ed letters announced 'La route de
Bouvigne'--'we are on the highroad to Bouvigne, wherever that may be.'

'Bouvigne!' exclaimed she, in an accent of some alarm; 'why, it's five
leagues from the chateau! I travelled there once by the highroad. How
are we ever to get back?'

That was the very question I was then canvassing in my own mind, without
a thought of how it was to be solved. However, I answered with an easy
indifference, 'Oh, nothing easier; we 'll take a _caleche_ at Bouvigne.'

'But they 've none.'

'Well, then, fresh horses.'

'There's not a horse in the place; it's a little village near the Meuse,
surrounded with tall granite rocks, and only remarkable for its ruined
castle, the ancient schloss of Philip de Bouvigne.'

'How interesting!' said I, delighted to catch at anything which should
give the conversation a turn; 'and who was Philip de Bouvigne?'

'Philip,' said the lady, 'was the second or third count, I forget which,
of the name. The chronicles say that he was the handsomest and most
accomplished youth of the time. Nowhere could he meet his equal at joust
or tournament; while his skill in arms was the least of his gifts--he
was a poet and a musician. In fact, if you were only to believe his
historians, he was the most dangerous person for the young ladies of
those days to meet with. Not that he ran away with them, _sur la grande
route_.' As she said this, a burst of laughing stopped her; and it was
one I could really forgive, though myself the object of it. 'However,'
resumed she, 'I believe he was just as bad. Well, to pursue my story,
when Philip was but eighteen, it chanced that a party of warriors bound
for the Holy Land came past the Castle of Bouvigne, and of course passed
the night there. From them, many of whom had already been in Palestine,
Philip heard the wondrous stories the crusaders ever brought back of
combats and encounters, of the fearful engagements with the infidels and
the glorious victories of the Cross. And at length, so excited did his
mind become by the narrations, that he resolved on the spot to set out
for the Holy Land, and see with his own eyes the wonderful things they
had been telling him.

'This resolution could not fail of being applauded by the rest, and by
none was it met with such decided approval as by Henri de Bethune, a
young Liegeois, then setting out on his first crusade, who could not
help extolling Philip's bravery, and above all his devotion in the gre