ech-Prince was
crawling with abominable contortions, now blowing himself out, and then
again extending himself, and groaning out, all the time,--"Gamaheh!
Still mine!"

In the middle of the hall, upon colossal microscopes, sate Leuwenhock
and Swammerdamm, making most piteous faces, and reproachfully calling
out to each other,--"See now! that was the point in the horoscope, the
meaning of which you could not interpret. The talisman is lost to us
for ever!"

Close upon the steps of the throne Doertje Elverdink and George Pepusch
seemed not so much to sleep as to be in a deep swoon.

Peregrine,--or, as we may now call him, King Sekakis,--flung back the
regal mantle that covered his breast, and, from within, the carbuncle
shot forth dazzling beams, like Heaven's fire, through the immense
hall.

The Genius, Thetel, again tried to rise, but he fell away, with a
hollow groan, into innumerable colourless flocks, which, driven by the
wind, were lost in the bushes.

With the most horrible cries of agony, the Leech-Prince shrunk up, and
vanished into the earth, while an indignant roar was heard, as if she
reluctantly received into her bosom the odious fugitive. Leuwenhock and
Swammerdamm had sunk down from the microscopes into themselves, and it
was plain, from their sighs and groans, that they were undergoing a
severe punishment.

But Doertje Elverdink and George Pepusch,--or, as we should now call
them, Princess Gamaheh and the Thistle, Zeherit,--had awakened from
their swoon, and knelt before the king. Their eyes were cast to earth,
as if unable to bear the burning splendour of the carbuncle.

Peregrine addressed them all with solemnity:

"Thou, who shouldst deceive men as the Genius, Thetel, thou wert
compounded, by the evil demon, of clay and feathers, and therefore the
beaming of love destroyed thee, empty phantom, and thou wert reduced to
thy original nothing.

"And thou too, blood-thirsty monster of the night, thou wast forced to
fly from the fire of the carbuncle into the bosom of the earth.

"But you, poor dupes, unhappy Swammerdamm, wretched Leuwenhock, your
whole life was one incessant error. You sought to inquire into Nature,
without suspecting the import of her inward being. You were
presumptuous enough to wish to penetrate into her workshop and watch
her secret labours, imagining that you could, without punishment, look
into the fearful mysteries of those depths, which are inscrutable to
the human eye.