Embankment we have a great opportunity; in
Carey-street we have a compromise and a
failure.

The whole question must be reconsidered in
the House of Commons, when the money grant
is asked for. It is to be hoped that, for once,
a metropolitan improvement will be carefully
and wisely discussed, and that the right course
may be adopted.

THE MYSTERY OF THE MOATED-
SCHLOSS.

CHAPTER I.

COUNT ALBRECHT VON RABENSBERG was the
object of some attention in the winter of
'44, when he appeared, for the first time, in
the salons of Vienna. He was the head of
an old Bohemian family; rich, not much
past thirty, and handsome. He was, moreover,
unmarried. Little was known about
him, except that he had large estates, and
more than one schloss, where he never
resided; that his father had died when he
was very young, and his only sister had
been drowned, by accident, many years
before; and that, left without kith or kin,
since the age of eighteen, he had led a
wandering life on the face of the globe,
never remaining for many months in the
same place. He consorted but little with
men of his own age, he neither gambled
nor drank, and he was said to be proof
against all the attentions of women.
Whether this was really so or not, such a
reputation was, in itself, enough to pique
curiosity and excite interest in Vienna, where
feminine intrigue spreads its endless
network among the roots of an aristocratic
society. Add to this, the stern, sad
expression of the young man's handsome
face, and his reluctance ever to talk about
himself, and the mystery with which it
pleased the Viennese world to invest him,
could no longer be a matter of surprise.

The world selected a very suitable wife
for him—a lovely daughter of the princely
house of L. He scandalously disappointed
the world, and chose a wife for himself.
He married a simple burgher's daughter;
and the indignation which this outrage
upon common decency aroused can only
be conceived by those who know what the
pride of "caste" in Vienna is. How could
his infatuation be accounted for? The girl
he fixed on was by no means beautiful.
A sweet, pale face, a slender, graceful
figure, were all young Magda had to boast of.
He saw her first in one of the Lust-Gartens
of the town, and from that moment his
infatuation began. He followed her home;
he never rested until he had made the good
citizen's acquaintance; he called at the
house daily during holy week, and on
Easter Monday he asked Magda to become
his wife. The girl was almost frightened.
It was scarce a fortnight since she had first
met the count's intense and searching gaze
bent upon her; since she had been
conscious of his following her and her mother
home; scarce ten days since he first called,
that cold March morning, when Magda's
hands were red from the household washing,
and she felt ashamed of them, as she
knitted with downcast eyes, and replied in
monosyllables to the questions of the
deep-eyed, melancholy Graf. It had all passed
like a dream, so fantastic and unreal it
seemed. She was still a little afraid of him.
He was very handsome and charming, no
doubt; and no young maiden could be
insensible to the devotion of such a knight; but
his gravity and the difference of their rank
a little oppressed her. She had scarcely
accustomed herself to his daily visit, scarcely
felt at ease in his presence, when he startled
her by laying all he possessed at her feet.
And with some trembling, some unaccountable
misgiving at heart, she faltered "Yes."

The cackling this event caused throughout
all classes (for high and low were
equally interested therein) was increased
by the haste with which the marriage was
hurried on. Of course, it was said the poor
young man had been entrapped into it;
there were hints that he had been made
drunk; there were even darker hints thrown
out, without one shadow of foundation; but
these lies had scarcely time to permeate
society, when the news burst like a bomb
into the midst of it that the ceremony had
actually taken place in private, and that
Count von Rabensberg and his bride had
left Vienna.

The count's conduct was no less strange
after marriage than it had been before.
He worshipped his young wife with a
passionate curiosity, so to speak, which seemed
allied to some other mysterious feeling,
deep-seated and unexplained. Now and
again he would lie at her feet for hours,
gazing into her eyes, as Hamlet may have
done into Ophelia's, with a silent,
half-sorrowful ecstasy, rising on a sudden, with
a wild rapture, to cast his arms about her
and cover her with kisses. By degrees she
became used to his ways, more at ease
under his long silences, less startled by his
sudden passionate outbursts. There were
times, too, when he would talk with an
eloquence, the like of which she had never