did what she had so often done in the intoxication of joy and pleasure.
Light and agile, instead of losing precious time in making a long
circuit, she sprang at once upon the table, passed nimbly through the
array of plates and bottles, and with one spring was by the side of the
sufferer.

"Jacques!" she exclaimed, without yet remarking the lion-tamer, and
throwing herself on the neck of her lover. "Jacques! it is I--Cephyse!"

That well-known voice, that heart-piercing cry, which came from the
bottom of the soul, seemed not unheard by Sleepinbuff. He turned his head
mechanically towards the Bacchanal Queen, without opening his eyes, and
heaved a deep sigh; his stiffened limbs relaxed, a slight trembling
succeeded to the convulsions, and in a few seconds his heavy eyelids were
raised with an effort, so as to uncover his dull and wandering gaze. Mute
with astonishment, the spectators of this scene felt an uneasy curiosity.
Cephyse, kneeling beside her lover, bathed his hands in her tears,
covered them with kisses, and exclaimed, in a voice broken by sobs, "It
is I--Cephyse--I have found you again--it was not my fault that I
abandoned you! Forgive me, forgive--"

"Wretched woman!" cried Morok, irritated at this meeting, which might,
perhaps, be fatal to his projects; "do you wish to kill him? In his
present state, this agitation is death. Begone!" So saying, he seized
Cephyse suddenly by the arm, just as Jacques, waking, as it were, from a
painful dream, began to distinguish what was passing around him.

"You! It is you!" cried the Bacchanal Queen, in amazement, as she
recognized Morok, "who separated me from Jacques!"