"Thou little fool!"  he exclaimed, "thou
little frantic fool! Art thou really so
unacquainted with men and the world as not
to know that each of my words is a
thunderbolt, before which every will trembles
and is silent? I tell thee thou must follow
me."

With these words he clasped the maiden in
his arms, and sought to draw her away.

The orphan sprang up. The anger of
outraged modesty glowed on her cheek; her
dark-blue eye flashed as if it would annihilate
the insolent intruder.

"Help!" she cried; "help! Am I quite
forsaken!"

On the surrounding heights appeared groups
of country people on their way to the
neighbouring church, who, anxious spectators of
the unequal contest, ventured not to stay
their dreaded master.

"Thou strugglest in vain, mischievous little
witch!" exclaimed Wilfred, as he strove to
lift her on his horse.

"Help!" cried the maiden again.

The groups on the hills crowded together.
The bells of the village church began to
sound the summons to the holy service.

With a violent movement of despair, the
orphan had succeeded in disengaging herself,
and had gained the brink of the stream.

"I understand thee!" shouted the Count;
"but thou art too beautiful to become the
prey of fishes: thou shalt not escape me so!"

He roughly grasped her long, silken hair,
and wound it several times round his right
hand. "Now fly!" he triumphantly exclaimed,
"call thy spirits to thy aid!"

The maiden trembled in every limb. "My
parents! my parents!" she cried. "Oh, help
your child!"

And suddenly—as when a huge caldron, on
the point of boiling, sends to the surface foam
and bubbles—the stream began to seethe and
heave; its colour changing to a dull grey;
a hollow plashing sound was heard; and an
odour of decay rose from the waters. The
orphan uttered a cry of joy; stretched her
arms as towards a visible object, and sank
into the stream.

A shriek of horror burst from the tyrant ;
the luxuriant tresses remained in his hand !
Pale as death, he staggered several paces
backward. "Lord, be merciful to me!" he
stammered, with halting tongue, and fell to
the ground in a swoon. His hand relaxed
its hold; and the delicate fair hair, carried
by the wind, flew along the shore, and rested
on hill and bush.

The bells were still calling to church; but
the people, excited and trembling at the
miracle they had witnessed, knelt down and
implored from Heaven forgiveness for the
wretched culprit.

Count Wilfred soon after made a pilgrimage
to the Holy Sepulchre, from which he never
returned. A few years more, and his elder
brother breathed his last, after a long illness,
surrounded in his dying moments only by
unsympathising men, whom he had taught
to feel towards him nothing but hatred, and
a longing for revenge. The property reverted
to the State.

But, maidens, ever since this wondrous
event, have found along the shores of the
Danube a new flower, the long, flaxen filaments
of which so closely resemble The Orphan
Maiden's Hair that they have given it that name.

Erzsi ceased. Meanwhile, the moon had
fully risen, and softly illumined the stream
and its green shores. Here and there, between
the reeds, were seen the delicate, light flowers,
the history of which she had related; and
which, gently stirred by the evening wind,
bore testimony to the truth of the Hungarian
legend.

It was late—my hosts retired to rest; but
I remained long on my seat before the house,
and let the rushing current of the Danube,
and the sighing of the reeds, repeat to me the
legend I had heard,

THE TREATMENT OF THE INSANE.

UNDER this head we spoke in our third
volume, at page 572, of the extent to which
insanity prevails in this kingdom, and pointed
out the insufficiency of the accommodation
provided for the care and cure of Lunatics.
Our comments were, on that occasion, by no
means exhausted.

In the first place, there is left to us
something to say of the arrangements now existing
on behalf of private patients in the County
Asylums, in the public ' Hospitals,' and lastly,
in the Licensed Houses.

According to a return made by the
Commissioners of Lunacy to the Lord Chancellor,
there were in January, 1850, nine county
asylums which admitted private as well as
pauper lunatics. The entire number of
private patients living at that time in the
asylums, was two hundred and thirty-two.
When county asylums were first established,
they were mainly for the benefit of pauper
lunatics; and, although in several instances
part of their accommodation has been applied
to the use of private patients, it would
have been better had they all remained
devoted wholly to the service of the poor.
When such necessary parts of an asylum as
its courts and grounds are subdivided for the
sake of separating patients between whom
there is no other difference than rank, the
pauper loses, and the private patient only
gets a part of the accommodation furnished,
not for men divided by the barriers of social
rank, but for men united by a common malady
under a common system of relief. Moreover,
there arises a great deal of practical
inconvenience from the endeavour to maintain two
scales of housekeeping under a single roof,
and what is a great deal worse, much moral