stic spectacle above described. With the disposition which this
reckless nobleman possessed to turn the most solemn and appalling
subjects to jest, he thought no season so fitting for such an
entertainment as the present--just as in our own time the lively
Parisians made the cholera, while raging in their city, the subject of a
carnival pastime. The exhibition witnessed by Chowles and Judith was a
rehearsal of the masque intended to be represented in the cathedral on
the following night.

Again marshalling his band, the Earl of Rochester beat his drum, and
skipping before them, led the way towards the south door of the
cathedral, which was thrown open by an unseen hand, and the procession
glided through it like a troop of spectres. Chowles, whose appearance
was not unlike that of an animated skeleton, was seized with a strange
desire to join in what was going forward, and taking off his doublet,
and baring his bony arms and legs, he followed the others, dancing round
Judith in the same manner that the other skeletons danced round their
partners.

On reaching the Convocation House, a door was opened, and the procession
entered the cloisters; and here Chowles, dragging Judith into the area
between him and the beautiful structure they surrounded, began a dance
of so extraordinary a character that the whole troop collected round to
witness it. Rochester beat his drum, and the other representatives of
mortality who were provided with musical instruments struck up a wild
kind of accompaniment, to which Chowles executed the most grotesque
flourishes. So wildly excited did he become, and such extravagances did
he commit, that even Judith stared aghast at him, and began to think his
wits were fled. Now he whirled round her--now sprang high into the
air--now twined his lean arms round her waist--now peeped over one
shoulder, now over the other--and at last griped her neck so forcibly,
that he might perhaps have strangled her, if she had not broken from
him, and dealt him a severe blow that brought him senseless to the
ground. On recovering, he found himself in the arched entrance of a
large octagonal chamber, lighted at each side by a lofty pointed window
filled with stained glass. Round this chamber ran a wide stone bench,
with a richly-carved back of the same material, on which the masquers
were seated, and opposite the entrance was a raised seat, ordinarily
allotted to the dean, but now occupied by the Earl of Rochester. A
c