the _Auto da Fe_,--and everybody was discussing the
ceremony.

"I will see this grand procession," said Philip to himself, as he
threw himself on his bed. "It will drive thought from me for a time,
and God knows how painful my thoughts have now become. Amine, dear
Amine, may angels guard thee!"

Chapter XL

Although to-morrow was to end all Amine's hopes and fears--all her
short happiness--her suspense and misery--yet Amine slept until
her last slumber in this world was disturbed by the unlocking and
unbarring of the doors of her cell, and the appearance of the head
jailor with a light. Amine started up--she had been dreaming of her
husband--of happiness! She awoke to the sad reality. There stood the
jailor, with a dress in his hand, which he desired she would put on.
He lighted a lamp for her, and left her alone. The dress was of black
serge, with white stripes.

Amine put on the dress, and threw herself down on the bed, trying if
possible to recall the dream from which she had been awakened, but
in vain. Two hours passed away, and the jailor again entered, and
summoned her to follow him. Perhaps one of the most appalling customs
of the Inquisition is, that after accusation, whether the accused
parties confess their guilt or not, they return to their dungeons,
without the least idea of what may have been their sentence, and when
summoned on the morning of the execution they are equally kept in
ignorance.

The prisoners were all summoned by the jailors, from the various
dungeons, and led into a large hall, where they found their
fellow-sufferers collected.

In this spacious, dimly lighted hall were to be seen about two hundred
men, standing up as if for support, against the walls, all dressed in
the same black and white serge; so motionless, so terrified were they,
that if it had not been for the rolling of their eyes, as they watched
the jailors, who passed and repassed, you might have imagined them to
be petrified. It was the agony of suspense, worse than the agony of
death. After a time, a wax candle, about five feet long, was put into
the hands of each prisoner, and then some were ordered to put on
over their dress the _Sanbenitos_--others the _Samarias_! Those who
received these dresses, with flames painted on them, gave themselves
up for lost; and it was dreadful to perceive the anguish of each
individual as the dresses were one by one brought forward, and with
the heavy drops of perspiration on h