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Title: The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Volume 2

Author: Edgar Allan Poe

Release Date: April, 2000  [Etext #2148]
[Last updated: October 15, 2021]

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE, VOL. 2 ***




Produced by David Widger




The Works of Edgar Allan Poe

by Edgar Allan Poe

The Raven Edition

VOLUME II.


Contents

 THE PURLOINED LETTER
 THE THOUSAND-AND-SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
 A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM.
 VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY
 MESMERIC REVELATION
 THE FACTS IN THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
 THE BLACK CAT.
 THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
 SILENCE—A FABLE
 THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH.
 THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO.
 THE IMP OF THE PERVERSE
 THE ISLAND OF THE FAY
 THE ASSIGNATION
 THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
 THE PREMATURE BURIAL
 THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
 LANDOR’S COTTAGE
 WILLIAM WILSO
 THE TELL-TALE HEART.
 BERENICE
 ELEONORA
 NOTES TO THE SECOND VOLUME

[Redactor’s Note—Some endnotes are by Poe and some were added by
Griswold. In this volume the notes are at the end.]




THE PURLOINED LETTER


Nil sapientiæ odiosius acumine nimio.—_Seneca_.

      At Paris, just after dark one gusty evening in the autumn of 18-,
      I was enjoying the twofold luxury of meditation and a meerschaum,
      in company with my friend C. Auguste Dupin, in his little back
      library, or book-closet, _au troisième_, No. 33, _Rue Dunôt,
      Faubourg St. Germain_. For one hour at least we had maintained a
      profound silence; while each, to any casual observer, might have
      seemed intently and exclusively occupied with the curling eddies
      of smoke that oppressed the atmosphere of the chamber. For
      myself, however, I was mentally discussing certain topics which
      had formed matter for conversation between us at an earlier
      period of the evening; I mean the affair of the Rue Morgue, and
      the mystery attending the murder of Marie Rogêt. I looked upon
      it, therefore, as something of a coincidence, when the door of
      our apartment was thrown open and admitted our old acquaintance,
      Monsieur G——, the Prefect of the Parisian police.

      We gave him a hearty welcome; for there was nearly half as much
      of the entertaining as of the contemptible about the man, and we
      had not seen him for several years. We had been sitting in the
      dark, and Dupin now arose for the purpose of lighting a lamp, but
      sat down again, without doing so, upon G.‘s saying that he had
      called to consult us, or rather to ask the opinion of my friend,
      about some official business which had occasioned a great deal of
      trouble.

      “If it is any point requiring reflection,” observed Dupin, as he
      forebore to enkindle the wick, “we shall examine it to better
      purpose in the dark.”

      “That is another of your odd notions,” said the Prefect, who had
      a fashion of calling every thing “odd” that was beyond his
      comprehension, and thus lived amid an absolute legion of
      “oddities.”

      “Very true,” said Dupin, as he supplied his visitor with a pipe,
      and rolled towards him a comfortable chair.

      “And what is the difficulty now?” I asked. “Nothing more in the
      assassination way, I hope?”

      “Oh no; nothing of that nature. The fact is, the business is very
      simple indeed, and I make no doubt that we can manage it
      sufficiently well ourselves; but then I thought Dupin would like
      to hear the details of it, because it is so excessively odd.”

      “Simple and odd,” said Dupin.

      “Why, yes; and not exactly that, either. The fact is, we have all
      been a good deal puzzled because the affair is so simple, and yet
      baffles us altogether.”

      “Perhaps it is the very simplicity of the thing which puts you at
      fault,” said my friend.

      “What nonsense you do talk!” replied the Prefect, laughing
      heartily.

      “Perhaps the mystery is a little too plain,” said Dupin.

      “Oh, good heavens! who ever heard of such an idea?”

      “A little too self-evident.”

      “Ha! ha! ha—ha! ha! ha!—ho! ho! ho!” roared our visitor,
      profoundly amused, “oh, Dupin, you will be the death of me yet!”

      “And what, after all, is the matter on hand?” I asked.

      “Why, I will tell you,” replied the Prefect, as he gave a long,
      steady and contemplative puff, and settled himself in his chair.
      “I will tell you in a few words; but, before I begin, let me
      caution you that this is an affair demanding the greatest
      secrecy, and that I should most probably lose the position I now
      hold, were it known that I confided it to any one.”

      “Proceed,” said I.

      “Or not,” said Dupin.

      “Well, then; I have received personal information, from a very
      high quarter, that a certain document of the last importance has
      been purloined from the royal apartments. The individual who
      purloined it is known; this beyond a doubt; he was seen to take
      it. It is known, also, that it still remains in his possession.”

      “How is this known?” asked Dupin.

      “It is clearly inferred,” replied the Prefect, “from the nature
      of the document, and from the non-appearance of certain results
      which would at once arise from its passing out of the robber’s
      possession; that is to say, from his employing it as he must
      design in the end to employ it.”

      “Be a little more explicit,” I said.

      “Well, I may venture so far as to say that the paper gives its
      holder a certain power in a certain quarter where such power is
      immensely valuable.” The Prefect was fond of the cant of
      diplomacy.

      “Still I do not quite understand,” said Dupin.

      “No? Well; the disclosure of the document to a third person, who
      shall be nameless, would bring in question the honor of a
      personage of most exalted station; and this fact gives the holder
      of the document an ascendancy over the illustrious personage
      whose honor and peace are so jeopardized.”

