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ZULMIERA, THE HALF-CARIB GIRL.
walked forward a few paces, and shading his eyes from the lingering sunbeams, scanned for a few moments the scene before him. What passed in the mind of Bridget during the foregoing conversation it is unnecessary to relate, but the emotions called up in the heart of the Carib girl while hearing her lover thus traduced were violent and various. Hate, scorn, and revenge, fired her eye, and sent a torrent of hot blood through her veins, which, rushing to her face, turned the clear olive to a fiery crimson. Yet so well was she accustomed to master her feelings, that before her young mistress was sufficiently recovered to commence another dialogue, she stood the same apparently calm being, her hands folded across her breast ; and only that her eye was more dilated, and her cheek still slightly tinged, none could tell that aught had moved her. An exclamation from the governor, who had, for the last few minutes, been intently gazing in one direction, arrested his daughter's attention, and, gliding to his elbow, she inquired if he addressed her. " Look, Bridget," replied her father, in a still stern, but not unmusical voice—" look o'er yonder grove—dost thou see aught moving ?"—" Nothing, dearest father," answered the maiden, in her own sweet tones—" nothing but the bland zephyr sporting amid the young green leaves, and playing its fairy music upon them." " Foolish enthusiast ! But haste, girl ! — fetch me the wondrous instrument the lord-general gave me, and let me give yon grove a sharper look—methinks it contains more inmates than we wot of. I have heard of wild Indians and their deeds." Roused, by his remarks, Zulmiera started forward, and in an agitated voice which she in vain tried to stifle, exclaimed, " Oh, no, your excellency, naught is there, save, as the Lady Bridget saith, the whispering wind or the flybirds as they seek their leafy bower." " Back, girl !" fiercely retorted the governor—" back to thy place ; who taught thee to hazard thy remarks ? Methinks thy cavalier masters might have made thee know thy station better."