"I see it all," cried the doctor. "It was a pious and praiseworthy deed. Bring the unfortunate youth to my dwelling, Baldred, and you shall be well rewarded. Use dispatch-use dispatch !"

As the gatekeeper essayed to comply, the wounded man groaned deeply, as if in great pain.

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Fling me the weapon with which you smote him," cried Doctor Lamb, in accents of commiseration; "and I will anoint it with the powder of sympathy. His anguish will be speedily abated."

"I know your worship can accomplish wonders," cried Baldred, throwing the halberd into the balcony. "I will do my part as gently as I can."

And as the alchemist took up the weapon, and disappeared through the window, the gatekeeper lifted the wounded man by the shoulders, and conveyed him down a narrow winding staircase, contrived in one of the turrets, to a lower chamber. Though he proceeded as carefully as he could, the sufferer was evidently put to excruciating pain; and when Baldred placed him on a wooden bench, and held a lamp towards him, he perceived that his features were blackened and distorted.

"I fear it's all over with him," murmured the gatekeeper; "I shall have merely a dead body to take to Doctor Lamb. It would be a charity to knock him on the head, rather than to let him suffer thus. The doctor passes for a cunning man, but if he can cure this poor youth, without seeing him, by the help of his sympathetic ointment, I shall begin to believe, what some folks avouch, that he has dealings with the devil.”

While Baldred was ruminating in this manner, a sudden and extraordinary change took place in the sufferer. As if by magic, the contraction of the muscles subsided; the features assumed a wholesome hue; and the respiration was no longer laborious. Baldred stared as if a miracle had been wrought.

Now that the countenance of the youth had regained its original expression, the gatekeeper could not help being struck by its extreme beauty. The face was a perfect oval, with regular and delicate features. A short silken moustache darkened the upper lip, which was short and proud, and a pointed beard terminated the chin. The hair was black, glossy, and cut short, so as to disclose a highly intellectual expanse of brow.

The figure of the youth was slight, but admirably proportioned. His attire consisted of a black satin doublet, slashed with white, hose of black silk, and a short velvet mantle. His eyes were still closed, and it was difficult to say what effect they might give to the face when they lighted it up; but notwithstanding its beauty, it was impossible not to admit that a strange, sinister, and almost demoniacal expression pervaded the countenance.

All at once, and with as much suddenness as his cure had

been effected, the young man started, uttered a piercing cry, and placed his hand to his side.

"Caitiff!" he cried, fixing his blazing eyes on the gatekeeper, "why do you torture me thus? Finish me at once- -Oh!" And overcome by anguish, he sank back again.

"I have not touched you, sir," replied Baldred. "I brought you here to succour you. You will be easier anon. Lamb must have wiped the halberd," he added to himself.

Doctor

Another sudden change. The pain fled from the sufferer's countenance, and he became easy as before.

"What have you done to me?" he asked, in a low tone; "the torture of my wound has suddenly ceased, and I feel as if a balm had been dropped into it. Let me remain in this state if you have any pity,-or despatch me, for my late agony was almost unsupportable."

"You are cared for by one who has greater skill than any chirurgeon in London," replied Baldred. "If I can manage to transport you to his lodgings, he will speedily heal your wounds." "Do not delay then," replied Auriol, faintly; "for though I am free from pain, I feel that my life is ebbing fast away."

"Press this handkerchief to your side, and lean on me," said Baldred. "Doctor Lamb's dwelling is but a step from the gateway-in fact, the first house on the bridge. By the way, the doctor declares he is your kinsman."

"It is the first I ever heard of him," replied Auriol, faintly; "but take me to him quickly, or it will be too late."

In another moment they were at the doctor's door. Baldred tapped against it, and the summons was instantly answered by a diminutive personage, clad in a jerkin of coarse grey serge, and having a leathern apron tied round his waist. This was Flapdragon.

Blear-eyed, smoke-begrimed, lantern-jawed, the poor dwarf seemed as if his whole life were spent over the furnace. And so, in fact, it was. He had become little better than a pair of human bellows. In his hand, he held the halberd with which Auriol had been wounded.

