shrieks came on our ears from the direction of the sea, then but a little way to our left. I instantly dismounted, and rushed towards the spot whence the sounds proceeded, being followed by several of our party. Vesuvius, which was then in action, seemed to aid my intentions, for the crater, just at that moment, threw up a grand column of flame, that illuminated the whole rocky coast of the Bay of Naples with a lurid glare, for several minutes. On a brink of the cliff, hanging over the waves, two men appeared dragging a third by a rope fastened to his neck. He was struggling hard for his life; but he struggled in vain; and as vain were my exertions to arrest his fate. The stilettos of the assassins drank his blood, and his murdered body was hurled amid the angry billows, chafing the rocks below. The horrible deed was hardly more than completed, when the ruffians, perceiving us just upon them, made an effort to escape. One of them, who was probably well acquainted with the intricacies of the spot, darted away, and escaped by some crevice unknown to us, and was instantly lost to view; but the retreat of the other was cut off, and, being surrounded, he was taken after a desperate re

sistance. He was immediately recognized by some of our party, as a man of the name of Harrison, who had lately deserted from a British manof-war. I did all I could to make him confess the object of this assassination, and who were his accomplices; but he maintained a sullen silence. Our hopes were yet high, that, notwithstanding his present obstinacy, we might ere long obtain confessions from him; and we pursued our way to Naples, carrying our prisoner with us. But in these hopes we were disappointed. A body of at least twenty armed men came galloping after us. Under pretence of being sbirri, they demanded our prisoner, saying, that some preliminary investigation must be gone through in the affair, before the culprit could be sent forward from Torre-del-Greco. We earnesly desired to be present at this inquiry; but our request was peremptorily refused, on the plea that we should be required as witnesses against him; and our names being taken, we were told to pursue our way to Naples, and that there we should probably be examined next day as to what we knew of the matter, so soon as the prisoner should reach the city. But what was our confusion and vexation upon learning from our

landlord at Portici, that we had been deceiv

ed.".

66

Aye! you were no match for me, mio bravo capitano!" exclaimed Antonio, as Cleaver had finished." Il marinaro, finding that he was foiled at Paestum, immediately dispatched information to Lady Deborah. She wrote to me to Portici, where I then lived. Here is the letter written with her own hand to seal his doom; I have preserved it; 'tis damning proof against her!-ha! ha! ha!”—

After this triumphant laugh, Antonio took breath for a moment, looking round him to watch the effect he was producing on his auditors. The dread silence of extreme horror prevailed.

Lady Deborah, who now expected that every obstacle to her marriage with you, Lord Eaglesholme, was removed, raved like a maniac, to find all her schemes, and all her crimes, thus rendered abortive by your desertion of her; her disappointed love for you clung to the fruit of your amour. But this fondness for her offspring could not be indulged without the demolition of her character, an idol which her artifices had hitherto enabled her to keep unprofaned. Her infant

niece, the orphan daughter of Sir Marmaduke Delassaux, having been consigned to her care, by the last will of her mother, she resolved to make away with this child, and substitute her own for it, that one dexterous blow might enable her to bring up her daughter without shame, and secure her an ample fortune.

"To find a hand to execute this new murder, was entrusted to my care. I sent for Harrison, and we met together at night in an orange grove near Lady Deborah's villa, but when I was in the act of handing him the infant, some thieves coming behind us, snatched away a gold chain Leavornament, carelessly left upon the babe, ing the child, we rushed after the thieves; but they escaped, and when we returned, the child was gone. But as it appeared highly probable, that it had been carried off by the same gang for the sake of its clothes, we had no doubt that it would meet with the very fate to which we had doomed it. Lady Deborah's child had been secretly put to nurse with my wife at Portici. I had not been there for some days, and when I went privately to fetch it, I found that it had been seized with some sudden illness

I

the day before, and had died in a few hours. could not go back to Lady Deborah with this intelligence,-I could not venture to tell her that she had been again guilty of a fruitless crime,nay, a crime worse than fruitless,—since, as she had now no niece, the Delassaux estates would have gone away to a distant relation, and all right to the management of them would have been lost to her for ever My wife Teresa observed, that it was a pity our boy Lorenzo had not been a little younger, and a girl, that we might have substituted him for Lady Deborah's child. I bethought me of her cousin's wife, who had a daughter exactly of the age. We accordingly sent for the father and mother of the child, and an agreement was made between us, by which I was to impose the false child upon Lady Deborah, as her own infant; and as the man carried on a trade that yielded him plenty of cash, a large sum of money was to be given me for effecting this deception. The young lady, therefore, who has been so long the representative of the Delassaux family, whom Lady Deborah Delassaux believed to be her own and Lord Eaglesholme's child,