be buttoned up to their chins," said Francis, "but
for all that I'll have a peep behind their black masks, or die for it.
Above all, I must try the fair-haired witch." And in the delirium of
the moment, he dashed his goblet through the window, and leaped upon a
chair, shouting "Huzza! huzza! away with the tables; we have had enough
of eating, and will dance you one till the floor shakes, and the
rafters crack again."

"Man! are you alone here?" exclaimed Tausdorf indignantly; but in his
frenzy, Francis heard him not, and, springing from the chair over the
table with a neck-breaking leap, alighted again just before the mask
with the auburn hair.

"Take away," said Christopher with vexation. "When once he breaks out,
there is no managing with him."

The tables were removed, the seats placed close to the walls, and the
guests made room for the dancers. Passing over the usual forms of
courtesy, Francis seized his chosen one with a rude grasp, and shouted
to the musicians, "A waltz! a waltz! but quick! quick!"

The music began, and the feet of the dancers kept pace with its
rapidity. The space about them grew wider and wider, for the spectators
could hardly get their feet out of the way in time from the stamping of
the intoxicated Francis, who kept clapping his hands, and shouting,
"Faster! faster! I can stand it, and so can she." At last the piper
stopped from want of breath; in a little time too the triangle was
unable to follow; and now only the tambourine gave a fit measure to
this bacchanalian revel.

"And this is called pleasure?" said Althea to Tausdorf, who had
retreated to a bow-window.

"Where the soul is incapable of enjoyment," he replied, "pleasure must
be sensual, or the vulgar mind would have no joy on earth whatever."

At last the sprightly bacchanal was exhausted, and danced off with his
female into the next room. There he threw himself into a chair, forced
his companion into the seat beside him, and panted out, "You dance as
gracefully as lightly, and only so much the more stimulate my desire to
see your face. It certainly won't have to be ashamed of the feet. Come,
take off the damnable Moor's visor."

"It is not yet time," replied the gipsy in a low tone, that sounded
still more hollowly from the mask.

"Not yet?" said Francis, with a rough grasp of her hand; "but soon?
to-day?"

"If all goes as it should, perhaps," was the answer.

"Then I must have patience, however little I am used to it