      “But this ascendancy,” I interposed, “would depend upon the
      robber’s knowledge of the loser’s knowledge of the robber. Who
      would dare—”

      “The thief,” said G., “is the Minister D——, who dares all things,
      those unbecoming as well as those becoming a man. The method of
      the theft was not less ingenious than bold. The document in
      question—a letter, to be frank—had been received by the personage
      robbed while alone in the royal boudoir. During its perusal she
      was suddenly interrupted by the entrance of the other exalted
      personage from whom especially it was her wish to conceal it.
      After a hurried and vain endeavor to thrust it in a drawer, she
      was forced to place it, open as it was, upon a table. The
      address, however, was uppermost, and, the contents thus
      unexposed, the letter escaped notice. At this juncture enters the
      Minister D——. His lynx eye immediately perceives the paper,
      recognises the handwriting of the address, observes the confusion
      of the personage addressed, and fathoms her secret. After some
      business transactions, hurried through in his ordinary manner, he
      produces a letter somewhat similar to the one in question, opens
      it, pretends to read it, and then places it in close
      juxtaposition to the other. Again he converses, for some fifteen
      minutes, upon the public affairs. At length, in taking leave, he
      takes also from the table the letter to which he had no claim.
      Its rightful owner saw, but, of course, dared not call attention
      to the act, in the presence of the third personage who stood at
      her elbow. The minister decamped; leaving his own letter—one of
      no importance—upon the table.”

      “Here, then,” said Dupin to me, “you have precisely what you
      demand to make the ascendancy complete—the robber’s knowledge of
      the loser’s knowledge of the robber.”

      “Yes,” replied the Prefect; “and the power thus attained has, for
      some months past, been wielded, for political purposes, to a very
      dangerous extent. The personage robbed is more thoroughly
      convinced, every day, of the necessity of reclaiming her letter.
      But this, of course, cannot be done openly. In fine, driven to
      despair, she has committed the matter to me.”

      “Than whom,” said Dupin, amid a perfect whirlwind of smoke, “no
      more sagacious agent could, I suppose, be desired, or even
      imagined.”

      “You flatter me,” replied the Prefect; “but it is possible that
      some such opinion may have been entertained.”

      “It is clear,” said I, “as you observe, that the letter is still
      in possession of the minister; since it is this possession, and
      not any employment of the letter, which bestows the power. With
      the employment the power departs.”

      “True,” said G.; “and upon this conviction I proceeded. My first
      care was to make thorough search of the minister’s hotel; and
      here my chief embarrassment lay in the necessity of searching
      without his knowledge. Beyond all things, I have been warned of
      the danger which would result from giving him reason to suspect
      our design.”

      “But,” said I, “you are quite au fait in these investigations.
      The Parisian police have done this thing often before.”

      “Oh, yes; and for this reason I did not despair. The habits of
      the minister gave me, too, a great advantage. He is frequently
      absent from home all night. His servants are by no means
      numerous. They sleep at a distance from their master’s apartment,
      and, being chiefly Neapolitans, are readily made drunk. I have
      keys, as you know, with which I can open any chamber or cabinet
      in Paris. For three months a night has not passed, during the
      greater part of which I have not been engaged, personally, in
      ransacking the D—— Hotel. My honor is interested, and, to mention
      a great secret, the reward is enormous. So I did not abandon the
      search until I had become fully satisfied that the thief is a
      more astute man than myself. I fancy that I have investigated
      every nook and corner of the premises in which it is possible
      that the paper can be concealed.”

      “But is it not possible,” I suggested, “that although the letter
      may be in possession of the minister, as it unquestionably is, he
      may have concealed it elsewhere than upon his own premises?”

      “This is barely possible,” said Dupin. “The present peculiar
      condition of affairs at court, and especially of those intrigues
      in which D—— is known to be involved, would render the instant
      availability of the document—its susceptibility of being produced
      at a moment’s notice—a point of nearly equal importance with its
      possession.”

      “Its susceptibility of being produced?” said I.

      “That is to say, of being destroyed,” said Dupin.

      “True,” I observed; “the paper is clearly then upon the premises.
      As for its being upon the person of the minister, we may consider
      that as out of the question.”

      “Entirely,” said the Prefect. “He has been twice waylaid, as if
      by footpads, and his person rigorously searched under my own
      inspection.”

      “You might have spared yourself this trouble,” said Dupin. “D——,
      I presume, is not altogether a fool, and, if not, must have
      anticipated these waylayings, as a matter of course.”

      “Not altogether a fool,” said G., “but then he’s a poet, which I
      take to be only one remove from a fool.”

      “True,” said Dupin, after a long and thoughtful whiff from his
      meerschaum, “although I have been guilty of certain doggrel
      myself.”

      “Suppose you detail,” said I, “the particulars of your search.”

      “Why the fact is, we took our time, and we searched _everywhere_.
      I have had long experience in these affairs. I took the entire
      building, room by room; devoting the nights of a whole week to
      each. We examined, first, the furniture of each apartment. We
      opened every possible drawer; and I presume you know that, to a
      properly trained police agent, such a thing as a secret drawer is
      impossible. Any man is a dolt who permits a ‘secret’ drawer to
      escape him in a search of this kind. The thing is so plain. There
      is a certain amount of bulk—of space—to be accounted for in every
      cabinet. Then we have accurate rules. The fiftieth part of a line
      could not escape us. After the cabinets we took the chairs. The
      cushions we probed with the fine long needles you have seen me
      employ. From the tables we removed the tops.”

      “Why so?”

      “Sometimes the top of a table, or other similarly arranged piece
      of furniture, is removed by the person wishing to conceal an
      article; then the leg is excavated, the article deposited within
      the cavity, and the top replaced. The bottoms and tops of
      bedposts are employed in the same way.”

      “But could not the cavity be detected by sounding?” I asked.

      “By no means, if, when the article is deposited, a sufficient
      wadding of cotton be placed around it. Besides, in our case, we
      were obliged to proceed without noise.”

      “But you could not have removed—you could not have taken to
      pieces all articles of furniture in which it would have been
      possible to make a deposit in the manner you mention. A letter
      may be compressed into a thin spiral roll, not differing much in
      shape or bulk from a large knitting-needle, and in this form it
      might be inserted into the rung of a chair, for example. You did
      not take to pieces all the chairs?”

      “Certainly not; but we did better—we examined the rungs of every
      chair in the hotel, and, indeed the jointings of every
      description of furniture, by the aid of a most powerful
      microscope. Had there been any traces of recent disturbance we
      should not have failed to detect it instantly. A single grain of
      gimlet-dust, for example, would have been as obvious as an apple.
      Any disorder in the glueing—any unusual gaping in the
      joints—would have sufficed to insure detection.”

