“Go to,—thou wily Fiend,"-the sable stranger cried,
Contempt upon his lip as frowning he replied;

"Think not to veil thy guilt, this scroll can prove full well
How young COLONNA's Lord beneath thy poisons fell;
And many a victim more is written here by thee,

In letters dark and strange,—yet not unknown to me!
Thou wert Toffania's charge,-to thee her arts are known;
Then strike as I command, or be thyself o'erthrown.”

As o'er the traveller lone, through mountain wilds who roves,
The dreadful snow-wreath hangs, and swiftly onward moves,
In vain his fate he flies, for Death his path has crost,
He trembles and it yields,—it falls. and he is lost :-
Twas thus Muerta saw his hidden crimes display'd,
And terror blanch'd his cheek, and guilt his soul dismay'd;
His mask was torn away, his veil was rent apart,

And thus he shew'd the fiend that dwelt within his heart.

"Down, Conscience, down ;-Remorse, thou ghastly shade, begone! Let others fear thee who thy sway despotic own;

But such as bravely dare above thy bonds to rise,

May mock thy keenest pangs, thy terrors may despise:
Shall I then, who have long the path of evil trod,

Gold for my hope and heaven,-Ambition for my God;
Shall I, when yet the streams of wealth may round me flow,
To Virtue bow me down?-No! by Apollyon, No!

Come what come will, I stand with Guilt enroll'd anew,
I will not shrink from aught which thou can'st bid me do:
Place gold before mine eyes, or power within my grasp,
And Fiends or Angels I alike with joy will clasp:
For, Oh the hours of want and famine I have known,
When Sorrow and Disease had mark'd me for their own,
Would shake the firmest faith that ever man received,
And make it worship aught that pity'd or relieved."

"Now is thine heart unveil'd," replied the dark unknown.
"Muerta, now thy brave and reckless soul is shewn;
That never quail'd at guilt, nor ever blench'd with fear,
Though witness oft to that which fiends would shrink to hear.
Of that no more, thou'rt mine:-Thou know'st this City round,
The swift-destroying sword of Pestilence is found;
Yet there are some to whom Death has not yet come nigh,
But thou their Leech shall be,-and mark me,-they shall die.

Brief is my tale; I came from bright Italia's land,
Where nature smiles, and shines, and scatters from her hand
Her never-failing gifts, from boundless stores above,
To form one blissful year of pleasure and of love.
There was I rear'd, my name,-Elvira de la MARE!
Nay, start not, although now a gallant's dress I wear;
Believe a greater change hath passion often wrought,
And direful was the intent with which this garb I sought.

In that luxurious clime, where love hath linger'd long
In looks of ladies eyes, and many a midnight song;
Where all things seem but made to cast their spells around,
A climate of delight, a sweet enchanted ground;
There, unto beauty's power a greater worth is given,
Than riches, fame, or name, prosperity, or heaven!
And one fair rival's face which other's eyes controuls
Will be the fatal wreck of hearts, and lives, and souls.

When life was fresh and I was bright in female charms,
Then young Colonna's Lord sought bliss within mine arms;
I heard him and believed, but tempted from my side
Thy drafts revenged me well,-he left me,- and he died!
Now would I seek thy skill, on one whose happy hour
As yet hath raised him o'er the Plague's destroying power,
LORD ALMERIC FITZ-MARCK, on whom my love was cast,
But he, unyielding fool, that opening love could blast."

Rejoice then o'er him now," the dark Muerta said,
"Think on his crime no more, or view him as the dead;
For such he soon shall be: This glass secure doth hide
That fluid breathed by some, of London's plague who died!
A subtle poison fill'd, as optic art hath shewn,
With fearful monstrous forms almost to earth unknown;
One drop, and one alone, the Pest will through him pour,
And in one little hour Fitz-Marck shall be no more."

What skills it now to tell, how murder stain'd again
Muerta's guilty soul, that conscience smote in vain;
Or how he gold amass'd, from those whose lives decay'd
By his accursed arts, more swift than nature bade;
Or how beneath his care, one MAGDALENA rose
From keenest want to wealth in London's year of woes:
At length the Pest decay'd, and Death decreased his claims,
But London wept again to see her streets in flames.

Time roll'd away before that mourning City rear'd
Her head from fire and death, and joy again appear'd
Within her rising seats, whose glories burst anew
O'er many a ruin dark, and dreadful still to view:
So did the sun arise in brightness on that ground
Where Sodom lay o'erthrown with livid flames around;
So direful was the sight that either scene could shew.
Beauty and grace above,-blackness and smoke below.

