nd is absent from the
tents without leave,' he answered. 'Take her prisoner to Alaric; she
will bear us witness that we have done as he commanded us. As for the
girl,' he continued, glancing at the blood on Antonina's dress, and
stirring her figure carelessly with his foot, 'she may be dead too, for
she neither moves nor speaks, and may be left like her protector to lie
graveless where she is. For us, it is time that we depart--the king is
impatient of delay.'

As they led her roughly from the house, Goisvintha shuddered, and
attempted to pause for a moment when she passed the corpse of the Goth.
Death, that can extinguish enmities as well as sunder loves, rose awful
and appealing as she looked her last at her murdered brother, and
remembered her murdered husband. No tears flowed from her eyes, no
groans broke from her bosom; but there was a pang, a last momentary
pang of grief and pity at her heart as she murmured while they forced
her away--'Aquileia! Aquileia! have I outlived thee for this!'

The troops retired. For a few minutes silence ruled uninterruptedly
over the room where the senseless girl still lay by the side of all
that was left to her of the object of her first youthful love. But ere
long footsteps again approached the farm-house door, and two Goths, who
had formed part of the escort allotted to the Hun, approached the young
chieftain's corpse. Quickly and silently they raised it in their arms
and bore it into the garden. There they scooped a shallow hole with
their swords in the fresh, flower-laden turf, and having laid the body
there, they hastily covered it, and rapidly departed without returning
to the house.

These men had served among the warriors committed to Hermanric's
command. By many acts of frank generosity and encouragement, the young
chieftain had won their rough attachment. They mourned his fate, but
dared not obstruct the sentence, or oppose the act that determined it.
At their own risk they had secretly quitted the advancing ranks of
their comrades, to use the last privilege and obey the last dictate of
human kindness; and they thought not of the lonely girl as they now
left her desolate, and hurried away to reassume their appointed
stations ere it was too late.

The turf lay caressingly round the young warrior's form; its crushed
flowers pressed softly against his cold cheek; the fragrance of the new
morning wafted its pure incense gently about his simple grave! Around
him f