food and hung on Barbara's lips as though spellbound.

This was something unprecedented. But when the monarch continued for
some time to display an abstemiousness so unlike him, the marquise cast
a hasty glance of inquiry at Malfalconnet. But the affirmative answer
which she expected did not come. Had the baron's keen eve failed to
notice so important a matter, or had his Majesty taken him into his
confidence and commanded him to keep the secret?

That Malfalconnet was merely avoiding making common cause with the old
intriguer, was a suspicion which vanity led her to reject the more
positively the more frequently her countryman sought her to learn
what he desired to know.

Besides, she soon required no further confirmation, for what now happened
put an end to every doubt.

Barbara had to sing the "Quia amore langueo" again, and how it sounded
this time to the listening hearer!

No voice which the Emperor Charles had ever heard had put such pure,
bewitching melody into this expression of the deepest yearning. It
seemed as though the longing of the whole world was flowing to him from
those fresh, young, beautifully formed red lips.

A heart which was not itself languishing for love could not pour forth
to another with such convincing truth, overwhelming power, and glowing
fervour the ardent longing of a soul seized by the omnipotence of love.

The mighty pressure of rising surges of yearning dashed against the