      “I presume you looked to the mirrors, between the boards and the
      plates, and you probed the beds and the bed-clothes, as well as
      the curtains and carpets.”

      “That of course; and when we had absolutely completed every
      particle of the furniture in this way, then we examined the house
      itself. We divided its entire surface into compartments, which we
      numbered, so that none might be missed; then we scrutinized each
      individual square inch throughout the premises, including the two
      houses immediately adjoining, with the microscope, as before.”

      “The two houses adjoining!” I exclaimed; “you must have had a
      great deal of trouble.”

      “We had; but the reward offered is prodigious!”

      “You include the grounds about the houses?”

      “All the grounds are paved with brick. They gave us comparatively
      little trouble. We examined the moss between the bricks, and
      found it undisturbed.”

      “You looked among D——‘s papers, of course, and into the books of
      the library?”

      “Certainly; we opened every package and parcel; we not only
      opened every book, but we turned over every leaf in each volume,
      not contenting ourselves with a mere shake, according to the
      fashion of some of our police officers. We also measured the
      thickness of every book-cover, with the most accurate
      admeasurement, and applied to each the most jealous scrutiny of
      the microscope. Had any of the bindings been recently meddled
      with, it would have been utterly impossible that the fact should
      have escaped observation. Some five or six volumes, just from the
      hands of the binder, we carefully probed, longitudinally, with
      the needles.”

      “You explored the floors beneath the carpets?”

      “Beyond doubt. We removed every carpet, and examined the boards
      with the microscope.”

      “And the paper on the walls?”

      “Yes.”

      “You looked into the cellars?”

      “We did.”

      “Then,” I said, “you have been making a miscalculation, and the
      letter is not upon the premises, as you suppose.”

      “I fear you are right there,” said the Prefect. “And now, Dupin,
      what would you advise me to do?”

      “To make a thorough re-search of the premises.”

      “That is absolutely needless,” replied G——. “I am not more sure
      that I breathe than I am that the letter is not at the Hotel.”

      “I have no better advice to give you,” said Dupin. “You have, of
      course, an accurate description of the letter?”

      “Oh yes!”—And here the Prefect, producing a memorandum-book,
      proceeded to read aloud a minute account of the internal, and
      especially of the external appearance of the missing document.
      Soon after finishing the perusal of this description, he took his
      departure, more entirely depressed in spirits than I had ever
      known the good gentleman before.

      In about a month afterwards he paid us another visit, and found
      us occupied very nearly as before. He took a pipe and a chair and
      entered into some ordinary conversation. At length I said,—

      “Well, but G——, what of the purloined letter? I presume you have
      at last made up your mind that there is no such thing as
      overreaching the Minister?”

      “Confound him, say I—yes; I made the re-examination, however, as
      Dupin suggested—but it was all labor lost, as I knew it would
      be.”

      “How much was the reward offered, did you say?” asked Dupin.

      “Why, a very great deal—a very liberal reward—I don’t like to say
      how much, precisely; but one thing I will say, that I wouldn’t
      mind giving my individual check for fifty thousand francs to any
      one who could obtain me that letter. The fact is, it is becoming
      of more and more importance every day; and the reward has been
      lately doubled. If it were trebled, however, I could do no more
      than I have done.”

      “Why, yes,” said Dupin, drawlingly, between the whiffs of his
      meerschaum, “I really—think, G——, you have not exerted
      yourself—to the utmost in this matter. You might—do a little
      more, I think, eh?”

      “How?—in what way?”

      “Why—puff, puff—you might—puff, puff—employ counsel in the
      matter, eh?—puff, puff, puff. Do you remember the story they tell
      of Abernethy?”

      “No; hang Abernethy!”

      “To be sure! hang him and welcome. But, once upon a time, a
      certain rich miser conceived the design of spunging upon this
      Abernethy for a medical opinion. Getting up, for this purpose, an
      ordinary conversation in a private company, he insinuated his
      case to the physician, as that of an imaginary individual.

      “‘We will suppose,’ said the miser, ‘that his symptoms are such
      and such; now, doctor, what would you have directed him to take?’

      “‘Take!’ said Abernethy, ‘why, take advice, to be sure.’”

      “But,” said the Prefect, a little discomposed, “I am perfectly
      willing to take advice, and to pay for it. I would really give
      fifty thousand francs to any one who would aid me in the matter.”

      “In that case,” replied Dupin, opening a drawer, and producing a
      check-book, “you may as well fill me up a check for the amount
      mentioned. When you have signed it, I will hand you the letter.”

      I was astounded. The Prefect appeared absolutely
      thunder-stricken. For some minutes he remained speechless and
      motionless, looking incredulously at my friend with open mouth,
      and eyes that seemed starting from their sockets; then,
      apparently recovering himself in some measure, he seized a pen,
      and after several pauses and vacant stares, finally filled up and
      signed a check for fifty thousand francs, and handed it across
      the table to Dupin. The latter examined it carefully and
      deposited it in his pocket-book; then, unlocking an escritoire,
      took thence a letter and gave it to the Prefect. This functionary
      grasped it in a perfect agony of joy, opened it with a trembling
      hand, cast a rapid glance at its contents, and then, scrambling
      and struggling to the door, rushed at length unceremoniously from
      the room and from the house, without having uttered a syllable
      since Dupin had requested him to fill up the check.

      When he had gone, my friend entered into some explanations.

      “The Parisian police,” he said, “are exceedingly able in their
      way. They are persevering, ingenious, cunning, and thoroughly
      versed in the knowledge which their duties seem chiefly to
      demand. Thus, when G—— detailed to us his mode of searching the
      premises at the Hotel D——, I felt entire confidence in his having
      made a satisfactory investigation—so far as his labors extended.”

      “So far as his labors extended?” said I.

      “Yes,” said Dupin. “The measures adopted were not only the best
      of their kind, but carried out to absolute perfection. Had the
      letter been deposited within the range of their search, these
      fellows would, beyond a question, have found it.”

