e well-laden board, he thought he had never seen a pair
more formed for the poetic legends of their native Troubadours.

Montreal conversed gaily upon a thousand matters--pressed the wine
flasks--and selected for his guest the most delicate portions of the
delicious spicola of the neighbouring sea, and the rich flesh of the
wild boar of the Pontine Marshes.

"Tell me," said Montreal, as their hunger was now appeased--"tell me,
noble Adrian, how fares your kinsman, Signor Stephen? A brave old man
for his years."

"He bears him as the youngest of us," answered Adrian.

"Late events must have shocked him a little," said Montreal, with an
arch smile. "Ah, you look grave--yet commend my foresight;--I was the
first who prophesied to thy kinsman the rise of Cola di Rienzi; he seems
a great man--never more great than in conciliating the Colonna and the
Orsini."

"The Tribune," returned Adrian, evasively, "is certainly a man of
extraordinary genius. And now, seeing him command, my only wonder is how
he ever brooked to obey--majesty seems a very part of him."

"Men who win power, easily put on its harness, dignity," answered
Montreal; "and if I hear aright--(pledge me to your lady's health)--the
Tribune, if not himself nobly born will soon be nobly connected."

"He is already married to a Raselli, an old Roman house," replied
Adrian.

"You evade my pursuit,--Le doulx soupir! le doulx soupir! as the old
Cabestan has it"--said Montreal, laughing. "Well, you have pledged me
one cup to your lady, pledge another to the fair Irene, the Tribune's
sister--always provided they two are not one.--You smile and shake your
head."

"I do not disguise from you, Sir Knight," answered Adrian, "that when my
present embassy is over, I trust the alliance between the Tribune and a
Colonna will go far towards the benefit of both."

"I have heard rightly, then," said Montreal, in a grave and thoughtful
tone. "Rienzi's power must, indeed, be great."

"Of that my mission is a proof. Are you aware, Signor de Montreal, that
Louis, King of Hungary--"

"How! what of him?"

"Has referred the decision of the feud between himself and Joanna of
Naples, respecting the death of her royal spouse, his brother, to the
fiat of the Tribune? This is the first time, methinks, since the death
of Constantine, that so great a confidence and so high a charge were
ever intrusted to a Roman!"

"By all the saints in the calendar," cried Montreal, crossing hims