at least none of your contrivance?"

"I had taught the girl who represented the queen. Her performance was
the result of my instructions. I supposed your highness would be not a
little astonished to find yourself known in this place, and (I entreat
your pardon, prince) your adventure with the Armenian gave me reason to
hope that you were already disposed to reject natural interpretations,
and to attribute so marvellous an occurrence to supernatural agency."

"Indeed," exclaimed the prince, at once angry and amazed, and casting
upon me a significant look; "indeed, I did not expect this."

[Neither did probably the greater number of my readers. The
circumstance of the crown deposited at the feet of the prince, in a
manner so solemn and unexpected, and the former prediction of the
Armenian, seem so naturally and obviously to aim at the same object
that at the first reading of these memoirs I immediately remembered
the deceitful speech of the witches in Macbeth:--

"Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!
All hail, Macbeth! that shall be king hereafter!"

and probably the same thing has occurred to many of my readers.

When a certain conviction has taken hold upon a man's mind in a
solemn and extraordinary manner, it is sure to follow that all
subsequent ideas which are in any way capable of being associated
with this conviction should attach themselves to, and in some
degree seem to be consequent upon it. The Sicilian, who seems to
have had no other motive for his whole scheme than to astonish the
prince by showing him that his rank was discovered, played, without
being himself aware of it, the very game which most furthered the
view of the Armenian; but however much of its interest this
adventure will lose if I take away the higher motive which at first
seemed to influence these actions, I must by no means infringe upon
historical truth, but must relate the facts exactly as they
occurred.--Note of the German Editor.]

"But," continued he, after a long silence, "how did you produce the
figure which appeared on the wall over the chimney?"

"By means of a magic lantern that was fixed in the opposite
window-shutter, in which you have undoubtedly observed an opening."

"But how did it happen that not one of us perceived the lantern?" asked
Lord Seymour.

"You remember, my lord, that on your re-entering the room it was
darkened by a thick smoke of fra