guests, living, speaking energies of the stars, were visible
above our heads? Are these bones the remains of their wandering upon
the surface, or of their flight into the deep?"

Suddenly the old man called them to him, and showed them the fresh
track of a human foot upon the ground. They could discover no more, so
that the old man concluded they might follow the track without fear of
meeting robbers. They were about to do this, when suddenly, as from a
great depth beneath their feet, a distinct strain arose. They listened
attentively, with not a little astonishment.

"In the vale I gladly linger,
Smiling in the dusky night,
For to me with rosy finger
Proffers Love his cup of light.

"With its dew my spirit sunken
Wafted is toward the skies,
And I stand in this life drunken
At the gate of paradise.

"Lulled in blessed contemplation,
Vexes me no petty smart;
O, the queen of all creation
Gives to me her faithful heart.

"Many years of tearful sorrows
Glorified this common clay,--
Thence a graven form it borrows,
Life securing it for aye.

"Here the lapse of days evanished
But a moment seems to me;
Backward would I turn, if banished,
Gazing hither gratefully."

All were most agreeably surprised and eagerly wished to discover the
singer.

After some search, they found in an angle of the right wall a deep
sunken path, to which the footsteps seemed to lead them. Soon they
thought they perceived a light, which became clearer as they
approached. A new vault of greater extent than those they had yet
passed opened before them, in the further extremity of which they saw a
human form sitting by a lamp, with a great book before him upon a slab,
in which he appeared to be reading.

The figure turned towards them, arose, and came forward. He was a man
whose age it were impossible to guess. He seemed neither old nor young,
and no traces of time were discoverable, except in his smooth silvery
hair, which was parted on his forehead. An indescribable air of
serenity dwelt in his eyes, as if he were looking down from a clear
mountain into an infinite spring.

He had sandals upon his feet, and wore no other dress except a large
mantle cast around him, which added dignity to his noble form