[138]
My Lord, said Jerome eagerly—peace? impostor! said Manfred; I will not have him prompted. My Lord, said Theodore, I want no assistance: My story is very brief. I was carried at five years of age to Algiers with my mother, who had been taken by corsairs from the coast of Sicily. She died of grief in less than a twelvemonth—the tears gushed from Jerome's eyes, on whose countenance a thousand anxious passions stood expressed. Before she died, continued Theodore, she bound a writing about my arm under my garments, which told me I was the son of the Count Falconara—it is most true, said Jerome; I am that wretched father—again I enjoin thee silence; said Manfred: Proceed. I remained in slavery, said Theodore, until within these two years, when attending on my master in his cruizes, I was delivered by a Christian vessel, which overpowered the pirate; and discovering myself to the captain, he generously put me on shore in Sicily—but alas! instead of finding a father, I learned that his estate,which