Time roll'd it's course away, and as it onward past,
O'er London's former woes a deepening veil was cast,
Till with fresh glories rear'd, each dark and fearful scene,
Forgotten or unknown, seem'd scarcely to have been;
Save where of ancient form some dwellings there were shewn,
That even London's flames had not yet overthrown;
Which still retain'd the cross of pestilence display'd,
As if preserved to shew where death his seat had made.

"Twas night at such a time, but such a night as seems
Only a milder veil for day's effulgent beams;
"Twas night, and heaven on high her silver lamp had hung,
And slumber closed each eye, and silence chain'd each tongue
The Priest had clasp'd his book, the Lady's lute was still,
And all things look'd as though the world were void of ill;
When through the lovely calm a voice was heard to break,
And fear was in it's sounds, for words like these it spake.

"What ho! Awake within! Bid PAUL the Priest arise,
For there is one who now at life's departure lies,
Whose rack'd tormented soul seeks vainly Death's embrace,
Till true confession shall it's former life retrace:

Then haste,-in pity haste, for nature trembling hangs,
Alike too weak to die or live beneath her pangs;
Oh! haste, in pity haste,-for ne'er did dying hour
Affright the sinner with such agonizing power,"

At noon or night prepared in virtue's cause to rise,

The Priest awoke, and chased sleep's slumbers from his eyes,
Then follow'd where he led who late those slumbers broke,

Yet not one word of aught save salutation spoke :
His soul seem'd musing deep, to arm it for the fight
With that dark wily fiend who grieved the parting sprite;
Then as he pass'd the porch, he said, "May Heaven release
They who in anguish weep, and in this house be peace!"

It was an ancient pile, that rear'd it's form on high,
With battlements antique against the midnight sky;
Twas lonely, but around a gloomy grandeur threw
A dark imposing air, yet blent with beauty too:
The door they pass'd, and soon the sick before them lay,
But ere the Priest began in fervent terms to pray,
The wretched victim cried, "Ere life and flesh be cold,
Let my last dying words to sacred ears be told.

Oh! there are crimes beyond the reach
Of mercy, penitence, or prayer;
That scorch the heart, and chain the speech,
Whose only prospect is despair!

And they who would of virtue teach

Should turn the sinner's glances there.
Then would they see that hell of mind
In which all guilty hearts are bound;
The joys united earth can find

Can never heal it's burning wound,
Nor for one moment still the sound

Of that deep voice whose tones remind

That pangs more keen and longer are behind!

But all my lamentations now

E'en as my hopes of heaven are vain ;

"Tis left me only to avow

My crimes that hidden yet remain :

To speak of that immortal stain
Which is upon my breast,
Then rush to an eternal chain,
To death, but not to rest.
It chanced, that while our City lay
In sackcloth, mourning, and dismay,
And I in Want and Famine crost
Half deem'd my sinking life was lost,
-And would that it bad but been so,

And would that death had struck the blow,-
That one from Spain, who long had tried
The arts by which mankind have died;

Who knew Toffania's secrets well,

Who studied in St. Croix' dark cell,

With cursed Brinvilliers traced the way

For life in languor to decay,

Came to my hovel to propose

The purpose of a fiend;

That I should nurse and murder those,

Who lay in pestilential throes,
Should hasten on of life the close,

And bring them to their end!

Then when the wretched victim's breath
Was passing, ere they stretch'd in death,
I caught the baneful foam that hung
On the pale lips and livid tongue,

And by that deadly fluid's pow'r,
I hasten'd many a parting hour;
For but one drop the life would chill,
And baffle all of human skill.

When death had seized his early prey

The spoil was our's, for none would stay
Within those dwellings where the Pest
Had been but for an hour a guest,
But that Muerta,-cursed name!
Procured a drug of wondrous fame,
Whose power was such as to defy
That swift and fearful malady;
And we, if gold could e'er have blest
Those who by sin that gold possest,
Might have rejoiced; but Oh! it fell
Like treasures burning fresh from hell;
For thus the Fiend his gifts controuls,
But takes the forfeit of our souls.
E'en so we batten'd on the prey
That sick or dead around us lay,
And fed upon the vital stream
That flow'd within the hearts of them,
Oh! if from the eternal world
The guilty soul be backward hurl'd,
To act again in mortal sphere

The crimes that once defaced it here,
Then will Muerta's, and mine own,

Like sanguine Vampire Sprites be shewn,
To feed on blood till time shall be
Swallow'd in immortality.

