t. John; and have men spoken of him fairly,
when they assert the sole stain on his laurels to be his avarice?"

Montreal bit his lip; nevertheless, he answered calmly, "My frankness
has brought its own penance, Lord Adrian. However, I cannot wholly leave
so honoured a guest under an impression which I feel to be plausible,
but not just. No, brave Colonna; report wrongs me. I value Gold,
for Gold is the Architect of Power! It fills the camp--it storms the
city--it buys the marketplace--it raises the palace--it founds the
throne. I value Gold,--it is the means necessary to my end!"

"And that end--"

"Is--no matter what," said the Knight coldly. "Let us to our tents, the
dews fall heavily, and the malaria floats over these houseless wastes."

The pair rose;--yet, fascinated by the beauty of the hour, they lingered
for a moment by the brook. The earliest stars shone over its crisping
wavelets, and a delicious breeze murmured gently amidst the glossy
herbage.

"Thus gazing," said Montreal, softly, "we reverse the old Medusan fable
the poets tell us of, and look and muse ourselves out of stone. A little
while, and it was the sunlight that gilded the wave--it now shines as
brightly and glides as gaily beneath the stars; even so rolls the stream
of time: one luminary succeeds the other equally welcomed--equally
illumining--equally evanescent!--You see, the poetry of Provence still
lives beneath my mail!"

Adrian early sought his couch; but his own thoughts and the sounds of
loud mirth that broke from Montreal's tent, where the chief feasted the
captains of his band, a revel from which he had the delicacy to excuse
the Roman noble, kept the Colonna long awake; and he had scarcely fallen
into an unquiet slumber, when yet more discordant sounds again invaded
his repose. At the earliest dawn the wide armament was astir--the
creaking of cordage--the tramp of men--loud orders and louder oaths--the
slow rolling of baggage-wains--and the clank of the armourers, announced
the removal of the camp, and the approaching departure of the Grand
Company.

Ere Adrian was yet attired, Montreal entered his tent.

"I have appointed," he said, "five score lances under a trusty leader,
to accompany you, noble Adrian, to the borders of Romagna; they wait
your leisure. In another hour I depart; the on-guard are already in
motion."

Adrian would fain have declined the proffered escort; but he saw that
it would only offend the pride of the c