hearing
the words--

"_C'est drole! c'est ma maison_--_ma maison veritable_!"

I remember staggering across a road, led by a soft hand, and entering a
gate, and a garden where there were benches, and statues, and
sweet-smelling flowers--I remember seeing servants come from the house
with lights, and that my arms were red, and my sleeves dripping with
blood! I remember from a female voice the cry--

"_Blesse_!" followed by a wild shriek; and of that scene I remember no
more!

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

WHERE AM I?

When I awoke to consciousness, it was day. A bright sun was pouring his
yellow light across the floor of my chamber; and from the diagonal
slanting of the beam, I could perceive that it was either very early in
the morning, or near sunset.

But birds were singing without. It must be morning, reasoned I.

I perceived that I was upon a low couch of elegant construction--without
curtains--but in their stead a mosquito-netting spread its gauzy meshes
above and around me. The snow-white colour and fineness of the linen,
the silken gloss of the counterpane, and the soft yielding mattress
beneath, imparted to me the knowledge that I lay upon a luxurious bed.
But for its extreme elegance and fineness, I might not have noticed
this; for I awoke to a sense of severe bodily pain.

The incidents of the preceding night soon came into my memory, and
passed rapidly one by one as they had occurred. Up to our reaching the
bank of the river, and climbing out of the water, they were all clear
enough. Beyond that time I could recall nothing distinctly. A house, a
large gateway, a garden, trees, flowers, statues, lights, black
servants, were all jumbled together on my memory.

There was an impression on my mind of having beheld amid this confusion
a face of extraordinary beauty--the face of a lovely girl! Something
angelic it seemed; but whether it had been a real face that I had seen,
or only the vision of a dream, I could not now tell. And yet its
lineaments were still before me, so plainly visible to the eye of my
mind, so clearly outlined, that, had I been an artist, I could have
portrayed them! The face alone I could remember nothing else. I
remembered it as the opium-eater his dream, or as one remembers a
beautiful face seen during an hour of intoxication, when all else is
forgotten! Strange to say, I did not associate this face with my
companion of the night; and my remembrance painted it not at all li