ascent, over the summit of which there floated heavily, thick, dense, murky, gloom-laden clouds. Crimson and red on their edges were they, as if crowned with thunder, and their bowels overcharged with lightnings; and their sombre shadows fell upon the plains below, heavy and pall-like, even as shrouds on the limbs of beauty, or the harsh critic’s sentence upon the first fruits of budding and aspiring genius. ‘It is nothing but a crowd,’ said I; and the being at my side repeated, as if in astonishment, ‘Nothing but a crowd? Boy, the destinies of nations centre in a crowd. Witness Paris. Look again!’ Obeying mechanically, I did so, and soon beheld a strange commotion among the people; and I heard a wail go up—a cry of deep anguish—a sound heavily freighted with human woe and agony. I shuddered.

“On the extreme apex of the mountain stood a colossal monument, not an obelisk, but a sort of temple, perfect in its proportions, and magnificent to the view. This edifice was surmounted by a large and highly polished golden pyramid in miniature. On all of the faces of this pyramid was inscribed the Latin word Felicitas; I asked for an explanation from my guide, but instead of giving it, he placed his air-like hand upon my head, and drawing it gently over my brow and eyes, said, ‘Look!’

“Was there magic in his touch? It really seemed so, for it increased my visual capacity fifty-fold, and on again turning to the earth beneath me, I found my interest almost painfully excited by a real drama there and then enacting. It was clearly apparent that the great majority of the people were partially, if not wholly blind; and I observed that one group, near the centre of the plain below the mountain, appeared to be under much greater excitement than most of the others, and their turbulence appeared to result from the desire of each individual to reach a certain golden ball and staff which lay on a cushion of crimson velvet within the splendid open-sided monument on the mountain. In the midst of this lesser crowd, energetically striving to reach the ascending path, was one man who seemed to be endowed with far more strength and resolution—not of body, but of purpose—than those immediately around him. Bravely he urged his way toward the mountain’s top, and, after almost incredible efforts, succeeded. Exultingly he approached the temple, by his side were hundreds more; he outran them, entered, reached forth to seize the ball and sceptre—it seemed that the courageous man must certainly succeed—his fingers touched the prize, a smile of triumph illumined his countenance, and then suddenly went out in the blight of death, for he fell to the earth from a deadly blow, dealt by one treacherous hand from behind, while others seized and hurled him down the steep abyss upon which the temple abutted, and he was first dashed to pieces and then trampled out of existence by the iron heels of advancing thousands—men who saw but pitied not, rather rejoicing that one rival less was in existence.

“ ‘Is it possible,’ cried I, internally, ‘that such hell-broth of vindictiveness boils in human veins?’

“ ‘Alas, thou seest!’ replied Ettelavar, by my side. ‘Learn a lesson,’ said he, ‘from what you have seen. Fame is a folly, not worth the having when obtained. ‘Felicitas’ is ever ahead, never reached, therefore not to be looked for. Friendship is an empty name, or convenient cloak which men put on to enable them to rob with greater facility. No man is content to see another rise, except when such rising will assist his own elevation; and the man behind will stab the man in front, if he stands in his way. Human nature is infantile, childish, weak, passionate and desperately depraved, and as a rule, they are the greater villains who assume the most sanctity; they the most selfish who prate loudest of charity, faith and love. I begin my tutelage by warning, therefore arming you, against the world and those who constitute it. If you wish to truly rise, you must first learn to put the world and what it contains at its proper value. Remember, I who speak am Ettelavar. Awake!’

“Like the sudden black cloud in eastern seas, there came a darkness before me; my eyes opened, and fell upon the old clock face. Its hands told me that it was exactly thirteen minutes since I had marked the hour on the dial. Since that hour I have had much similar experience, and it is this that affords ground for the unusual powers in certain respects, not claimed by, but attributed to me.” ...

Such was the substance of the young man’s narrative, in answer to questions propounded to him long before the date at which he is introduced to the reader.

CHAPTER V.
LOVE. EULAMPÉA[2]—THE BEAUTIFUL.

The golden sun was setting, and day was sinking beneath his crimson coverlets in the glowing west. The birds, on thousand green boughs, were singing the final chorus of the summer opera; the lambs were skipping homeward in the very excess of joy; while the cattle on the hills lowed and bellowed forth their thanksgiving to the viewless Lord of Glory. Man alone seemed unconscious of his duty and the blessings he enjoyed. Toil-weary farmers were slowly plodding their way supper and bed-ward, and all nature seemed to be preparing to enjoy her bath of rest. Still sat the wanderer by the highway side; still fell his tears upon the grateful soil; and as the journeyers home and tavern-ward passed him by, many were the remarks they made upon him, careless whether he heard them or not. Some in cruel, heartless mockery and derision, some few in pity, and all in something akin to surprise, for men of his appearance were rarely seen in that neighborhood. At last there came along three persons, two of whom were unmistakably Indians, and the third, a girl of such singular complexion, grace, form, and extraordinary facial beauty, it was extremely difficult to ethnologically define what she was. This girl was about fourteen; the boy who accompanied her and the grey-haired old Indian by her side, was apparently about twelve years old. This last was the first to notice the stranger.

“Oh, Evlambéa,” said he, “see! there’s a man crying, and I’m going to help him!” The boy spoke in his own vernacular, for he was a full blood of the Oneida branch of the Mohawks, fearless, honorable, quick, impulsive, and generous as sunlight itself. To see distress and fly to its relief was but a single thing for him, and used to be with his people until improved and “civilized” with bad morals and worse protection. The Indian was Ki-ah-wah-nah (The Lenient and Brave) chief of the Stockbridge section of the Mohawks. The girl, Evlambéa, nominally passed for his grandchild, but such was not the case, for although she might well be taken for a fourth blood, she really had not a trace of Indian about her, further than the costume, language, and general education and habit. Her name was modern Greek, or Romaic, but her features and complexion no more resembled that of the pretty dwellers on Prinkipo or the shores of the Bosphorus, than that of the Indians or Anglo Saxon. Many years previous to that day, this girl, then a child of three or four months age, had been brought to the chief and left in his care for a week, by a woman clad in the garb of, and belonging to a wandering band of gipsies, who, attracted by the universal reputation of the New World, had left Bohemia and crossed the seas to reap a golden harvest. This band had held its headquarters for nearly a year on Cornhill, Utica, whence they had deployed about the country in a circle whose radius averaged one hundred and twenty miles. The woman never came back to claim the child, for the members of the band suddenly decamped after having