e palm. The little
negresses were perfectly awe-stricken by this oracular display.
Josephine, however, was only amused, and smiling, said,

"So you discover something very extraordinary in my destiny?"

"Yes!" replied the negress, with an air of great solemnity.

"Is happiness or misfortune to be my lot?" Josephine inquired.

The negress again gazed upon her hand, and then replied, "Misfortune;"
but, after a moment's pause, she added, "and happiness too."

"You must be careful, my good woman," Josephine rejoined, "not to commit
yourself. Your predictions are not very intelligible."

The negress, raising her eyes with an expression of deep mystery to
heaven, rejoined, "I am not permitted to render my revelations more
clear."

In every human heart there is a vein of credulity. The pretended
prophetess had now succeeded in fairly arousing the curiosity of
Josephine, who eagerly inquired, "What do you read respecting me in
futurity? Tell me exactly."

[Illustration: THE SIBYL.]

Again the negress, assuming an air of profound solemnity, said, "You
will not believe me if I reveal to you your strange destiny."

"Yes, indeed, I assure you that I will," Josephine thoughtlessly
replied. "Come, good mother, do tell me what I have to hope and what to
fear."

"On your own head be it, then. Listen. You will soon be married. That
union will not be happy. You will become a widow, and then you will be
Queen of France. Some happy years will be yours, but afterward you will
die in a hospital, amid civil commotions."

The old woman then hurried away. Josephine talked a few moments with the
young negroes upon the folly of this pretended fortune-telling, and
leaving them, the affair passed from her mind. In subsequent years, when
toiling through the vicissitudes of her most eventful life, she recalled
the singular coincidence between her destiny and the prediction, and
seemed to consider that the negress, with prophetic vision, had traced
out her wonderful career.

But what is there so extraordinary in this narrative? What maiden ever
consulted a fortune-teller without receiving the agreeable announcement
that she was to wed beauty, and wealth, and rank? It was known
universally, and it was a constant subject of plantation gossip, that
the guardians of Josephine were contemplating a match for her with the
son of a neighboring planter. The negroes did not think him half worthy
of their adored and queenly Josephine. They suppos