Ere yet Muerta's spirit fled,

In his last anguish thus he said:

O, Magdalena! had I seen

The torments of those Furies keen,

Who rend the dying sinner's heart,

I had not ta'en that awful part

Which blasts all hope, nor drawn thee in
To acts of deepest foulest sin:
But poverty around me prest,

My heart was broke, my soul distrest,
And one who knew my life of shame,
A proud, imperious, jealous dame,
Elvira de la Mare her name,
Employ'd me as her Leech to send
Her hated rivals to their end!

I was revenged on her, for fear
Is ever following guilt's career,

And lest she e'er these acts should tell,
Een by my drafts Elvira fell!'

He ceased, and death but yesterday
To judgment summon'd him away;

For I, this wretched life to save,
By poison hurl'd him to the grave;
Yet vainly-for his hand to me
Hath given the same:-thus should it be
Muerta,-now I come to thee!"

Then came the Death-shriek's awful close;
And Oh! those tones spread far and wide;

And to this hour the building shows

Where LONDON'S VAMPIRES lived and died.

P.

NOTES.

The crimson Cross of Death.-In the orders which King Charles II. issued for the prevention and cure of the Pestilence, it was directed, that all visited, or infected, houses should be designated by a red Cross of a foot in length, and a bill on which was written, “Lord have mercy upon us."

Who that Elixir form'd.-This alludes to the Acqua Toffania, a secret poison common in Italy about the middle of the seventeenth century; by which persons were enabled to kill their enemies with the utmost privacy and certainty, at any distance of time.

A subtle poison fill'd, as optic art hath shewn,

With fearful monstrous forms almost to earth unknown.

In "The City Remembrancer," Lond. 1769, Svo. Vol. 1. p. 129, it is related, that in 1665, some supposed that infection might be discovered, by the breath being cast upon a piece of glass, "where the breath condensing, there might be seen by a microscope, living creatures of strange, monstrous, and frightful shapes, like dragons, snakes, serpents, &c."

DOMESTIC TALES.-GRATITUDE.
(Continued from page 131.)

rience any regret in the change.
It was now that I expected to feel
the value of Mr. Jerningham's ge-
herosity; and determined, when I
should arrive in a strange place, to
turn to some account the five pounds
that I had hitherto kept undiminished
in my own possession. You will think
it, probably, very selfish and unfeeling,
that, with the pressing wants of my
family daily before me, I had not
been induced to share with them my
little hoard of wealth; but there were
two considerations which restrained
me from doing this: firstly, the dread-
ed chastisement of my carelessness;
and, secondly, your uncle's words,
when he obliged me to accept his
bounty, which remained firmly im-
pressed on my memory, though my
faculties were not, at that time,
sufficiently developed to comprehend
the full extent of their meaning.

AT the period that I became the subjeet of your compassionate notice, and of Mr. Jerningham's bounty, said Mr. H. I had just attained the fourteenth year of my age; but, though the eldest of my family, was so grossly ignorant, as to be unacquainted even with the letters of the alphabet; the result of the state of extreme indigence in which we lived, and of my having been considered, by my father and mother, as totally devoid of the natural abilities of boys of my age. By the neighbours in general, too, I was regarded as so inveterately stupid, that from the dulness of my comprehension, and the heaviness of my manner, I had acquired, among the children, the nick-name of "Mopus;" for, instead of joining, whenever I had an opportunity, in their youthful sports, I had used to slink into a corner, and consume the scarce hour of leisure in unhealthy and unprofit-"My lad," said he, "you should able inactivity both of body and mind. Little did any one imagine, that my obtuse head contained a talent which should some day make the fortune of my family; and that the seeming coldness of my heart was merely the disguise of an excessive sensibility, which, being ashamed of, as a weakness, I endeavoured to hide, by an appearance of sullen apathy.

In three days after my memorable visit to Atherfield, my uncle, who was a ship-carpenter in the dock-yard at Yarmouth, came to our cottage; and, to the great delight of my parents, carried me away, to be his assistant in his occupation: nor did I expeEur. Mag. Vol. 81. March 1822.

get some one to place your five pounds into a fund, where it would bear interest; which, if allowed to accumulate for the space of twenty years, would double the principal; whereas, if you were to keep it locked up in a box for twenty years, it would only be five pounds at the last."

One day, not long after I had removed to Yarmouth, while engaged in attending on my uncle, who was employed, with a great many others, in the construction of an immense sloop of war; I overheard one of the workmen say, "This will be a brave job when 'tis finished."

Ay, faith will it,' replied his com-
Hh