      I merely laughed—but he seemed quite serious in all that he said.

      “The measures, then,” he continued, “were good in their kind, and
      well executed; their defect lay in their being inapplicable to
      the case, and to the man. A certain set of highly ingenious
      resources are, with the Prefect, a sort of Procrustean bed, to
      which he forcibly adapts his designs. But he perpetually errs by
      being too deep or too shallow for the matter in hand; and many a
      schoolboy is a better reasoner than he. I knew one about eight
      years of age, whose success at guessing in the game of ‘even and
      odd’ attracted universal admiration. This game is simple, and is
      played with marbles. One player holds in his hand a number of
      these toys, and demands of another whether that number is even or
      odd. If the guess is right, the guesser wins one; if wrong, he
      loses one. The boy to whom I allude won all the marbles of the
      school. Of course he had some principle of guessing; and this lay
      in mere observation and admeasurement of the astuteness of his
      opponents. For example, an arrant simpleton is his opponent, and,
      holding up his closed hand, asks, ‘are they even or odd?’ Our
      schoolboy replies, ‘odd,’ and loses; but upon the second trial he
      wins, for he then says to himself, ‘the simpleton had them even
      upon the first trial, and his amount of cunning is just
      sufficient to make him have them odd upon the second; I will
      therefore guess odd;’—he guesses odd, and wins. Now, with a
      simpleton a degree above the first, he would have reasoned thus:
      ‘This fellow finds that in the first instance I guessed odd, and,
      in the second, he will propose to himself, upon the first
      impulse, a simple variation from even to odd, as did the first
      simpleton; but then a second thought will suggest that this is
      too simple a variation, and finally he will decide upon putting
      it even as before. I will therefore guess even;’—he guesses even,
      and wins. Now this mode of reasoning in the schoolboy, whom his
      fellows termed ‘lucky,’—what, in its last analysis, is it?”

      “It is merely,” I said, “an identification of the reasoner’s
      intellect with that of his opponent.”

      “It is,” said Dupin; “and, upon inquiring of the boy by what
      means he effected the thorough identification in which his
      success consisted, I received answer as follows: ‘When I wish to
      find out how wise, or how stupid, or how good, or how wicked is
      any one, or what are his thoughts at the moment, I fashion the
      expression of my face, as accurately as possible, in accordance
      with the expression of his, and then wait to see what thoughts or
      sentiments arise in my mind or heart, as if to match or
      correspond with the expression.’ This response of the schoolboy
      lies at the bottom of all the spurious profundity which has been
      attributed to Rochefoucault, to La Bougive, to Machiavelli, and
      to Campanella.”

      “And the identification,” I said, “of the reasoner’s intellect
      with that of his opponent, depends, if I understand you aright,
      upon the accuracy with which the opponent’s intellect is
      admeasured.”

      “For its practical value it depends upon this,” replied Dupin;
      “and the Prefect and his cohort fail so frequently, first, by
      default of this identification, and, secondly, by
      ill-admeasurement, or rather through non-admeasurement, of the
      intellect with which they are engaged. They consider only their
      own ideas of ingenuity; and, in searching for anything hidden,
      advert only to the modes in which they would have hidden it. They
      are right in this much—that their own ingenuity is a faithful
      representative of that of the mass; but when the cunning of the
      individual felon is diverse in character from their own, the
      felon foils them, of course. This always happens when it is above
      their own, and very usually when it is below. They have no
      variation of principle in their investigations; at best, when
      urged by some unusual emergency—by some extraordinary reward—they
      extend or exaggerate their old modes of practice, without
      touching their principles. What, for example, in this case of
      D——, has been done to vary the principle of action? What is all
      this boring, and probing, and sounding, and scrutinizing with the
      microscope and dividing the surface of the building into
      registered square inches—what is it all but an exaggeration of
      the application of the one principle or set of principles of
      search, which are based upon the one set of notions regarding
      human ingenuity, to which the Prefect, in the long routine of his
      duty, has been accustomed? Do you not see he has taken it for
      granted that all men proceed to conceal a letter,—not exactly in
      a gimlet hole bored in a chair-leg—but, at least, in some
      out-of-the-way hole or corner suggested by the same tenor of
      thought which would urge a man to secrete a letter in a
      gimlet-hole bored in a chair-leg? And do you not see also, that
      such recherchés nooks for concealment are adapted only for
      ordinary occasions, and would be adopted only by ordinary
      intellects; for, in all cases of concealment, a disposal of the
      article concealed—a disposal of it in this recherché manner,—is,
      in the very first instance, presumable and presumed; and thus its
      discovery depends, not at all upon the acumen, but altogether
      upon the mere care, patience, and determination of the seekers;
      and where the case is of importance—or, what amounts to the same
      thing in the political eyes, when the reward is of magnitude,—the
      qualities in question have never been known to fail. You will now
      understand what I meant in suggesting that, had the purloined
      letter been hidden any where within the limits of the Prefect’s
      examination—in other words, had the principle of its concealment
      been comprehended within the principles of the Prefect—its
      discovery would have been a matter altogether beyond question.
      This functionary, however, has been thoroughly mystified; and the
      remote source of his defeat lies in the supposition that the
      Minister is a fool, because he has acquired renown as a poet. All
      fools are poets; this the Prefect feels; and he is merely guilty
      of a non distributio medii in thence inferring that all poets are
      fools.”

      “But is this really the poet?” I asked. “There are two brothers,
      I know; and both have attained reputation in letters. The
      Minister I believe has written learnedly on the Differential
      Calculus. He is a mathematician, and no poet.”

      “You are mistaken; I know him well; he is both. As poet and
      mathematician, he would reason well; as mere mathematician, he
      could not have reasoned at all, and thus would have been at the
      mercy of the Prefect.”

      “You surprise me,” I said, “by these opinions, which have been
      contradicted by the voice of the world. You do not mean to set at
      naught the well-digested idea of centuries. The mathematical
      reason has long been regarded as the reason par excellence.”

