he forest."

"I will confess anything you please," replied Surrey evasively.

"And what have you seen?--a stranger vision than the first?" rejoined
the Fair Geraldine.

"Since your ladyship answers for me, there is no need for explanation on
my part," rejoined Surrey, with a faint laugh. "And know you not, that
those who encounter super natural beings are generally bound to profound
secrecy?"

"Such, I hope, is not your case, Henry?" cried the Lady Mary Howard, in
alarm;--"nor yours, my lord?" she added to the Duke of Richmond.

"I am bound equally with Surrey," returned the duke mysteriously

"You pique my curiosity, my lords," said the Fair Geraldine; "and since
there is no other way of gratifying it, if the Lady Mary Howard will
accompany me, we will ourselves venture into the forest, and try whether
we cannot have a meeting with this wild huntsman. Shall we go to-night?

"Not for worlds," replied the Lady Mary, shuddering; "were I to see
Herne, I should die of fright."

"Your alarm is groundless," observed Richmond gallantly. "The presence
of two beings, fair and pure as yourself and the Lady Elizabeth
Fitzgerald, would scare away aught of evil."

The Lady Mary thanked him with a beaming smile, but the Fair Geraldine
could not suppress a slight laugh.

"Your grace is highly flattering," she said. "But, with all faith
in beauty and purity, I should place most reliance in a relic I
possess--the virtue of which has often been approved against evil
spirits. It was given by a monk--who had been sorely tempted by a demon,
and who owed his deliverance to it--to my ancestor, Luigi Geraldi of
Florence; and from him it descended to me."

"Would I had an opportunity of proving its efficacy!" exclaimed the Earl
of Surrey.

"You shall prove it, if you choose," rejoined the Fair Geraldine. "I
will give you the relic on condition that you never part with it to
friend or foe."

And detaching a small cross of gold, suspended by a chain from her neck,
she presented it to the Earl of Surrey.

"This cross encloses the relic," she continued; "wear it, and may it
protect you from all ill!"

Surrey's pale cheek glowed as he took the gift. "I will never past
with it but with life," he cried, pressing the cross to his lips, and
afterwards placing it next his heart.

"I would have given half my dukedom to be so favoured," said Richmond
moodily.

And quitting the little group, he walked towards the Lady Anne. "Henry,"
s