"So you have been playing the leech, Flapdragon, eh?” cried Baldred.

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Ay, marry have I," replied the dwarf, with a wild grin, and displaying a wolfish set of teeth. My master ordered me to smear the halberd with the sympathetic ointment. I obeyed him; rubbed the steel point, first on one side-then on the other; next wiped it; and then smeared it again."

"Whereby you put the patient to exquisite pain,” replied Baldred; "but help me to transport him to the laboratory." "I know not if the doctor will like to be disturbed," said Flapdragon. "He is busily engaged on some grand operation." "I will take the risk on myself," said Baldred. "The youth will die if he remains here. See, he has fainted already !"

Thus urged, the dwarf laid down the halberd, and between the two, Auriol was speedily conveyed up a wide oaken staircase to the laboratory. Doctor Lamb was plying the bellows at the furnace, on which a large alembic was placed, and he was so engrossed by his task, that he scarcely noticed the entrance of the others.

"Place the youth on the ground, and rear his head against the chair," he cried, hastily, to the dwarf. "Bathe his brows with the decoction in that crucible. I will attend to him anon myself. Come to me, on the morrow, Baldred, and I will repay thee for thy trouble. I am busy now."

"These relics, doctor," cried the gatekeeper, glancing at the bag, which was lying on the ground, and from which a bald head protruded-" I ought to take them back with me."

"Heed them not-they will be safe in my keeping," cried Doctor Lamb, impatiently; "to-morrow-to-morrow."

Casting a furtive glance round the laboratory, and shrugging his shoulders, Baldred departed; and Flapdragon, having bathed the sufferer's temples with the decoction, in obedience to his master's injunctions, turned to inquire what he should do next. "Begone!" cried the doctor, so fiercely that the dwarf darted out of the room, clapping the door after him.

Doctor Lamb then applied himself to his task with renewed ardour, and in a few seconds became wholly insensible of the presence of a stranger.

Revived by the stimulant, Auriol presently opened his eyes, and gazing round the room, thought he must be dreaming, so strange and fantastical did all appear. The floor was covered with the implements used by the adept-bolt-heads, crucibles, cucurbites, and retorts, scattered about without any attempt at arrangement. In one corner was a large terrestrial sphere; near it was an astrolabe; and near that a heap of disused glass vessels. On the other side, lay a black, mysterious-looking book, fastened with brazen clasps. Around it, were a ram's horn, a pair of forceps, a roll of parchment, a pestle and mortar, and a large plate of copper, graven with the mysterious symbols of the Isaical table. Near this was the leathern bag containing the two decapitated heads, one of which had partly rolled forth. On a table, at the further end of the room, stood a large open volume, with parchment leaves, covered with cabalistical characters, referring to the names of spirits. Near it were two parchment scrolls, written in letters, respectively denominated by the Chaldaic sages "the Malachim," and "the passing of the river." One of these scrolls was kept in its place by a skull. An ancient and grotesque-looking brass lamp, with two snakeheaded burners, lighted the room. From the ceiling depended a huge, scaly sea-monster, with outspread fins, open jaws, garnished with tremendous teeth, and great goggling eyes. Near it hung the celestial sphere. The chimney-piece, which

was curiously carved, and projected far into the room, was covered with various implements of Hermetic science. Above it were hung dried bats and flitter-mice, interspersed with the skulls of birds and apes. Attached to the chimney-piece was an horary, sculptured in stone, near which hung a large star-fish. The fireplace was occupied by the furnace, on which, as has been stated, was placed an alembic, communicating by means of a long serpentine pipe, with a receiver. Within the room were two skeletons, one of which, placed behind a curtain in the deep embrasure of the window, where its polished bones glistened in the white moonlight, had a horrible effect. The other enjoyed more comfortable quarters near the chimney, its fleshless feet dangling down in the smoke arising from the furnace.

