Year: 1867




tales told about old Count Robert which Agatha,
the old house-keeper, knew by heart. He had iv,
ed in evil times, when men give soft and glozing
epithets to deeds which in orderly and peaceful
periods they shudder at as crimes. Old Agatha
was descendant of those who had been the faith.
full and confidential servants of the Count and the
family, generation after generation, through al
mutations, had kept their places in the household
firmly and faithfully attached to the descendants
of their ancient lords The traditions and history
of the family had thus been handed down, and as
faithfully preserved as if chronicled by the pen ot
the historian During the long winter evenings
old Agatha was delighted when willing listener
was seated by the snug fire in the house-keeper's
room, in recounting the history and achievements
of the Guiscards whose family she and her father
had served with fidelity for so many generations.
Some of the neighboring families, themselves de-
scendants of the Huguenots, were occasional visit
ors at Guiscad's hospitabe bachelorestablishment,
and when the sudden inclemency Of the weather OF
other causes detained such visitors as guests during
the night, those of her own sex, who condescended
to spend an hour or two in the house-keeper's OWL
snug apartments before retiring for the night
were sure to find their condescension amply repaid
by the entertaining narratives Of dame Agatha
She could not indeed be regardedas holding the po
siton of servant in the family for, notwithstand
ing her actual occupation, Guiscard himself ever
treated her as privileged person, under the atfec-
tionate but familiar soubriquet Of Aunt Agatha
while the ladies of the neighboring planters fire.
quently called upon her and received her visits in
return.


Old Agatha often shook her head sadly and NUT
tered indistinctly to herself, as when busted in
sweeping the dust from the picture frames, she
was employed about the picture of old Count Rob
bert, the founder of the family What had she to
do with im-him whose body had returned to
dust generations before she herself saw the light?


1.-The curse came with him" muttered she, as
she beat the frame with her duster. 1.-THE curse
came with him and poisoned every cup of happi-
ness raised to the lips of his descendants. When
will it pass away? Poor Robert! last of his race,
and best of them, where all but one was good, and
all those good unhappy and stricken by fate, while
the guilty one alone was happy and had his path
way among roses! But for his guilt and wrong,
their lips might all have been as smiling as his
ownw Speaking thus, old Agatha dismounted
from the stool on which she had stood while dust
ing the pictures, and through her spectaces gazed
sadly ere she retired to her room, at the portraits
on each side of the gallery She had thus gazed at
them hundred times before, and in good truth,
there was muchin this gallery of portraits to arrest
the attentionand claim more than passing glance.


The portrait of Count Robert was evidently from
the hand of a master His clear, full liquid eyes,
had in them scarce a trace of that sadness which
seemed to deepen in the faces of his successive de-
scendants, whose portraits hanked and fronted his
own. Anobly arched and full brow, around which
lightly foated his raven locks in soft silky masses,
nose slightly aquiline, and full rosy lips, around
which playeda smile of benignity and contentment,
seemed to point him out as one who, at least, up
to the time when his features had been transferred
to canvass had tred path of unclouded happiness.
But as the spectator turned to the portraits of his
successive descendants, all of which bore striking
resemblance in outline of feature to his own as to
their original, the sunshine of joy seemed, by sue
cessve gradations to die away, and the face of one
generation after another to wear sadder and more
melancholy expression, until in the last of ALL gaze
of deep and unutterable sadness seemed to rest up
on the spectator 1t was as if each generation had
accumulated burden of sorrow and sadness which,
with the patrimonial estate descended to the next
heir, to be by him increased and handed down to
his successor There was manly grace in all the
male portraits and even the saddest-eyed of them
all, was model of masculine beauty.


| Female beauty, too, looked sweetly down upon
the idle passer-by, whose footsteps echoed loudly
along the empty gallery. There were no spectaclcd
danes, no respectable, age-stricken grandmothers,
to meet the gazer with their benignant and matron
ly regards All were transcendently and surpass-
ngy beautiful all were blooming, all were in the
dewyfeshness of those starry days when the orange
flower seems the fitting and appropriate wreath for
the fresh brow Of maiden-hood about to lift the veil
and enter the sanctuary of welded affections A.
mong the halfscore portraits Of females that hung
in the gallery there not one that would not have
taken high rank merely as model of beauty.
But the beauty and repose of old age was wanting
to the completeness of the gallery. Was it not
strange, was there not even sadness in the rehec
ton, that the present owner of this proud mansion
found only beauty and youth in the faces Of his fe
male ancestry, and that he no where encountered
among them the sober and matrony brow of expe
rienced womanhood? They, too, suggested the his
tory-was it happy one? ?-of the female line O
his family. They seemed to speak of youthful
beauty never ripening into the maturer charms thai
gain from experience and pleasant association, what
they lose in youthful freshness and grace of strong
sweet ties broken too soon, of graves immaturely
filed, and of bleeding and broken hearts.


Whatever may have been the cause, Robert Guis
card, the present owner of the estate, had remain
ed an unmarried, and an almost secluded man,


He was virtuous noble, rich and respected. His
morals were pure, and represented to al the noble
and rare example of young man, born to almost
boundless wealth. with no monitor, save his con
science, to curb or restrain him, regulating his con
duct according to the most rigid dictates Of mor,i
ty and sobriety. Yet, Guiscard had never sought
the love of woman.


A few miles below his residence lived widow
beautiful and attractive, with daughter, beautiful
and lovely as an houri, in the first dawn Of woman
hood. The family was far from wealthy; the
father had been bad manager rather than al
improvident or reckless man, and, at the time O.
his death, which occurred years before the date
of our story, his family had been deprived Of the
greater portion of their property. A small trac
of land and some ten or twelve house servants wa
all that was left them. Though not wealthy, thu
spirt the intellect and refined tastes Of both moth