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'must needs be enchanted. The baron did not fail to make this remark: therefore thinking he would outwit his shaggy son-in-law, he determined to fortify himself so strongly in his castle that the bear should not be able to get in, 'when he came at the appointed time to fetch his bride. "Although," said he to himself," an enchanted bear may have the faculty of reasoning and speaking, he is nevertheless a bear, and must have all the qualities of a natural bear. He will not, for instance, be able to fly like a bird, or, like a ghost, pop through a key hole, or glide through the eye of a needle." Next day he related the adventure in the wood to the baroness and the young ladies. Miss Wulfilda fainted away in horror, as soon as she heard she was to be wedded to a frightful bear; the mother wrung her hands, and the sisters sobbed and wept from fear and sympathy. Papa, however, went out, and surveyed the castle walls and moat, tried the locks and bolts of the iron door, let down the draw-bridge, and stopped up all the avenues. He then mounted to the watch-tower, where he found a secret room under the roof: here he shut up the young lady who tore her hair, and almost wept out her azure eyes.

-Six days had passed, and the seventh was dawning, when, behold, a loud noise was heard towards the wood, as if an army of savages had been approaching with their war-whoops. The whips cracked, the horns blew, the horses pranced, the wheels rattled. A sumptuous state coach, surrounded with horse guards, rolled forwards

across the lawn towards the castle. All the bolts started back, the gate flew open, the draw-bridge fell: a young prince fair as the day, stepped out of the coach, clad in velvet and satin; round his neck he wore a triple chain of gold; his hat was bound with a string of pearls and dazzling diamonds, and the button that fixed the plume would have been cheap at a dukedom. He flew as quick as lightning or whirlwind up the winding staircase, and in a moment the affrighted bride was seen trembling in his arms.

The noise roused the baron from his morning nap; he opened the window of his chamber; and on seeing horses, and chariots, knights and horsemen, in the court, and his daughter in the arms of a stranger, who was lifting her into the coach, and the train ready to go out at the castle gate, a pang pierced his heart through and through, and he set up a loud lamentation Adieu, my daughter dear! Farewell thou bruin's bride?''Wulfilda, hearing her father's voice, waved her handkerchief out at the coach window, as a signal of her last farewell.

The old people were thunderstruck at the loss of their daughter: they looked ruefully at each other without speaking. Mamma would not believe her eyes; and, concluding the carrying away was all illusion and deceit, she seized the bundle of keys, opened the secret chamber, but found neither her daughter nor any of her things. But there lay on the table a silver key, which she took up: looking through a chink in the wall, she saw a cloud

of dust rise towards the east, and heard the tumult and shouting of the bridal pomp as far as the entrance of the wood. She descended in sorrow from the tower, put on mourning apparel, covered her head with ashes, and wept three live long days, accompanied by her husband and remaining daughters.

On the fourth day, the baron quitted the mourning chamber to breathe a little fresh air; when behold, as he passed through the court, he perceived a strong box of ebony, close locked, and heavy to lift. He readily guessed the contents; the baroness gave him the key: he turned the lock and found an hundred weight of gold, all in doubloons and of one coinage. In his joy for this windfall, he forgot all his sorrows, bought horses and falcons, and also fine cloaths for his wife and the misses, hired servants and began anew his trade of carousal and riot, which he held on till the last doubloon made itself wind and flew out of the strong box. He then ran in debt: the creditors flocked upon him in shoals, an execution was lodged in the castle, and every thing sold, except an old hawk. The old lady and her daughters again took charge of the kitchen, while he traversed the fields, day after day, with his hawk on his hand, out of mere listlessness, and want of something to do.

One day he loosed his hawk: the bird rose high in the air, and would not return to his master's hand, though he eagerly called it back. The baron followed its flight as fast as he could over the spacious plain. The bird

sailed towards the dreadful wood, which the baron was afraid to enter, and so gave up his faithful bird for lost. On a sudden, a mighty eagle arose from out of the wood, and pursued the hawk, which was no sooner aware of the superior enemy, than it turned back to its master, in hopes of protection. But the eagle darted down like an arrow, grasped the baron's shoulder with the powerful talons of one foot, and with the other crushed the affectionate falcon to death. The affrighted baron tried to beat off the enraged monster with his spear, and struck and thrust hard at the enemy. But the eagle seized his weapon; broke it, like a slender reed, in two; and then screamed these words aloud in his ear: "How darest thou, bold intruder, disturb my range of air with thy sport? Thou shalt pay for the trespass with thy life."-This address led the baron to conjecture what sort of an adventure he had now fallen upon" Gently, good Mr. Eagle, gently I pray you;' do not squeeze my shoulders so hard: what have I done to you! My hawk has suffered the punishment of his rashness: I give him up to you; satisfy your appetite." “No, no,” rejoined the eagle, to day I have longed for human flesh, and thou seemest a fat and dainty morsel." "Ah, spare me," cried the baron, in his distress, spare me, I pray. Ask what you will of me, and demand shall be satisfied, only spare my life.”—“Good,” resumed the bird; " I take thee at thy word: thou hast two fair daughters, and I need a wife-promise me thy Adelheid, and I will let thee go in peace. Her ransom

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shall betwo lumps of gold, each one hundred pounds weight. In seven weeks I fetch my darling home."-On this he mounted aloft, and disappeared among the clouds.

In distress every thing loses its value. When the father saw the traffic of his daughters bring such ample profit, he rested himself content with the waste of his family. This time be returned cheerful to the castle, and took no notice of his adventure, partly to save himself the reproaches of his wife, and partly lest he should make heavy his daughter's heart before the time. To preserve appearances he lamented the loss of his hawk, which, as he pretended, had gone beyond its knowledge and came back no more.

Miss Adelheid was the best spinstress in the country; she was also an expert weaver, and had just then taken from the loom a piece of costly linen, as fine as the finest muslin, which she exposed to bleach on a green grassplat near the castle. Six weeks and six days had passed before the fair spinstress had any apprehension of her approaching fate, though her father, who grew somewhat sad at this period, gave her many a dark hint, and would often relate dreams that renewed the memory of Wulfilda, who had now been long forgotten. Adelheid was of a light and airy disposition. She attributed these moping fancies of her father to heaviness of blood and hypochondria. She tripped nimbly to the bleaching ground, at the dawn of the appointed day, and spread out her linen that it might imbibe the morning dew. When she had

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