cabinet for the
gems of the world. The daylight, shaded by high and deep-set casements
of stained glass, streamed in a purple and mellow hue over all that the
art of that day boasted most precious, or regal luxury held most dear.
The candelabras of the silver workmanship of Florence; the carpets and
stuffs of the East; the draperies of Venice and Genoa; paintings like
the illuminated missals, wrought in gold, and those lost colours of blue
and crimson; antique marbles, which spoke of the bright days of Athens;
tables of disinterred mosaics, their freshness preserved as by magic;
censers of gold that steamed with the odours of Araby, yet so subdued
as not to deaden the healthier scent of flowers, which blushed in every
corner from their marble and alabaster vases; a small and spirit-like
fountain, which seemed to gush from among wreaths of roses, diffusing
in its diamond and fairy spray, a scarce felt coolness to the air;--all
these, and such as these, which it were vain work to detail, congregated
in the richest luxuriance, harmonised with the most exquisite taste,
uniting the ancient arts with the modern, amazed and intoxicated the
sense of the beholder. It was not so much the cost, nor the luxury, that
made the character of the chamber; it was a certain gorgeous and almost
sublime phantasy,--so that it seemed rather the fabled retreat of
an enchantress, at whose word genii ransacked the earth, and fairies
arranged the produce, than the grosser splendour of an earthly queen.
Behind the piled cushions upon which Nina half reclined, stood four
girls, beautiful as nymphs, with fans of the rarest feathers, and at
her feet lay one older than the rest, whose lute, though now silent,
attested her legitimate occupation.

But, had the room in itself seemed somewhat too fantastic and
overcharged in its prodigal ornaments, the form and face of Nina would
at once have rendered all appropriate; so completely did she seem the
natural Spirit of the Place; so wonderfully did her beauty, elated as it
now was with contented love, gratified vanity, exultant hope, body forth
the brightest vision that ever floated before the eyes of Tasso, when
he wrought into one immortal shape the glory of the Enchantress with the
allurements of the Woman.

Nina half rose as she saw Ursula, whose sedate and mournful features
involuntarily testified her surprise and admiration at a loveliness
so rare and striking, but who, undazzled by the splendour arou