he stretched himself a moment upon
the green bank.

"Ha! what is that!" he exclaimed, bending forward to listen; "a
horseman? Let him come; friend or foe, I shall be glad to see him."

He was on his horse in a moment. As he turned to look behind, he saw a
gentleman, richly dressed, and admirably mounted, coming at full speed
from another quarter of the wood. The stranger was quite young, perhaps
a year or two older than our hunter, but certainly not over
twenty-three. The youth knit his brows as the horseman approached, and
eyed him keenly and sternly. When within a few yards of the spring, the
stranger dismounted and drew his sword. The youth did the same. His
handsome features were now distorted with anger and disdain, and it was
difficult to recognize in the fierce figure, that seemed the guardian
dragon of the fountain, the laughing boy who sat there so quietly a
moment before. The stranger appeared to return the bitter hatred.

"I have found you, Gilbert de Hers," he muttered; "your bugle has rung
your knell."

Gilbert replied but by a laugh of scorn, and the next instant their
swords gleamed in the air. But just as the two blades met with a sharp
clang, there came stealing through the wood the mellow sound of a
distant bell. It was like the voice of an angel forbidding strife. Those
soft, lingering notes seemed to have won a sweetness from the skies to
pour out upon the world, and, filling the space between field and cloud,
connected for a moment heaven and earth--for they wake in the heart of
man the same emotions more perfectly felt in paradise.

For many centuries after the destruction of the Roman Empire, when all
human institutions were swept away by the resistless torrent that poured
from the North, and the Church of God alone stood safe and firm, with
the rainbow of heaven around her, the stern warriors of Germany asserted
their rights, or redressed their wrongs with the sword, and scorned to
bow before the impotent decrees of a civil tribunal. A regular system of
private warfare gradually sprang up, which falsely led every man of
honor to revenge any real or fancied offence offered to any of his
kindred. The most deadly enmity frequently existed between neighboring
chiefs, and the bitter feeling was transmitted unimpaired from father to
son. The most dreadful consequences inevitably resulted from this fatal
installation of might in the outraged temple of justice. Until lately a
blind prejudice and a