fficulty,
dismissed; and, refusing to retire to rest, she spent the night in
examining the chamber, which she found was secured, and in thoughts of
Zanoni, in whose power she felt an almost preternatural confidence.

Meanwhile the prince descended the stairs and sought the room into which
the stranger had been shown.

He found the visitor wrapped from head to foot in a long robe,
half-gown, half-mantle, such as was sometimes worn by ecclesiastics. The
face of this stranger was remarkable. So sunburnt and swarthy were his
hues, that he must, apparently, have derived his origin amongst the
races of the farthest East. His forehead was lofty, and his eyes so
penetrating yet so calm in their gaze that the prince shrank from them
as we shrink from a questioner who is drawing forth the guiltiest secret
of our hearts.

"What would you with me?" asked the prince, motioning his visitor to a
seat.

"Prince of --," said the stranger, in a voice deep and sweet, but
foreign in its accent,--"son of the most energetic and masculine race
that ever applied godlike genius to the service of Human Will, with its
winding wickedness and its stubborn grandeur; descendant of the great
Visconti in whose chronicles lies the history of Italy in her palmy
day, and in whose rise was the development of the mightiest intellect,
ripened by the most restless ambition,--I come to gaze upon the last
star in a darkening firmament. By this hour to-morrow space shall know
it not. Man, unless thy whole nature change, thy days are numbered!"

"What means this jargon?" said the prince, in visible astonishment and
secret awe. "Comest thou to menace me in my own halls, or wouldst
thou warn me of a danger? Art thou some itinerant mountebank, or some
unguessed-of friend? Speak out, and plainly. What danger threatens me?"

"Zanoni and thy ancestor's sword," replied the stranger.

"Ha! ha!" said the prince, laughing scournfully; "I half-suspected thee
from the first. Thou art then the accomplice or the tool of that most
dexterous, but, at present, defeated charlatan? And I suppose thou wilt
tell me that if I were to release a certain captive I have made, the
danger would vanish, and the hand of the dial would be put back?"

"Judge of me as thou wilt, Prince di --. I confess my knowledge of
Zanoni. Thou, too, wilt know his power, but not till it consume thee.
I would save, therefore I warn thee. Dost thou ask me why? I will tell
thee. Canst thou remember to h