salvation
shall proceed from the very quarter which was least known to me, and
concerning which I have manifested the most contemptuous indifference,
in the sphere of knowledge!"

"You appear to be much interested, signor," said the barber, "in this
same tale of Christianus Rosencrux. But there is too much intelligence
depicted on your countenance to allow me to suppose that you will place
any reliance on the absurd story. How is it possible, signor, that an
order could have existed for so many years without any one member ever
having betrayed the secrets which bind them all together? Moreover,
their place of abode and study is totally unknown to the world; and if
they inhabited the deepest caverns under the earth accident must, sooner
or later, have led to its discovery. Believe me, signor, 'tis naught
save a ridiculous legend; though a poor, ignorant man myself, I hope I
have too much good sense and too much respect for my father-confessor,
to suppose for a minute that there is on earth any set of men more
learned than the holy ministers of the church."

"How long ago is Christianus Rosencrux reported to have lived?" demanded
Wagner, suddenly interrupting the garrulous and narrow-minded Sicilian.

"There we are again!" he ejaculated. "The credulous declare that
Rosencrux discovered in the East the means of prolonging existence, and
though he was born as far back as the year 1359, he is still alive."

Had not the barber turned aside at that precise instant to fill an ewer
and place a towel for his customer's use, he would have been surprised
by the sudden start and the expression of ineffable joy which denoted
Fernand's emotions, as by a rapid calculation mentally made, our hero
perceived that if Rosencrux were born in 1359, and alive at that
moment--namely, in 1521--his age would be exactly one hundred and
sixty-two!

"It is Christianus Rosencrux, then," he said to himself, "whom I have
inquired for--whom I am to see--and who will dissolve the spell that has
been placed upon me. But where shall I seek him? whither shall I go to
find his secret abode?"

The d