      “‘Il y a à parièr,’” replied Dupin, quoting from Chamfort, “‘que
      toute idée publique, toute convention reçue est une sottise, car
      elle a convenue au plus grand nombre.’ The mathematicians, I
      grant you, have done their best to promulgate the popular error
      to which you allude, and which is none the less an error for its
      promulgation as truth. With an art worthy a better cause, for
      example, they have insinuated the term ‘analysis’ into
      application to algebra. The French are the originators of this
      particular deception; but if a term is of any importance—if words
      derive any value from applicability—then ‘analysis’ conveys
      ‘algebra’ about as much as, in Latin, ‘ambitus’ implies
      ‘ambition,’ ‘_religio_’ ‘religion,’ or ‘_homines honesti_’ a set
      of _honorable_ men.”

      “You have a quarrel on hand, I see,” said I, “with some of the
      algebraists of Paris; but proceed.”

      “I dispute the availability, and thus the value, of that reason
      which is cultivated in any especial form other than the
      abstractly logical. I dispute, in particular, the reason educed
      by mathematical study. The mathematics are the science of form
      and quantity; mathematical reasoning is merely logic applied to
      observation upon form and quantity. The great error lies in
      supposing that even the truths of what is called pure algebra,
      are abstract or general truths. And this error is so egregious
      that I am confounded at the universality with which it has been
      received. Mathematical axioms are not axioms of general truth.
      What is true of relation—of form and quantity—is often grossly
      false in regard to morals, for example. In this latter science it
      is very usually untrue that the aggregated parts are equal to the
      whole. In chemistry also the axiom fails. In the consideration of
      motive it fails; for two motives, each of a given value, have
      not, necessarily, a value when united, equal to the sum of their
      values apart. There are numerous other mathematical truths which
      are only truths within the limits of relation. But the
      mathematician argues, from his finite truths, through habit, as
      if they were of an absolutely general applicability—as the world
      indeed imagines them to be. Bryant, in his very learned
      ‘Mythology,’ mentions an analogous source of error, when he says
      that ‘although the Pagan fables are not believed, yet we forget
      ourselves continually, and make inferences from them as existing
      realities.’ With the algebraists, however, who are Pagans
      themselves, the ‘Pagan fables’ are believed, and the inferences
      are made, not so much through lapse of memory, as through an
      unaccountable addling of the brains. In short, I never yet
      encountered the mere mathematician who could be trusted out of
      equal roots, or one who did not clandestinely hold it as a point
      of his faith that x2+px was absolutely and unconditionally equal
      to q. Say to one of these gentlemen, by way of experiment, if you
      please, that you believe occasions may occur where x2+px is not
      altogether equal to q, and, having made him understand what you
      mean, get out of his reach as speedily as convenient, for, beyond
      doubt, he will endeavor to knock you down.

      “I mean to say,” continued Dupin, while I merely laughed at his
      last observations, “that if the Minister had been no more than a
      mathematician, the Prefect would have been under no necessity of
      giving me this check. I know him, however, as both mathematician
      and poet, and my measures were adapted to his capacity, with
      reference to the circumstances by which he was surrounded. I knew
      him as a courtier, too, and as a bold intriguant. Such a man, I
      considered, could not fail to be aware of the ordinary policial
      modes of action. He could not have failed to anticipate—and
      events have proved that he did not fail to anticipate—the
      waylayings to which he was subjected. He must have foreseen, I
      reflected, the secret investigations of his premises. His
      frequent absences from home at night, which were hailed by the
      Prefect as certain aids to his success, I regarded only as ruses,
      to afford opportunity for thorough search to the police, and thus
      the sooner to impress them with the conviction to which G——, in
      fact, did finally arrive—the conviction that the letter was not
      upon the premises. I felt, also, that the whole train of thought,
      which I was at some pains in detailing to you just now,
      concerning the invariable principle of policial action in
      searches for articles concealed—I felt that this whole train of
      thought would necessarily pass through the mind of the Minister.
      It would imperatively lead him to despise all the ordinary nooks
      of concealment. He could not, I reflected, be so weak as not to
      see that the most intricate and remote recess of his hotel would
      be as open as his commonest closets to the eyes, to the probes,
      to the gimlets, and to the microscopes of the Prefect. I saw, in
      fine, that he would be driven, as a matter of course, to
      simplicity, if not deliberately induced to it as a matter of
      choice. You will remember, perhaps, how desperately the Prefect
      laughed when I suggested, upon our first interview, that it was
      just possible this mystery troubled him so much on account of its
      being so very self-evident.”

      “Yes,” said I, “I remember his merriment well. I really thought
      he would have fallen into convulsions.”

      “The material world,” continued Dupin, “abounds with very strict
      analogies to the immaterial; and thus some color of truth has
      been given to the rhetorical dogma, that metaphor, or simile, may
      be made to strengthen an argument, as well as to embellish a
      description. The principle of the vis inertiæ, for example, seems
      to be identical in physics and metaphysics. It is not more true
      in the former, that a large body is with more difficulty set in
      motion than a smaller one, and that its subsequent momentum is
      commensurate with this difficulty, than it is, in the latter,
      that intellects of the vaster capacity, while more forcible, more
      constant, and more eventful in their movements than those of
      inferior grade, are yet the less readily moved, and more
      embarrassed and full of hesitation in the first few steps of
      their progress. Again: have you ever noticed which of the street
      signs, over the shop-doors, are the most attractive of
      attention?”

      “I have never given the matter a thought,” I said.

      “There is a game of puzzles,” he resumed, “which is played upon a
      map. One party playing requires another to find a given word—the
      name of town, river, state or empire—any word, in short, upon the
      motley and perplexed surface of the chart. A novice in the game
      generally seeks to embarrass his opponents by giving them the
      most minutely lettered names; but the adept selects such words as
      stretch, in large characters, from one end of the chart to the
      other. These, like the over-largely lettered signs and placards
      of the street, escape observation by dint of being excessively
      obvious; and here the physical oversight is precisely analogous
      with the moral inapprehension by which the intellect suffers to
      pass unnoticed those considerations which are too obtrusively and
      too palpably self-evident. But this is a point, it appears,
      somewhat above or beneath the understanding of the Prefect. He
      never once thought it probable, or possible, that the Minister
      had deposited the letter immediately beneath the nose of the
      whole world, by way of best preventing any portion of that world
      from perceiving it.

