The tables had been set out in the lower open gallery, and shone dazzlingly with their white coverings and their load of sparkling crystal: rich clusters of many-coloured flowers rose from the graceful necks of alabaster vases; green garlands, starred with white blossoms, twined round the columns: and it was a lovely sight to behold the bride gliding along with gentle motion between the tables and the pillars, amid the light of the flowers, overlooking the whole with a searching glance, and then vanishing; and reappearing a moment after above, to pass into her chamber. "She is the loveliest, most enchanting creature I ever saw!" cried Anderson: "our friend is indeed a happy man." "Her very paleness," added the officer, "hightens her beauty. Her hazel eyes only sparkle the more intensely above those white cheeks and beneath those dark locks; and the singular, almost burning redness of her lips gives her face a truly magical appearance." "The air of silent melancholy that surrounds her," said Anderson, "sheds a noble majesty over her." The bridegroom joined them, and askt after Roderick: he had been missing for some time, and they could not conceive what he was about. All set off in search of him. "He is down in the hall," said at length a young man whom they happened to ask, "in the midst of the coachmen, footmen, and grooms, shewing off tricks at cards, which make them stare till their wits ache." They walkt in, and interrupted the boisterous admiration of the servants, without however disturbing Roderick, who quietly went on conjuring. When he had finisht, he returned with the others into the garden, and said: "I do it only to strengthen the fellows in their faith: these puzzles give a hard blow to their groomships' free-thinking inclinations, and help to make 'em true believers." "I see," said the bridegroom, "my all-sufficing friend, among his other talents, does not think that of a mountebank beneath his cultivation." "We live in strange times," replied the other; "who knows whether mountebanks may not come to rule the roast in their turn? One ought to despise nothing nowadays: the veriest straw of a talent may be that which is to break the camel's back."