growing up distinguished in nothing but rank from the neighbouring boors. The little town that surrounded the castle, inhabited entirely by his own tenants and vassals, furnished neither a companion for his pastimes, nor an instructor in any art or accomplishment; but Manfred even from his earliest youth had manifested an aptness to learn, and an eagerness in the pursuit of knowledge, such as no allurements to idleness could divert and no obstacles over

come.

Manfred had never known parental love. Abandoned to the care, or rather to the neglect, of hirelings, the voice of kindness was strange to his ear. No approving monitor cheered his progress in learning; and he grew in stature and in beauty beneath the eye of cold indifference. His little heart had never throbbed with affection, his sympathies had never been called forth. An undefinable oppression, and a vague desire of he knew not what, repressed the buoyant spirit of youth. He had never known the wild laugh, the joyous exuberance of infancy; and frequently, as he watched the village children at play from his solitary terrace, or saw the tender caresses

of some fond mother, his heart would swell with unconscious jealousy, and he would turn away with envy to relieve his overcharged breast by a flood of tears.

As he grew towards manhood, his only refuge from these feelings, which became more painful when he traced them to their source, was the ardent pursuit of knowledge: and happy indeed are they, and blessed "beyond the lover's and the poet's lot," who can effectually apply this remedy to the disappointments of life and the injuries of wounded feeling!

Fortunately, a neighbouring convent of Cistercian Monks (which owed its rich endowments to the house of Fortebraccio) furnished a valuable library; and a brother of the order, a man of learning and austere piety, willingly assisted the young student in his researches; thus nobly repaying the munificence of the founders by the education of their descendant.

Father Lorenzo loved his pupil. In the ardent and melancholy boy he found a mind congenial to his own, a soil which yielded a rich return for all his labours; still he was not the person to infuse the first useful lessons of

patience and forbearance into a youthful mind. Early in life, disappointed and deceived, he had sought retreat less from the world than from his own thoughts; and in the gloom of a convent, and in the performance of more than monastic rigours, he found a sullen consolation, or at least a respite from reflections that haunted him, and from worldly dreams which even the discipline of the cloister could hardly dispel.

In the education of the deserted orphan, he had found a slight interruption to the dark monotony of his existence. He was once more awakened to an interest in his species, and there seemed yet to remain one link to connect him with humanity. His affection was to be discovered rather in actions than in words; the austerity of his general manners, the abstruse nature of his studies, and the gloomy cast of his religion, checked the manifestation of it. Yet sometimes it had been observed that, as his eye fixed itself upon the beautiful and open brow of the young Manfred, while he sat intently poring over some huge volume, his expression would soften, and the

tear would tremble on his eyelid; but, ashamed of the weakness, he would hastily wipe it away, and quickly reassume the unbending gravity of his usual deportment.

Manfred, in return, grateful for the benefits he had received, and deprived of all other objects of affection, both loved and revered this only friend. His love, however, was mingled with awe the austerity of the recluse, his piety, and the mysterious hints that occasionally dropped from him, did not fail to inspire this feeling in all who approached him. It was encouragement that Manfred needed: he had no youthful follies to be checked, no petulance to repress; but the severe friar saw weakness to be overcome and frailty to be combated in the most natural affections: and the young count, thus repressed even where he most loved, grew up with the idea that all he felt should be examined with suspicion, and that there was guilt and shame in the generous overflowings of a feeling heart.

As he approached the verge of manhood, his books, amongst which had hitherto lain his only happiness, grew less pleasing to him; and the

fate that seemed to have doomed him to perpetual solitude and isolation, grew daily more oppressive to his imagination. He would neglect the manly sports in which he excelled, to pass whole days together in the wild and rugged region that surrounded his castle; and, wandering amidst the rocks and forests, or watching the sullen surge as it broke against the cliffs, he would lament the hard fate that had given him birth, to wander forth alone, without a friend and without an object.

It is not surprising that these circumstances, acting on a mind of great native power, had given an entirely original character to his mode of thought and action. Of the restraint in which, for the most part, the young nobles of Sicily are educated, he knew nothing. His tutor possessed little influence over him, and assumed no authority. His servants, stewards, and other dependents, if they did not consult his interests, at least did not openly oppose his wishes. He had no one, therefore, to direct, and few to contradict him. His manner was pleasing and mild, yet it had something in it that awed and repressed those with whom he