ned:
And they, the martyrs, red at every pore:
The blood-sown Truth of all these mighty dead
Ye have ingarnered, and the fruit appears
Nursed unto giant growth to the full days--
Now, Lebanon is shaken--Isles outspread
Amid the seas are stirred--they who sowed in tears
In gladness now the harvest paean raise.

ROCHESTER'S RETURN.

OR THE KING OUTWITTED.

BY JOSEPH A. NUNES.

CHAPTER I.

"We shall see," gentlemen, said King Charles, as he strode with a
hasty step across the apartment, "whether my lord of Rochester's
presence is as essential to the court and to the amusement of the
king, as his vanity induces him to suppose."

"The expression was a thoughtless one," observed the young Count de
Grammont, who was present, "and doubtless not intended for your
majesty's ears."

"Yet it was made, De Grammont," replied the king, "and, by the soul of
St. Paul! he shall be responsible for it. Rochester presumes too much
on our clemency, which he has so often experienced, but which he shall
have no reason to slight again."

"Be merciful, my liege, for the sake of his wit," said the Duke of
Buckingham, with an ill-concealed smile at the king's petulance.

"Better he had none, George," replied the king, "for he knows not how
to use it. Odds-fish! he as essential to Charles as Charles to him! We
have more wits at court, my lords, than Rochester. There's yourself,
Buckingham, and De Grammont, there, and Killegrew, Sedly, and a dozen
others who can make a pigmy of this Goliah!"

"But your majesty will limit the period of his disgrace?" asked De
Grammont, who was sincerely friendly toward the obnoxious earl.

"We will put this limit to it, and none other," replied Charles. "When
Rochester's wit is seductive enough to induce his king, personally, to
wait upon him three several times, or to command his presence at
court, then he may return, and not before; but come, gentleman, we
have other things to attend to this morning without wasting time upon
an ingrate."

CHAPTER II.

The wittiest man at the wittiest court in Europe--that of Charles the
Second of England--was undoubtedly John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester; and
innumerable are the anecdotes that have been related of him in
connection with his friend and sovereign, Charles. Rochester's wit,
however, sometimes resulted in inconvenience to himself, and was
occasionally the means of having him banished from the court. This
circumsta