"'Oh! Holy Echri, this thing must not be. His pain is my pain; and if he will not spare himself, then must thou spare him,' Volinè said, in a voice piteous to hear; and her words went each like a keen-edged dagger into my heart. Turning to me, she continued: "'Harry, thou shalt not go! Yea, I will even wed thee as thou art. Come back to me, for my heart is breaking. Come back to me; come back and comfort my dreadful sorrow. Oh! why did I tell thee of this terrible thing! oh! why did I tempt thee! Why, oh why did I counsel thee to this! Why send thee to such a doom of agony for ME--thee, whom I love better than my own life!' "But even as Volinè spoke I was led away by the attendant Priests, feeling powerless to help the woman I loved, and growing more determined to consummate the dread doom before me. "They led me unto the fiery stream, and there, as Echri rose and raised his voice in some unknown tongue, the floor gave way beneath me and I sank in an oblique direction into a small pit which seemed to me to be under, or in the very course of, the fiery stream! Then all became dark, and I could hear, as afar off, the singing of the Priests, their heaven-wrought music, and the piteous appeals of she whom I loved! Shortly the agony of my awful situation entered into my soul; yet all was hopeless now; hopeless! A living death by Fire approached me! I tried to cry out, but my voice was dumb; 'Volinè,' the one word I could say, became but a hideous rattle in my burning throat; and as my eyes strove in vain to penetrate the ghastly gloom of this dread chamber, the blackness around me seemed to fall away, and a volume of white-hot fire approached! Scorched and burnt by the sudden heat, all the agony of death entered into my soul in that one awful moment of time, my brain seemed to burst asunder with pain, and all became an instant blank! "How long this lasted I know not; but in what seemed to me the twinkling of an eye I awoke, and found myself in the same small chamber where the Priests had robed and chained me. Echri stood near, and the same Priests were arranging my old garments ready for use. The melted gold of my manacles still hung in guttered streams from my wrists; my robe was burned to tinder; yet, otherwise, not one trace of fire marked my body, and even the downy hair upon my arms was soft and unsinged! The sacred ring upon my finger had also passed through the fire unscathed! At all this I marvelled greatly, and pondered in amazement. I felt myself, and yet I knew instinctively I was not. What had actually befallen me I had not a single remembrance; all was blotted out by that stream of raging fire. How this wonderful transformation had been accomplished I never learned. It was the jealously-kept secret of Echri and his brother-Priests. "'My son, thou hast acted as only a brave man couldst. Begarb thyself, and hasten to the comfort of her whom thou lovest. She needs thy care.'