After this conversation, it is not wonderful that all were on the qui vive as they ascended the mountain road leading to the castle of Alcantra. Magdalena started at every sound, and even Clara, fearless as she was, felt relieved when she saw the lofty turrets and extensive battlements she had dimly remembered, spreading out before her, their dark outline relieved against the blue sky. If the approach was romantic and alarming, it was a good preparation to their minds for the castle itself; it was built in the times of feudal power and intestine wars, and its massive walls had well performed their part in the defence of its inmates during many sieges. And yet, strong as it was, and built, as it appeared, for eternity, a portion of this noble structure was going to decay; one wing had been very much battered in the last siege it had sustained, and the cannon-balls had done the work of centuries; but the main building looked very imposing, as if able to resist the lapse of ages, and appeared, from its elevation, to frown down upon intruders, and to scorn the very idea of danger. It was exactly such a place as was calculated to fire the imaginations and to win the hearts of young girls, brought up in a gay metropolis, from the very contrast to all they had ever seen before; there was a romance about its very gloom that was attractive to them. Associated as it was with much historic interest, and with many family traditions, they had ardently longed to behold it, and now that they saw it rise, in its dark grandeur, before them, they acknowledged that their expectations were more than realized.