I whispered to Ayesha the conclusion to which I came. "Thinkest thou,"
she answered, without raising her mournful head, "that the Agencies of
Nature are the movements of chance? The Spirits I invoked to his aid are
leagued with the hosts that assail. A mightier than I am has doomed him!"

Scarcely had she uttered these words before Margrave exclaimed, "Behold
how the Rose of the alchemist's dream enlarges its blooms from the folds
of its petals! I shall live, I shall live!"

I looked, and the liquid which glowed in the caldron had now taken a
splendour that mocked all comparisons borrowed from the lustre of gems.
In its prevalent colour it had, indeed, the dazzle and flash of the ruby;
but out from the mass of the molten red, broke coruscations of all prismal
hues, shooting, shifting, in a play that made the wavelets them selves
seem living things, sensible of their joy. No longer was there scum or
film upon the surface; only ever and anon a light rosy vapour floating
up, and quick lost in the haggard, heavy, sulphurous air, hot with the
conflagration rushing towards us from behind. And these coruscations
formed, on the surface of the molten ruby, literally the shape of a Rose,
its leaves made distinct in their outlines by sparks of emerald and
diamond and sapphire.

Even while gazing on this animated liquid lustre, a buoyant delight seemed
infused into my senses; all terrors conceived before were annulled; the
phantoms, whose armies had filled the wide spaces in front, were
forgotten; the crash of the forest behind was unheard. In the reflection
of that glory, Margrave's wan cheek seemed already restored to the
radiance it wore when I saw it first in the framework of blooms.