"Thou art an insolent!" cried Manfred. "Lord Marquis, it much
misgives me that this scene is concerted to affront me. Are my own

domestics suborned to spread tales injurious to my honour? Pursue
your claim by manly daring; or let us bury our feuds, as was proposed,

by the intermarriage of our children. But trust me, it ill becomes a
Prince of your bearing to practise on mercenary wenches."

"I scorn your imputation," said Frederic. "Until this hour I never
set eyes on this damsel: I have given her no jewel. My Lord, my

Lord, your conscience, your guilt accuses you, and would throw the
suspicion on me; but keep your daughter, and think no more of

Isabella. The judgments already fallen on your house forbid me
matching into it."

Manfred, alarmed at the resolute tone in which Frederic delivered
these words, endeavoured to pacify him. Dismissing Bianca, he made

such submissions to the Marquis, and threw in such artful encomiums on
Matilda, that Frederic was once more staggered. However, as his

passion was of so recent a date, it could not at once surmount the
scruples he had conceived. He had gathered enough from Bianca's

discourse to persuade him that heaven declared itself against Manfred.
The proposed marriages too removed his claim to a distance; and the

principality of Otranto was a stronger temptation than the contingent
reversion of it with Matilda. Still he would not absolutely recede

from his engagements; but purposing to gain time, he demanded of
Manfred if it was true in fact that Hippolita consented to the

divorce. The Prince, transported to find no other obstacle, and
depending on his influence over his wife, assured the Marquis it was

so, and that he might satisfy himself of the truth from her own mouth.
As they were thus discoursing, word was brought that the banquet was

prepared. Manfred conducted Frederic to the great hall, where they
were received by Hippolita and the young Princesses. Manfred placed

the Marquis next to Matilda, and seated himself between his wife and
Isabella. Hippolita comported herself with an easy gravity; but the

young ladies were silent and melancholy. Manfred, who was determined
to pursue his point with the Marquis in the remainder of the evening,

pushed on the feast until it waxed late; affecting unrestrained
gaiety, and plying Frederic with repeated goblets of wine. The

latter, more upon his guard than Manfred wished, declined his frequent
challenges, on pretence of his late loss of blood; while the Prince,

to raise his own disordered spirits, and to counterfeit unconcern,
indulged himself in plentiful draughts, though not to the intoxication

of his senses.
The evening being far advanced, the banquet concluded. Manfred would

have withdrawn with Frederic; but the latter pleading weakness and
want of repose, retired to his chamber, gallantly telling the Prince

that his daughter should amuse his Highness until himself could attend
him. Manfred accepted the party, and to the no small grief of

Isabella, accompanied her to her apartment. Matilda waited on her
mother to enjoy the freshness of the evening on the ramparts of the

castle.
Soon as the company were dispersed their several ways, Frederic,

quitting his chamber, inquired if Hippolita was alone, and was told by
one of her attendants, who had not noticed her going forth, that at

that hour she generally withdrew to her oratory, where he probably
would find her. The Marquis, during the repast, had beheld Matilda

with increase of passion. He now wished to find Hippolita in the
disposition her Lord had promised. The portents that had alarmed him

were forgotten in his desires. Stealing softly and unobserved to the
apartment of Hippolita, he entered it with a resolution to encourage

her acquiescence to the divorce, having perceived that Manfred was
resolved to make the possession of Isabella an unalterable condition,

before he would grant Matilda to his wishes.
The Marquis was not surprised at the silence that reigned in the

Princess's apartment. Concluding her, as he had been advertised, in
her oratory, he passed on. The door was ajar; the evening gloomy and

overcast. Pushing open the door gently, he saw a person kneeling
before the altar. As he approached nearer, it seemed not a woman, but

one in a long woollen weed, whose back was towards him. The person
seemed absorbed in prayer. The Marquis was about to return, when the

figure, rising, stood some moments fixed in meditation, without
regarding him. The Marquis, expecting the holy person to come forth,

and meaning to excuse his uncivil interruption, said,
"Reverend Father, I sought the Lady Hippolita."

