with her sisters. Followed by her slaves, she went into her garden
and sank in a hammock, hung amid the gigantic leaves of a palm-tree,
and, while the negro girls danced and sang round her, the young maid
was dreaming about the future, and her beating heart asked if it
were not possible that the prophecy of the negro woman might one day
be realized.

She, the daughter of M. Tascher de la Pagerie--she a future "Queen
of France! More than a queen!" Oh, it was mere folly to think on
such things, and to busy herself with the ludicrous prophecies of
the old woman.

And Josephine laughed at her own credulity, and the slaves sang and
danced, and against her will the thoughts of the young maiden
returned to the prophecy again and again.

What the old fortune-teller had said, was it so very ridiculous, so
impossible? Could not that prophecy become a reality? Was it, then,
the first time that a daughter of the Island of Martinique had been
exalted to grandeur and lofty honors?

Josephine asked these questions to herself, as dreaming and
thoughtful she swung in the hammock and gazed toward the horizon
upon the sea, which, in its blue depths and brilliancy, hung there
as if heaven had lowered itself down to earth. That sea was a
pathway to France, and already once before had its waves wafted a
daughter of the Island of Martinique to a throne.

Thus ran the thoughts of Josephine. She thought of Franchise
d'Aubigne, and of her wondrous story. A poor wanderer, fleeing from