leaning against the rock; his arms stretched out on each side, and his head bent backwards. His mouth, which breathed no longer, was open, and his glazed eyes were fixed on nothingness. The young men took hold of him, but he was stiff and senseless; a cold corpse, like his luckless bride.

It was never known whether Elly or Oswald had reached the rock the first. It appeared that she must have sat down to wait for her lover, and have fallen asleep in the cold and snow. That Oswald, with his heavy burden should have found his way across these dreadful heights, over the rocks and snow, on such a dark, tempestuous night,, and passed every precipice in safety, was most astonishing. Exhausted by exertions, almost more than human, he had probably sat down to repose himself; and benumbed by the frost, had fallen asleep, never to wake again. Thus lay the lovers, divided only by the rock, and faithful in the hour of death. Each had expired alone, and without knowing that the other was near.

The procession returned to the village in solemn silence; all Stürvis was assembled before the house of Bathönier, where the two bodies were deposited. Words cannot express the despair of the parents, and the grief of the whole community. The chaplain arrived at noon, and the blessing he was to have invoked for the living, was now spoken over the dead.

The bells of the

little chapel which were to have hailed the merry nup

tials, and sounded joyously through the silent valley, now tolled a mournful note, to summon the bridal pair to the grave which was prepared for them, and where their remains were laid down together.

A few weeks afterwards, the inconsolable Goutta was released by a stroke of the palsy, and placed beside her children. Bathönier, and the greater part of the inhabitants of Stürvis, regarded this sad catastrophe as a warning from Providence. They began, one after another, to negociate with the Mayenfelders, an exchange of their respective privileges, giving up at first only portions of private property, but ended by abandoning the entire Alp, and emigrating into the valley with wives, children, and all belonging to them. Two families alone refused to desert the habitation of their forefathers, and remained behind in their mountain dwelling. Some time afterwards, they were reached by the plague, to which, being cut off from every human assistance, they all fell victims. Their cottages are swept away; Stürvis exists no longer; but the fatal rock may be seen to this day.

AN AUSTRIAN ASSASSIN.

Ir was reserved for this age to produce advocates for assassination ready to pronounce it one of the noblest and boldest resources of great minds only, swayed by the strongest passions; forgetting how generally the most vile passions are the strongest, and how easily this resource is within the reach of the least elevated mind. Let us see one example of the thousand which might be found to convince us with what uncertainty we judge of those motives by which sophists would pretend to determine the guilt of an assassin.

The wavering ambition, the enthusiasm, and the fanciful sensibility of the emperor Joseph II. are not for gotten, and the favourites of his councils were often men whose recommendation was a tincture of similar peculiarities. There was one person, to whom, if German etiquette had been flexible, he would have given public entrance to his cabinet; but rigid prejudices and custom compelled him to be content with private patronage. Whence this man came is very doubtful, though some

remarkable instances of courage and fidelity which he had shewn during Joseph's quarrel with his Belgian subjects, were supposed to have been his first passports to favour. If he was a native of Flanders, the acuteness of his eye, his sharp lean features, and slender person, were no evidences of his birth-place, and his accent was observed to have something Italian in it. Joseph meditated bold and singular changes in German jurisprudence, and was supposed to carry on a private correspondence with those literary men, who, if they did not absolutely change the tide of public opinion, availed themselves of it to rise on the surface. Otto, though he only acted as the emperor's page ostensibly, held some secret share in this correspondence, and was believed to have a watchword by which he passed the sentinels of the palace in his secret visits. Nor did he always go alone. He was watched, and a spy appointed by the chancellor of the chamber of Wetzlar traced him to a spot which instigated all his employer's curiosity. The chancellor was noted for his strict adherence to old principles, and his resistance to the new code of laws by which Joseph hoped to substitute long imprisonment for death as the punishment of capital crimes. He was not ill pleased to detect in his sovereign some error which might render his legislation unpopular by disgracing the source. He wrapped himself in his darkest apparel, and creeping under the shadow of a high wall, followed a man he believed to be Otto, and another person from the private gate of

VOL. III.

F

and your pannier rattling down the first precipice we come to! Mind this, now; but if once we have taken a glass together, to the making up of our quarrel, I will let you off again, and you may go to the deuce, if you like it, for any thing I care about the matter." Oswald recollected his heavy load, which would prevent him from being able to defend himself, if this desperado should really follow him out of the town; and, for the sake of getting quit of him, he consented to go with him for a minute into the next public house. As his pannier reached considerably above his head, he was obliged to take it off before he could go into the room, and having set it down at the door, he hastily ordered two flasks of wine instead of one, that his tormentor might have enough to satisfy him." "How mighty generous we are to day!-this is really very becoming in a bridegroom," said the provoking Balz, who thirsted more for revenge than for wine; "but I see Tritz Kaiser out yonder, and he may as well come in for a glass too-so I will just go and fetch him." With these words he ran off. Oswald waited for him a good while in vain, went out of doors in quest of him, called, looked round, and behold his pannier was missing! Transported with rage and vexation, he ran to and fro, inquiring from every one he met, whether they had seen any thing of the object of his pursuit? but, alas! black Balz was not to be heard of. For at least two hours did poor Oswald wander about in despair, traversing all the town and the suburbs, and groaning