"Hippolita!" replied a hollow voice; "camest thou to this castle to
seek Hippolita?" and then the figure, turning slowly round, discovered

to Frederic the fleshless jaws and empty sockets of a skeleton, wrapt
in a hermit's cowl.

"Angels of grace protect me!" cried Frederic, recoiling.
"Deserve their protection!" said the Spectre. Frederic, falling on

his knees, adjured the phantom to take pity on him.
"Dost thou not remember me?" said the apparition. "Remember the wood

of Joppa!"
"Art thou that holy hermit?" cried Frederic, trembling. "Can I do

aught for thy eternal peace?"
"Wast thou delivered from bondage," said the spectre, "to pursue

carnal delights? Hast thou forgotten the buried sabre, and the behest
of Heaven engraven on it?"

"I have not, I have not," said Frederic; "but say, blest spirit, what
is thy errand to me? What remains to be done?"

"To forget Matilda!" said the apparition; and vanished.
Frederic's blood froze in his veins. For some minutes he remained

motionless. Then falling prostrate on his face before the altar, he
besought the intercession of every saint for pardon. A flood of tears

succeeded to this transport; and the image of the beauteous Matilda
rushing in spite of him on his thoughts, he lay on the ground in a

conflict of penitence and passion. Ere he could recover from this
agony of his spirits, the Princess Hippolita with a taper in her hand

entered the oratory alone. Seeing a man without motion on the floor,
she gave a shriek, concluding him dead. Her fright brought Frederic

to himself. Rising suddenly, his face bedewed with tears, he would
have rushed from her presence; but Hippolita stopping him, conjured

him in the most plaintive accents to explain the cause of his
disorder, and by what strange chance she had found him there in that

posture.
"Ah, virtuous Princess!" said the Marquis, penetrated with grief, and

stopped.
"For the love of Heaven, my Lord," said Hippolita, "disclose the cause

of this transport! What mean these doleful sounds, this alarming
exclamation on my name? What woes has heaven still in store for the

wretched Hippolita? Yet silent! By every pitying angel, I adjure
thee, noble Prince," continued she, falling at his feet, "to disclose

the purport of what lies at thy heart. I see thou feelest for me;
thou feelest the sharp pangs that thou inflictest - speak, for pity!

Does aught thou knowest concern my child?"
"I cannot speak," cried Frederic, bursting from her. "Oh, Matilda!"

Quitting the Princess thus abruptly, he hastened to his own apartment.
At the door of it he was accosted by Manfred, who flushed by wine and

love had come to seek him, and to propose to waste some hours of the
night in music and revelling. Frederic, offended at an invitation so

dissonant from the mood of his soul, pushed him rudely aside, and
entering his chamber, flung the door intemperately against Manfred,

and bolted it inwards. The haughty Prince, enraged at this
unaccountable behaviour, withdrew in a frame of mind capable of the

most fatal excesses. As he crossed the court, he was met by the
domestic whom he had planted at the convent as a spy on Jerome and

Theodore. This man, almost breathless with the haste he had made,
informed his Lord that Theodore, and some lady from the castle were,

at that instant, in private conference at the tomb of Alfonso in St.
Nicholas's church. He had dogged Theodore hither" target="_blank" title="ad.到那里 a.那边的">thither, but the gloominess

of the night had prevented his discovering who the woman was.
Manfred, whose spirits were inflamed, and whom Isabella had driven

from her on his urging his passion with too little reserve, did not
doubt but the inquietude she had expressed had been occasioned by her

impatience to meet Theodore. Provoked by this conjecture, and enraged
at her father, he hastened secretly to the great church. Gliding

softly between the aisles, and guided by an imperfect gleam of
moonshine that shone faintly through the illuminated windows, he stole

towards the tomb of Alfonso, to which he was directed by indistinct
whispers of the persons he sought. The first sounds he could

distinguish were -
"Does it, alas! depend on me? Manfred will never permit our union."

"No, this shall prevent it!" cried the tyrant, drawing his dagger, and