Doctor Lamb, meanwhile, steadily pursued his task, though he ever and anon paused, to fling certain roots and drugs, which he took out of glass vessels near him, upon the charcoal. As he did this, various-coloured flames broke forth-now blue, now green, now blood-red.

Tinged by these fires, the different objects in the chamber seemed to take other forms and to become instinct with animation The gourd-shaped cucurbites were transformed into great bloated toads bursting with venom; the long-necked bolt-heads became monstrous serpents; the worm-like pipes, adders; the alembics looked like plumed helmets; the characters on the Isaical table, and those on the parchments seemed traced in fire, and to be ever changing; the sea-monster bellowed and roared, and, flapping his fins, tried to burst from his hook; the skeletons wagged their jaws, and raised their fleshless fingers in mockery, while blue lights burnt in their eyeless sockets; the bellows became a prodigious bat fanning the fire with its wings; and the old alchemist assumed the appearance of the arch-fiend presiding over a witch's sabbath.

Auriol's brain reeled, and he pressed his hand to his brows, to exclude these phantasms from his sight. But even thus they pursued him; and he imagined he could hear the infernal riot going on around him.

Suddenly, he was roused by a loud joyful cry, and uncovering his eyes, he beheld the old alchemist pouring the contents of the matrass-a bright, transparent liquid-into a small phial. Having carefully secured the bottle with a glass stopper, the doctor held it towards the light, and gazed at it with rapture.

"At length," he exelaimed aloud-" at length, the great work is achieved. With the birth of the century now expiring, I first saw light, and the draught I hold in my hand shall enable me to see the opening of centuries and centuries to come. Composed of the lunar stones, the solar stones, and the mercurial stonesprepared according to the instructions of the Rabbi Ben Lucca, -namely, by the separation of the pure from the impure, the volatilization of the fixed, and the fixing of the volatile; this

elixir shall renew my youth, like that of the eagle, and give me length of days greater than any patriarch ever enjoyed."

While thus speaking, he held up the sparkling liquid, and gazed at it like a Persian worshipping the sun.

"To live for ever!" he cried, after a pause-" to escape the jaws of death just when they are opening to devour me! to be free from all accidents!-'tis a glorious thought!-ha!-I bethink me, the Rabbi said there was one peril against which the elixir could not guard me-one vulnerable point, by which, like the heel of Achilles, death might reach me! What is it?-where can it lie ?"

And he relapsed into deep thought.

"This uncertainty will poison all my happiness," he continued; "I shall live in constant dread, as of an invisible enemy. But no matter! Perpetual life!—perpetual youth!—what more need be desired?"

"What more, indeed!" cried Auriol.

"Ha!" exclaimed the doctor, suddenly recollecting the wounded man, and concealing the phial beneath his gown.

"Your caution is vain, doctor," said Auriol. "I have heard what you have uttered. have uttered. You imagine you have discovered the elixir vitæ."

“The

"Imagine I have discovered it !" cried Doctor Lamb. matter is past all doubt. I am the possessor of the wondrous secret which the greatest philosophers of all ages have sought to discover-the miraculous preservative of the body against decay."

"The man who brought me hither told me you were my kinsman," said Auriol. "Is it so ?"

"It is," replied the doctor, " and you shall now learn the connexion that subsists between us. Look at that ghastly relic," he added, pointing to the head protruding from the bag-" that was once my son Simon. His son's head is within the sackyour father's head-so that four generations are brought together."

"Gracious Heaven!" exclaimed the young man, raising himself on his elbow. "You, then, are my great-grandsire. My father supposed you had died in his infancy. An old tale runs in the family that you were charged with sorcery, and fled to avoid the stake.”

"It is true that I fled, and took the name I bear at present," replied the old man; " but I need scarcely say that the charge brought against me was false. I have devoted myself to abstrusest science; have held commune with the stars; and have wrested the most hidden secrets from Nature—but that is all. Two crimes alone have stained my soul, but both, I trust, have been expiated by repentance."

"Were they deeds of blood?" asked Auriol.
"One was so,” replied Darcy, with a shudder.

"It was a