bronze, which led to the covered way that conducted to the temple,
but it was closed. Baffled and almost in despair, a distant chorus
reached his ear, then the tramp of feet, and then slowly the portal
opened. He imagined that the Queen was returning; but, on the contrary,
pages and women and priests swept by without observing him, for he was
hidden by one of the opened valves, but Astarte was not there; and,
though the venture was rash, Tancred did not hesitate, as the last
individual in the procession moved on, to pass the gate. The portal
shut instantly with a clang, and Tancred found himself alone and in
comparative darkness. His previous experience, however, sustained him.
His eye, fresh from the sunlight, at first wandered in obscurity, but
by degrees, habituated to the atmosphere, though dim, the way was
sufficiently indicated, and he advanced, till the light became each step
more powerful, and soon he emerged upon the platform, which faced the
mountain temple at the end of the ravine: a still and wondrous scene,
more striking now, if possible, when viewed alone, with his heart the
prey of many emotions. How full of adventure is life! It is monotonous
only to the monotonous. There may be no longer fiery dragons, magic
rings, or fairy wands, to interfere in its course and to influence our
career; but the relations of men are far more complicated and numerous
than of yore; and in the play of the passions, and in the devices of
creative spirits, that have thus a proportionately greater sphere for
their action, there are spells of social sorcery more potent than all
the necromancy of Merlin or Friar Bacon.

Tancred entered the temple, the last refuge of the Olympian mind. It was
race that produced these inimitable forms, the idealised reflex of
their own peculiar organisation. Their principles of art, practised by a
different race, do not produce the same results. Yet we shut our eyes to
the great truth into which all truths merge, and we call upon the Pict,
or the Sarmatian, to produce the forms of Phidias and Praxiteles.

Not devoid of that awe which is caused by the presence of the solemn
and the beautiful, Tancred slowly traced his steps through the cavern
sanctuary. No human being was visible. Upon his right was the fane to
which Astarte led him on his visit of initiation. He was about to enter
it, when, kneeling before the form of the Apollo of Antioch, he beheld
the fair Queen of the Ansarey, motionless and sp