dreadful, wondrous fair;
Burned itself into his spirit, And abode for ever there!

"Never more--from that sweet moment--Gazed he on womankind; He was dumb
to love and wooing And to all their graces blind.

"Full of love for that sweet vision, Brave and pure he took the field;
With his blood he stained the letters N. P. B. upon his shield.

"'Lumen caeli, sancta Rosa!' Shouting on the foe he fell, And like
thunder rang his war-cry O'er the cowering infidel.

"Then within his distant castle, Home returned, he dreamed his
days-Silent, sad,--and when death took him He was mad, the legend says."

When recalling all this afterwards the prince could not for the life of
him understand how to reconcile the beautiful, sincere, pure nature of
the girl with the irony of this jest. That it was a jest there was no
doubt whatever; he knew that well enough, and had good reason, too,
for his conviction; for during her recitation of the ballad Aglaya had
deliberately changed the letters A. N. B. into N. P. B. He was quite
sure she had not done this by accident, and that his ears had not
deceived him. At all events her performance--which was a joke, of
course, if rather a crude one,--was premeditated. They had evidently
talked (and laughed) over the 'poor knight' for more than a month.

Yet Aglaya had brought out these letters N. P. B. not only without the
slightest appearance of irony, or even any particular accentuation, but
with so even and unbroken an appearance of seriousness that assuredly
anyone might have supposed that these initials were the original ones
written in the ballad. The thing made an uncomfortable impression upon
the prince. Of course Mrs. Epanchin saw nothing either in the change of
initials or in the insinuation embodied therein. General Epanchin only
knew that there was a recitation of verses going on, and took no further
interest in the matter. Of the rest of the audience, many had understood
the allusion and wondered both at the daring of the lady and at the
motive underlying it, but tried to show no sign of their feelings. But
Evgenie Pavlovitch (as the prince was ready to wager) both comprehended
and tried his best to show that he comprehended; his smile was too
mocking to leave any doubt on that point.

"How beautiful that is!" cried Mrs. Epanchin, with sincere admiration.
"Whose is it?"

"Pushkin's, mama, of course! Don't disgrace us all by showing your
ignorance," said Adelaida.

"As soon as we rea