ERNEST MALTRAVERS

BY EDWARD BULWER LYTTON
(Lord Lytton)


BOOK IV.

"Strange is the land that holds thee,--and thy couch
is widow'd of the loved one."
EURIP. /Med./ 442
Translation by R. G.



CHAPTER I.

"I, alas!
Have lived but on this earth a few sad years;
And so my lot was ordered, that a father
First turned the moments of awakening life
To drops, each poisoning youth's sweet hope."
"/Cenci/."

FROM accompanying Maltravers along the noiseless progress of mental
education, we are now called awhile to cast our glances back at the
ruder and harsher ordeal which Alice Darvil was ordained to pass. Along
her path poetry shed no flowers, nor were her lonely steps towards the
distant shrine at which her pilgrimage found its rest lighted by the
mystic lamp of science, or guided by the thousand stars which are never