through the blazing grasses, the hiss of the serpents, the scream
of the birds, and the bellow and tramp of the herds plunging wild
through the billowy red of their pastures.

Ayesha now wound her arms around Margrave, and wrenched him,
reluctant and struggling, from his watch over the seething caldron.
In rebuke of his angry exclamations, she pointed to the march of
the fire, spoke in sorrowful tones a few words in her own language,
and then, appealing to me in English, said:

"I tell him that, here, the Spirits who oppose us have summoned a
foe that is deaf to my voice, and--"

"And," exclaimed Margrave, no longer with gasp and effort, but with
the swell of a voice which drowned all the discords of terror and
of agony sent forth from the Phlegethon burning below--"and this
witch, whom I trusted, is a vile slave and impostor, more desiring
my death than my life. She thinks that in life I should scorn and
forsake her, that in death I should die in her arms! Sorceress,
avaunt! Art thou useless and powerless now when I need thee most?
Go! Let the world be one funeral pyre! What to ME is the world?
My world is my life! Thou knowest that my last hope is here--that
all the strength left me this night will die down, like the lamps
in the circle, unless the elixir restore it. Bold friend, spurn
that sorceress away. Hours yet ere those flames can assail us! A
few minutes more, and life to your Lilian and me!"

Thus having said, Margrave turned from us, and cast into the
caldron the last essence yet left in his empty coffer.