y,
and then turned his earnest eyes upon the young soldier.

"You see ill-fortune for me, Doctor!" exclaimed Jumonville, with bright,
unflinching eyes, as he would look on danger of any kind.

"The Hyleg, or giver of life, is afflicted by Mars in the eighth house,
and Saturn is in evil aspect in the ascendant!" said the Doctor slowly.

"That sounds warlike, and means fighting I suppose, Doctor. It is a
brave fortune for a soldier. Go on!" Jumonville was in earnest now.

"The pars fortunae," continued the Doctor, gazing upward, "rejoices in
a benign aspect with Venus. Fame, true love, and immortality will be
yours, Jumonville de Villiers; but you will die young under the flag of
your country and for sake of your King! You will not marry, but all the
maids and matrons of New France will lament your fate with tears, and
from your death shall spring up the salvation of your native land--how,
I see not; but decretum est, Jumonville, ask me no more!"

A thrill like a stream of electricity passed through the company. Their
mirth was extinguished, for none could wholly free their minds from
the superstition of their age. The good Doctor sat down, and wiped his
moistened eye-glasses. He would tell no more to-night, he said. He had
really gone too far, making jest of earnest and earnest of jest, and
begged pardon of Jumonville for complying with his humor.

The young soldier laughed merrily. "If fame, immortality, and true love
are to be mine, what care I for death? It will be worth giving up life
for, to have the tears of the maids and matrons of New France to lament
your fate. What could the most ambitious soldier desire more?"

The words of Jumonville struck a kindred chord in the bosom of Hortense
de Beauharnais. They were stamped upon her heart forever. A few years
after this prediction, Jumonville de Villiers lay slain under a flag of
truce on the bank of the Monongahela, and of all the maids and matrons
of New France who wept over his fate, none shed more and bitterer tears
than his fair betrothed bride, Hortense de Beauharnais.

The prediction of the Sieur Gauthier was repeated and retold as a
strangely true tale; it passed into the traditions of the people, and
lingered in their memory generations after the festival of Belmont was
utterly forgotten.

When the great revolt took place in the English Colonies, the death of
the gallant Jumonville de Villiers was neither forgotten nor forgiven by
New France. Congress