The Wondrous Tale of Alroy

I

It was midnight. Alroy slept upon the couch: his sleep was troubled. Jabaster stood by his side motionless, and gazing intently upon his slumbering guest.

“The only hope of Israel,” murmured the Cabalist, “my pupil and my prince! I have long perceived in his young mind the seed of mighty deeds; and o’er his future life have often mused with a prophetic hope. The blood of David, the sacred offspring of a solemn race. There is a magic in his flowing veins my science cannot reach.

“When in my youth I raised our standard by my native Tigris, and called our nation to restore their ark, why we were numerous, wealthy, potent; we were a people then, and they flocked to it boldly.” Did we lack counsel? did we need a leader? Who can aver Jabaster’s brain or arm was ever wanting? And yet the dream dissolved, the glorious vision. Oh! when I struck down Marvan, and the Caliph’s camp flung its blazing shadow o’er the bloody river—ah! then indeed I lived. Twenty years of vigil may gain a pardon that I then forgot we lacked the chief ingredient in the spell—the blood that sleeps beside me.

“I recall the glorious rapture of that sacred strife amid the rocks of Caucasus. A fugitive, a proscribed and outlawed wretch, whose life is common sport, and whom the vilest hind may slay without a bidding. I who would have been Messiah!”