l be
vanquished in this second trial, and Maina will be yours--for you are
the protege of a greater than the Stadtholder. Adieu--we shall meet
again." On finishing this speech the Unknown advanced to the lake.
Immediately the waves bubbled up, and rose in vast billows; and opening
with dreadful noise, exposed an unfathomable abyss. At the same moment
thunder growled in the sky, the moon hid herself behind a veil of
clouds, and the brewer's son, half choked with the smell of brimstone,
fell insensible on the ground.

CHAPTER IV.

When Frederick came to his senses he found himself in his chamber,
seated on the same sofa of Utrecht brocade which he had watered with his
tears two hours before. On the table before him lay the fiddle which he
had dashed to atoms against the corner of the chimney. On seeing the
object of his affection, the enraptured musician, the rival of Castero,
rushed towards it with a cry of joyful surprise. He took the instrument
in his hands--he devoured it with his eyes, and then, at the summit of
his felicity, he clasped it to his bosom. The instrument was perfectly
uninjured, without even a mark of the absurd injustice of its owner. Not
a crack, not a fissure, only the two gracefully shaped Sec. Sec. to give vent
to the double stream of sound. But is he not the victim of some
trick--has no other fiddle been substituted for the broken Straduarius?
No!--'tis his own well-known fiddle, outside and in--the same delicate
proportions, the same elegant neck, and the same swelling rotundity of
contour that might have made it a model for the Praxiteles of violins.
He placed the instrument against his shoulder and seized the bow. But
all of a sudden he paused--a cold perspiration bedewed his face--his
limbs could scarcely support him. What if the proof deceives him. What
if--; but incertitude was intolerable, and he passed the bow over the
strings. Oh blessedness! Frederick recognized the unequalled tones of
his instrument--he recognized its voice, so clear, so melting, and yet
so thrilling and profound,

"The charm is done,
Life to the dead returns at last,
And to the corpse a soul has past."

Now, then, with his fiddle once more restored to him, with love in his
heart, and hatred also lending its invigorating energies, he felt that
the future was still before him, and that Castero should pay dearly for
his triumph of the former day.

When these transports had a little subsided, Frederi