the world, the champion of a girl. What
dream, what lethargy can have drowned a valour like thine? What vileness
have had attraction for thee? Up, up, and with us. The camp, the
commander himself calls for thee; fortune and victory await thee. Come,
fated warrior, and finish thy work; see the false creed which thou hast
shaken, laid low beneath thy inevitable sword."

On hearing these words the noble youth remained for a time without
speaking, without moving. At length shame gave way to a passionate sense
of his duty. With a new fire in his cheeks, he tore away the effeminate
ornaments of his servitude, and quitted the spot without a word. In a few
moments he had threaded the labyrinth: he was outside the gate. Ere long
he was descending the mountain.

But meantime Armida had received news of the two visitors; and coming to
look for them, and casting her eyes down the steep, she beheld--with his
face, alas, turned no longer towards her own--the hasty steps of her hero
between his companions. She wished to cry aloud, but was unable. She
might have resorted to some of her magic devices, but her heart forbade
her. She ran, however--for what cared she for dignity?--she ran down
the mountain, hoping still by her beauty and her tears to arrest the
fugitive; but his feet were too strong, even for love: she did not reach
him till he had arrived on the sea-shore. Where was her pride now? where
the scorn she had exhibited to so many suitors? where her coquetry and
her self-sufficiency--her love of being loved, with the power to hate the
lover? The enchantress was now taught what the passion was, in all its
despair as well as delight. She cried aloud. She cared not for the
presence of the messengers. "Oh, go not, Rinaldo," she cried; "go not, or
take me with thee. My heart is torn to pieces. Take me, or turn and kill
me. Stop, at least, and be cruel to me here. If thou hast the heart to
fly me, it will not be hard to thee to stay and be unkind."

Even the messengers were moved at this, or seemed to be moved. Ubaldo
told the fugitive that it would be heroical in him to wait and hear what
the lady had to say, with gentleness and firmness.

His conquest over himself would then be complete.

Rinaldo stopped, and Armida came up breathless and in tears--lovelier
than ever. She looked earnestly at him at first, without a word. He gave
her but a glance, and looked aside.

As a fine singer, before he lets loose his tongue in the lofty