ejnour,--had he but delayed the last and most perilous
ordeal of daring wisdom until the requisite training and initiation had
been completed,--your ancestor would have stood with me upon an
eminence which the waters of Death itself wash everlastingly, but cannot
overflow. Your grandsire resisted my fervent prayers, disobeyed my most
absolute commands, and in the sublime rashness of a soul that panted
for secrets, which he who desires orbs and sceptres never can obtain,
perished, the victim of his own frenzy."

"He was poisoned, and Mejnour fled."

"Mejnour fled not," answered the stranger, proudly--"Mejnour could not
fly from danger; for to him danger is a thing long left behind. It was
the day before the duke took the fatal draft which he believed was to
confer on the mortal the immortal boon, that, finding my power over him
was gone, I abandoned him to his doom. But a truce with this: I loved
your grandsire! I would save the last of his race. Oppose not thyself
to Zanoni. Yield not thy soul to thine evil passions. Draw back from the
precipice while there is yet time. In thy front, and in thine eyes, I
detect some of that diviner glory which belonged to thy race. Thou hast
in thee some germs of their hereditary genius, but they are choked up
by worse than thy hereditary vices. Recollect that by genius thy house
rose; by vice it ever failed to perpetuate its power. In the laws
which regulate the universe, it is decreed that nothing wicked can long
endure. Be wise, and let history warn thee. Thou standest on the verge
of two worlds, the past and the future; and voices from either shriek
omen in thy ear. I have done. I bid thee farewell!"

"Not so; thou shalt not quit these walls. I will make experiment of thy
boasted power. What, ho there!--ho!"

The prince shouted; the room was filled with his minions.

"Seize that man!" he cried, pointing to the spot which had been filled
by the form of Mejnour. To his inconceivable amaze and horror, the spot
was vacant. The mysterious stranger had vanished like a dream; but a
thin and fragrant mist undulated, in pale volumes, round the walls of
the chamber. "Look to my lord," cried Mascari. The prince had fallen to
the floor insensible. For many hours he seemed in a kind of trance. When
he recovered, he dismissed his attendants, and his step was heard in his
chamber, pacing to and fro, with heavy and disordered strides. Not till
an hour before his banquet the next day did he seem