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ANNED by a gust of cold wind, the lamp crackled as the harper passed over the doorstep of Hlohov. Cautiously he protected the flame with his hand, and stopping, raised the light over his head. His eyes measured the height of the arch under which he found himself. His sight could not reach the ceilings, which were lost in darkness, but he dimly discerned a wide double stairway in the back of the hall winding upward.

“Ah, yes, this is Hlohov—at last!” the young man exclaimed with enthusiasm, proceeding through the cold, dark space like a spirit in the lower regions. “Different the breeze that cools my forehead here, different the echo which my footsteps make. All is entirely different from there below; all is