"Ah, aged and weather-wise as ever, sir chronicler;--I predict a fair
night, and many to follow."

"Patience needs no prophet," said Babbalanja. "The night, is at hand."

Hitherto the lagoon had been smooth: but anon, it grew black, and
stirred; and out of the thick darkness came clamorous sounds. Soon,
there shot into the air a vivid meteor, which bursting at the zenith,
radiated down the firmament in fiery showers, leaving treble darkness
behind.

Then as all held their breath, from Franko there spouted an eruption,
which seemed to plant all Mardi in the foreground.

As when Vesuvius lights her torch, and in the blaze, the storm-swept
surges in Naples' bay rear and plunge toward it; so now, showed
Franko's multitudes, as they stormed the summit where their monarch's
palace blazed, fast by the burning mountain.

"By my eternal throne!" cried Media, starting, "the old volcano has
burst forth again!"

"But a new vent, my lord," said Babbalanja.

"More fierce this, than the eruption which happened in my youth," said
Mohi--"methinks that Franko's end has come."

"You look pale, my lord," said Babbalanja, "while all other faces
glow;--Yoomy, doff that halo in the presence of a king."

Over the waters came a rumbling sound, mixed with the din of warfare,
and thwarted by showers of embers that fell not, for the whirling
blasts.

"Off shore! off shore!" cried Media; and with all haste we gained a
place of safety.

Down the valley now poured Rhines and Rhones of lava, a fire-freshet,
flooding the forests from their fastnesses, and leaping with them into
the seething sea.

The shore was lined with multitudes pushing off wildly in canoes.

Meantime, the fiery storm from Franko, kindled new flames in the
distant valleys of Porpheero; while driven over from Verdanna came
frantic shouts, and direful jubilees. Upon Dominora a baleful glare
was resting.

"Thrice cursed flames!" cried Media. "Is Mardi to be one
conflagration? How it crackles, forks, and roars!--Is this our funeral
pyre?"

"Recline, recline, my lord," said Babbalanja. "Fierce flames are ever
brief--a song, sweet Yoomy! Your pipe, old Mohi! Greater fires than
this have ere now blazed in Mardi. Let us be calm;--the isles were
made to burn;--Braid-Beard! hereafter, in some quiet cell, of this
whole scene you will but make one chapter;--come, digest it now."

"My face is scorched," cried Media.

"The last, last day!" cried Mohi.

"Not so, old ma