      “But the more I reflected upon the daring, dashing, and
      discriminating ingenuity of D——; upon the fact that the document
      must always have been at hand, if he intended to use it to good
      purpose; and upon the decisive evidence, obtained by the Prefect,
      that it was not hidden within the limits of that dignitary’s
      ordinary search—the more satisfied I became that, to conceal this
      letter, the Minister had resorted to the comprehensive and
      sagacious expedient of not attempting to conceal it at all.

      “Full of these ideas, I prepared myself with a pair of green
      spectacles, and called one fine morning, quite by accident, at
      the Ministerial hotel. I found D—— at home, yawning, lounging,
      and dawdling, as usual, and pretending to be in the last
      extremity of ennui. He is, perhaps, the most really energetic
      human being now alive—but that is only when nobody sees him.

      “To be even with him, I complained of my weak eyes, and lamented
      the necessity of the spectacles, under cover of which I
      cautiously and thoroughly surveyed the whole apartment, while
      seemingly intent only upon the conversation of my host.

      “I paid especial attention to a large writing-table near which he
      sat, and upon which lay confusedly, some miscellaneous letters
      and other papers, with one or two musical instruments and a few
      books. Here, however, after a long and very deliberate scrutiny,
      I saw nothing to excite particular suspicion.

      “At length my eyes, in going the circuit of the room, fell upon a
      trumpery fillagree card-rack of pasteboard, that hung dangling by
      a dirty blue ribbon, from a little brass knob just beneath the
      middle of the mantel-piece. In this rack, which had three or four
      compartments, were five or six visiting cards and a solitary
      letter. This last was much soiled and crumpled. It was torn
      nearly in two, across the middle—as if a design, in the first
      instance, to tear it entirely up as worthless, had been altered,
      or stayed, in the second. It had a large black seal, bearing the
      D—— cipher _very_ conspicuously, and was addressed, in a
      diminutive female hand, to D——, the minister, himself. It was
      thrust carelessly, and even, as it seemed, contemptuously, into
      one of the uppermost divisions of the rack.

      “No sooner had I glanced at this letter, than I concluded it to
      be that of which I was in search. To be sure, it was, to all
      appearance, radically different from the one of which the Prefect
      had read us so minute a description. Here the seal was large and
      black, with the D—— cipher; there it was small and red, with the
      ducal arms of the S—— family. Here, the address, to the Minister,
      diminutive and feminine; there the superscription, to a certain
      royal personage, was markedly bold and decided; the size alone
      formed a point of correspondence. But, then, the radicalness of
      these differences, which was excessive; the dirt; the soiled and
      torn condition of the paper, so inconsistent with the true
      methodical habits of D——, and so suggestive of a design to delude
      the beholder into an idea of the worthlessness of the
      document—these things, together with the hyper-obtrusive
      situation of this document, full in the view of every visitor,
      and thus exactly in accordance with the conclusions to which I
      had previously arrived; these things, I say, were strongly
      corroborative of suspicion, in one who came with the intention to
      suspect.

      “I protracted my visit as long as possible, and, while I
      maintained a most animated discussion with the Minister upon a
      topic which I knew well had never failed to interest and excite
      him, I kept my attention really riveted upon the letter. In this
      examination, I committed to memory its external appearance and
      arrangement in the rack; and also fell, at length, upon a
      discovery which set at rest whatever trivial doubt I might have
      entertained. In scrutinizing the edges of the paper, I observed
      them to be more chafed than seemed necessary. They presented the
      broken appearance which is manifested when a stiff paper, having
      been once folded and pressed with a folder, is refolded in a
      reversed direction, in the same creases or edges which had formed
      the original fold. This discovery was sufficient. It was clear to
      me that the letter had been turned, as a glove, inside out,
      re-directed, and re-sealed. I bade the Minister good morning, and
      took my departure at once, leaving a gold snuff-box upon the
      table.

      “The next morning I called for the snuff-box, when we resumed,
      quite eagerly, the conversation of the preceding day. While thus
      engaged, however, a loud report, as if of a pistol, was heard
      immediately beneath the windows of the hotel, and was succeeded
      by a series of fearful screams, and the shoutings of a terrified
      mob. D—— rushed to a casement, threw it open, and looked out. In
      the meantime, I stepped to the card-rack, took the letter, put it
      in my pocket, and replaced it by a fac-simile, (so far as regards
      externals,) which I had carefully prepared at my
      lodgings—imitating the D—— cipher, very readily, by means of a
      seal formed of bread.

      “The disturbance in the street had been occasioned by the frantic
      behavior of a man with a musket. He had fired it among a crowd of
      women and children. It proved, however, to have been without
      ball, and the fellow was suffered to go his way as a lunatic or a
      drunkard. When he had gone, D—— came from the window, whither I
      had followed him immediately upon securing the object in view.
      Soon afterwards I bade him farewell. The pretended lunatic was a
      man in my own pay.”

      “But what purpose had you,” I asked, “in replacing the letter by
      a fac-simile? Would it not have been better, at the first visit,
      to have seized it openly, and departed?”

      “D——,” replied Dupin, “is a desperate man, and a man of nerve.
      His hotel, too, is not without attendants devoted to his
      interests. Had I made the wild attempt you suggest, I might never
      have left the Ministerial presence alive. The good people of
      Paris might have heard of me no more. But I had an object apart
      from these considerations. You know my political prepossessions.
      In this matter, I act as a partisan of the lady concerned. For
      eighteen months the Minister has had her in his power. She has
      now him in hers—since, being unaware that the letter is not in
      his possession, he will proceed with his exactions as if it was.
      Thus will he inevitably commit himself, at once, to his political
      destruction. His downfall, too, will not be more precipitate than
      awkward. It is all very well to talk about the facilis descensus
      Averni; but in all kinds of climbing, as Catalani said of
      singing, it is far more easy to get up than to come down. In the
      present instance I have no sympathy—at least no pity—for him who
      descends. He is that monstrum horrendum, an unprincipled man of
      genius. I confess, however, that I should like very well to know
      the precise character of his thoughts, when, being defied by her
      whom the Prefect terms ‘a certain personage’ he is reduced to
      opening the letter which I left for him in the card-rack.”

