The servant entered the room at this moment, and the two young men parted for the night, having thus settled in a few moments the preliminaries of a mortal combat, with as much coolness as if it had been an agreement for a fox-hunt. FOOTNOTES: [6] A coxcomb, a popinjay. CHAPTER VII. “'We try this quarrel hilt to hilt.' Then each at once his falchion drew, Each on the ground his scabbard threw, Each looked to sun, and stream, and plain, As what they ne'er might see again; Then foot, and point, and eye opposed, In dubious strife they darkly closed.” _Lady of the Lake._ It is a happy thing for human nature that the cares, and vexations, and fears, of this weary life, are at least excluded from the magic world of sleep. Exhausted nature will seek a respite from her trials in forgetfulness, and steeped in the sacred stream of Lethe, like the young Achilles, she becomes invulnerable. It is but seldom that care dares intrude upon this quiet realm, and though it may be truly said that sleep “swift on her downy pinions flies from woe,” yet, when at last it does alight on the lid sullied by a tear, it rests as quietly as elsewhere. We have scarcely ever read of an instance where the last night of a convict was not passed in tranquil slumber, as though Sleep, the sweet sister of the dread Terror, soothed more tenderly, in this last hour, the victim of her gloomy brother's dart. Thomas Hansford, for with him our story remains, slept as calmly on this night as though a long life of happiness and fame stretched out before his eyes. 'Tis true, that ere he went to bed, as he unbelted his trusty sword, he looked at its well-tempered steel with a confident eye, and thought of the morrow. But so fully imbued were the youth of that iron age with the true spirit of chivalry, that life was but little regarded where honour was concerned, and the precarious tenure by which life was held, made it less prized by those who felt that they might be called on any day to surrender it. Hansford, therefore, slept soundly, and the first red streaks of the morning twilight were smiling through his window when he awoke. He rose, and dressing himself hastily, he repaired to the study, where he wrote a few hasty lines to his mother and to Virginia—the first to assure her of his filial love, and to pray her forgiveness for thus sacrificing life for honour; and the second breathing the warm ardour of his heart for her who, during his brief career, had lightened the cares and shared the joys which fortune had strewn in his path. As he folded these two letters and placed them in his pocket, he could not help drawing a deep sigh, to think of these two beings whose fate was so intimately entwined with his own, and whose thread of life would be weakened when his had been severed. Repelling such a thought as unworthy a brave man engaged in an honourable cause,