was formed in the mountain, under which the travellers passed to the splendid hall of a subterranean regal palace. Here many beautiful forms of men and women, but all proportionably small, met the countess and her companion, and respectfully saluting them, conducted them through many royal saloons, glittering with gold and silver, to one more superb than any of the rest, in which were a pair of golden folding-doors communicating with another chamber. These suddenly flew open, and another female advancing, took the countess by the hand, and saying that the Mountain-Queen longed for her impatiently, conducted her into the apartment. The little men fell back respectfully, but the waiting-maids accompanied the countess into the chamber of the sovereign. Here walls of pure marble were surmounted by a cupola of soft green emerald, under which stood a bed of beaten gold, and upon that reclined a lovely female, mild and gracious as the Italian representations of the Madonna. ‘Noble lady,’ said she, in a gentle tone, to dame Ursula, ‘be not alarmed; you are even safer here than in the home of your fathers: approach me without hesitation, and assist me in this hour of mortal terror, which has fallen upon me in the Eve of St. John, when the spirits of the earth are powerless until morning. I bear beneath my heart a pledge of our sovereign-husband’s love, which, without your aid, cannot see the light; assist me, then, in this my hour of need, as you would hope for help in yours.’
“Ursula was moved by this gentle address and the high confidence reposed in her: she spoke some words