      “How? did you put any thing particular in it?”

      “Why—it did not seem altogether right to leave the interior
      blank—that would have been insulting. D——, at Vienna once, did me
      an evil turn, which I told him, quite good-humoredly, that I
      should remember. So, as I knew he would feel some curiosity in
      regard to the identity of the person who had outwitted him, I
      thought it a pity not to give him a clue. He is well acquainted
      with my MS., and I just copied into the middle of the blank sheet
      the words—

      “‘— — Un dessein si funeste,
      S’il n’est digne d’Atrée, est digne de Thyeste.

      They are to be found in Crébillon’s ‘Atrée.’”




THE THOUSAND-AND-SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE


Truth is stranger than fiction.—_Old Saying_

      Having had occasion, lately, in the course of some Oriental
      investigations, to consult the Tellmenow Isitsöornot, a work
      which (like the Zohar of Simeon Jochaides) is scarcely known at
      all, even in Europe; and which has never been quoted, to my
      knowledge, by any American—if we except, perhaps, the author of
      the “Curiosities of American Literature”;—having had occasion, I
      say, to turn over some pages of the first-mentioned very
      remarkable work, I was not a little astonished to discover that
      the literary world has hitherto been strangely in error
      respecting the fate of the vizier’s daughter, Scheherazade, as
      that fate is depicted in the “Arabian Nights”; and that the
      _dénouement_ there given, if not altogether inaccurate, as far as
      it goes, is at least to blame in not having gone very much
      farther.

      For full information on this interesting topic, I must refer the
      inquisitive reader to the “Isitsöornot” itself; but in the
      meantime, I shall be pardoned for giving a summary of what I
      there discovered.

      It will be remembered, that, in the usual version of the tales, a
      certain monarch having good cause to be jealous of his queen, not
      only puts her to death, but makes a vow, by his beard and the
      prophet, to espouse each night the most beautiful maiden in his
      dominions, and the next morning to deliver her up to the
      executioner.

      Having fulfilled this vow for many years to the letter, and with
      a religious punctuality and method that conferred great credit
      upon him as a man of devout feeling and excellent sense, he was
      interrupted one afternoon (no doubt at his prayers) by a visit
      from his grand vizier, to whose daughter, it appears, there had
      occurred an idea.

      Her name was Scheherazade, and her idea was, that she would
      either redeem the land from the depopulating tax upon its beauty,
      or perish, after the approved fashion of all heroines, in the
      attempt.

      Accordingly, and although we do not find it to be leap-year
      (which makes the sacrifice more meritorious), she deputes her
      father, the grand vizier, to make an offer to the king of her
      hand. This hand the king eagerly accepts—(he had intended to take
      it at all events, and had put off the matter from day to day,
      only through fear of the vizier),—but, in accepting it now, he
      gives all parties very distinctly to understand, that, grand
      vizier or no grand vizier, he has not the slightest design of
      giving up one iota of his vow or of his privileges. When,
      therefore, the fair Scheherazade insisted upon marrying the king,
      and did actually marry him despite her father’s excellent advice
      not to do any thing of the kind—when she would and did marry him,
      I say, will I, nill I, it was with her beautiful black eyes as
      thoroughly open as the nature of the case would allow.

      It seems, however, that this politic damsel (who had been reading
      Machiavelli, beyond doubt), had a very ingenious little plot in
      her mind. On the night of the wedding, she contrived, upon I
      forget what specious pretence, to have her sister occupy a couch
      sufficiently near that of the royal pair to admit of easy
      conversation from bed to bed; and, a little before cock-crowing,
      she took care to awaken the good monarch, her husband (who bore
      her none the worse will because he intended to wring her neck on
      the morrow),—she managed to awaken him, I say, (although on
      account of a capital conscience and an easy digestion, he slept
      well) by the profound interest of a story (about a rat and a
      black cat, I think) which she was narrating (all in an undertone,
      of course) to her sister. When the day broke, it so happened that
      this history was not altogether finished, and that Scheherazade,
      in the nature of things could not finish it just then, since it
      was high time for her to get up and be bowstrung—a thing very
      little more pleasant than hanging, only a trifle more genteel!

      The king’s curiosity, however, prevailing, I am sorry to say,
      even over his sound religious principles, induced him for this
      once to postpone the fulfilment of his vow until next morning,
      for the purpose and with the hope of hearing that night how it
      fared in the end with the black cat (a black cat, I think it was)
      and the rat.

      The night having arrived, however, the lady Scheherazade not only
      put the finishing stroke to the black cat and the rat (the rat
      was blue) but before she well knew what she was about, found
      herself deep in the intricacies of a narration, having reference
      (if I am not altogether mistaken) to a pink horse (with green
      wings) that went, in a violent manner, by clockwork, and was
      wound up with an indigo key. With this history the king was even
      more profoundly interested than with the other—and, as the day
      broke before its conclusion (notwithstanding all the queen’s
      endeavors to get through with it in time for the bowstringing),
      there was again no resource but to postpone that ceremony as
      before, for twenty-four hours. The next night there happened a
      similar accident with a similar result; and then the next—and
      then again the next; so that, in the end, the good monarch,
      having been unavoidably deprived of all opportunity to keep his
      vow during a period of no less than one thousand and one nights,
      either forgets it altogether by the expiration of this time, or
      gets himself absolved of it in the regular way, or (what is more
      probable) breaks it outright, as well as the head of his father
      confessor. At all events, Scheherazade, who, being lineally
      descended from Eve, fell heir, perhaps, to the whole seven
      baskets of talk, which the latter lady, we all know, picked up
      from under the trees in the garden of Eden; Scheherazade, I say,
      finally triumphed, and the tariff upon beauty was repealed.

