The principal occupant was a man of a lean, haggard figure, bowed less by age than by toil and privation. A few black, uncombed locks escaping from the folds of a turban, once white, now begrimed with smoke and dust, straggled over a swarthy forehead, marked with lines caused by intense thought, and abortive speculations. He was dressed in Moorish garments, the sleeves tucked above the elbows, revealing his emaciated arms, while his talon-like fingers grasped an immense triangular crystal, through which he was casting refractions upon the screen. His deep, cavernous eyes seemed to gleam with the fires of insanity, yet he spoke in a tone of deep abstraction, though with something like the voice of affection. "Disturb me not, my daughter, but stand aside till I have completed my experiment." The maidens remained silently by the door, and Berengaria had leisure to note the motions of a dwarf African, who sat diligently blowing the bellows of the furnace, rolling his eyes, and saluting the ladies with smiles which served at once to exhibit his white teeth and his satisfaction at the interruption. Notwithstanding her fears at finding herself in so strange a situation, the curiosity of Berengaria was so excited by the novelty of the scene, that she waited patiently while the philosopher experimented first with one light and then with another, till apparently becoming dissatisfied with the result, he attempted to change the position of the tubes. Scarce was his purpose accomplished, when a deafening explosion rent the air, followed by sounds as of the falling of the ruin overhead. Profound darkness ensued, and the groans of the wounded alchemist mingled with the demoniac laughter of the African, and the echo of her own shrieks increased the terror of the princess almost to agony. Elsiebede alone retained any share of self-possession. "A light, a light, Salaman," exclaimed she. Instantly a line of blue flame crept along the wall, and a tiny torch in the hand of the dwarf mysteriously ignited, revealed again his malevolent countenance, and threw his misshapen and magnified image in full relief upon the screen. An odor of brimstone that seemed to accompany the apparition, did not serve to allay Berengaria's apprehensions. Elsiebede for once forgot her mistress. Hastily snatching the torch from the negro, she lighted a lamp and raising her father from the stone floor, began to examine his wounds. The blood was oozing from a contusion upon the back of his head, one side of his face was dreadfully burned, and his right hand lay utterly powerless. Giving hurried directions in Moorish to the grinning Ethiope, Elsiebede with his assistance placed her father upon a couch behind the screen, and bathed the painful wounds with a balmy liquid from one of the dusty phials, accompanying her soothing appliances with the soft and gentle expressions of affection. Their language was foreign to the ear of Berengaria, but she discovered by the tones of the