the barrier of the Pincian Gate, an opportunity is
at length afforded of turning our attention towards a scene from which
it has been long removed. Let us now revisit the farm-house in the
suburbs, and look once more on the quiet garden and on Hermanric's
grave.

The tranquility of the bright warm day is purest around the retired
path leading to the little dwelling. Here the fragrance of wild flowers
rises pleasantly from the waving grass; the lulling, monotonous hum of
insect life pervades the light, steady air; the sunbeams, intercepted
here and there by the clustering trees, fall in irregular patches of
brightness on the shady ground; and, saving the birds which
occasionally pass overhead, singing in their flight, no living creature
appears on the quiet scene, until, gaining the wicket-gate which leads
into the farm-house garden, we look forth upon the prospect within.

There, following the small circular footpath which her own persevering
steps have day by day already traced, appears the form of a solitary
woman, pacing slowly about the mound of grassy earth which marks the
grave of the young Goth.

For some time she proceeds on her circumscribed round with as much
undeviating, mechanical regularity, as if beyond that narrow space rose
a barrier which caged her from ever setting foot on the earth beyond.
At length she pauses in her course when it brings her nearest to the
wicket, advances a few steps towards it, then recedes, and recommences
her monotonous progress, and then again breaking off on her round,
finally succeeds in withdrawing herself from the confines of the grave,
passes through the gate, and following the path to the high-road,
slowly proceeds towards the eastern limits of the Gothic camp. The
fixed, ghastly, unfeminine expression on her features marks her as the
same woman whom we last beheld as the assassin at the farm-house, but
beyond this she is hardly recognisable again. Her formerly powerful
and upright frame is bent and lean; her hair waves in wild, white locks
about her shrivelled face; all the rude majesty of her form has
departed; there is nothing to show that it is still Goisvintha haunting
the scene of her crime but the savage expression debasing her
countenance and betraying the evil heart within, unsubdued as ever in
its yearning for destruction and revenge.

Since the period when we last beheld her, removed in the custody of the
Huns from the dead body of her kinsman, the far