      Now, this conclusion (which is that of the story as we have it
      upon record) is, no doubt, excessively proper and pleasant—but
      alas! like a great many pleasant things, is more pleasant than
      true, and I am indebted altogether to the “Isitsöornot” for the
      means of correcting the error. “Le mieux,” says a French proverb,
      “est l’ennemi du bien,” and, in mentioning that Scheherazade had
      inherited the seven baskets of talk, I should have added that she
      put them out at compound interest until they amounted to
      seventy-seven.

      “My dear sister,” said she, on the thousand-and-second night, (I
      quote the language of the “Isitsöornot” at this point, verbatim)
      “my dear sister,” said she, “now that all this little difficulty
      about the bowstring has blown over, and that this odious tax is
      so happily repealed, I feel that I have been guilty of great
      indiscretion in withholding from you and the king (who I am sorry
      to say, snores—a thing no gentleman would do) the full conclusion
      of Sinbad the sailor. This person went through numerous other and
      more interesting adventures than those which I related; but the
      truth is, I felt sleepy on the particular night of their
      narration, and so was seduced into cutting them short—a grievous
      piece of misconduct, for which I only trust that Allah will
      forgive me. But even yet it is not too late to remedy my great
      neglect—and as soon as I have given the king a pinch or two in
      order to wake him up so far that he may stop making that horrible
      noise, I will forthwith entertain you (and him if he pleases)
      with the sequel of this very remarkable story.”

      Hereupon the sister of Scheherazade, as I have it from the
      “Isitsöornot,” expressed no very particular intensity of
      gratification; but the king, having been sufficiently pinched, at
      length ceased snoring, and finally said, “Hum!” and then “Hoo!”
      when the queen, understanding these words (which are no doubt
      Arabic) to signify that he was all attention, and would do his
      best not to snore any more—the queen, I say, having arranged
      these matters to her satisfaction, re-entered thus, at once, into
      the history of Sinbad the sailor:

      “‘At length, in my old age,’ [these are the words of Sinbad
      himself, as retailed by Scheherazade]—‘at length, in my old age,
      and after enjoying many years of tranquillity at home, I became
      once more possessed of a desire of visiting foreign countries;
      and one day, without acquainting any of my family with my design,
      I packed up some bundles of such merchandise as was most precious
      and least bulky, and, engaging a porter to carry them, went with
      him down to the sea-shore, to await the arrival of any chance
      vessel that might convey me out of the kingdom into some region
      which I had not as yet explored.

      “‘Having deposited the packages upon the sands, we sat down
      beneath some trees, and looked out into the ocean in the hope of
      perceiving a ship, but during several hours we saw none whatever.
      At length I fancied that I could hear a singular buzzing or
      humming sound; and the porter, after listening awhile, declared
      that he also could distinguish it. Presently it grew louder, and
      then still louder, so that we could have no doubt that the object
      which caused it was approaching us. At length, on the edge of the
      horizon, we discovered a black speck, which rapidly increased in
      size until we made it out to be a vast monster, swimming with a
      great part of its body above the surface of the sea. It came
      toward us with inconceivable swiftness, throwing up huge waves of
      foam around its breast, and illuminating all that part of the sea
      through which it passed, with a long line of fire that extended
      far off into the distance.

      “‘As the thing drew near we saw it very distinctly. Its length
      was equal to that of three of the loftiest trees that grow, and
      it was as wide as the great hall of audience in your palace, O
      most sublime and munificent of the Caliphs. Its body, which was
      unlike that of ordinary fishes, was as solid as a rock, and of a
      jetty blackness throughout all that portion of it which floated
      above the water, with the exception of a narrow blood-red streak
      that completely begirdled it. The belly, which floated beneath
      the surface, and of which we could get only a glimpse now and
      then as the monster rose and fell with the billows, was entirely
      covered with metallic scales, of a color like that of the moon in
      misty weather. The back was flat and nearly white, and from it
      there extended upwards of six spines, about half the length of
      the whole body.

      “‘This horrible creature had no mouth that we could perceive;
      but, as if to make up for this deficiency, it was provided with
      at least four score of eyes, that protruded from their sockets
      like those of the green dragon-fly, and were arranged all around
      the body in two rows, one above the other, and parallel to the
      blood-red streak, which seemed to answer the purpose of an
      eyebrow. Two or three of these dreadful eyes were much larger
      than the others, and had the appearance of solid gold.

      “‘Although this beast approached us, as I have before said, with
      the greatest rapidity, it must have been moved altogether by
      necromancy—for it had neither fins like a fish nor web-feet like
      a duck, nor wings like the seashell which is blown along in the
      manner of a vessel; nor yet did it writhe itself forward as do
      the eels. Its head and its tail were shaped precisely alike,
      only, not far from the latter, were two small holes that served
      for nostrils, and through which the monster puffed out its thick
      breath with prodigious violence, and with a shrieking,
      disagreeable noise.

      “‘Our terror at beholding this hideous thing was very great, but
      it was even surpassed by our astonishment, when upon getting a
      nearer look, we perceived upon the creature’s back a vast number
      of animals about the size and shape of men, and altogether much
      resembling them, except that they wore no garments (as men do),
      being supplied (by nature, no doubt) with an ugly uncomfortable
      covering, a good deal like cloth, but fitting so tight to the
      skin, as to render the poor wretches laughably awkward, and put
      them apparently to severe pain. On the very tips of their heads
      were certain square-looking boxes, which, at first sight, I
      thought might have been intended to answer as turbans, but I soon
      discovered that they were excessively heavy and solid, and I
      therefore concluded they were contrivances designed, by their
      great weight, to keep the heads of the animals steady and safe
      upon their shoulders. Around the necks of the creatures were
      fastened black collars, (badges of servitude, no doubt,) such as
      we keep on our dogs, only much wider and infinitely stiffer, so
      that it was quite impossible for these poor victims to move their
      heads in any direction without moving the body at the same time;
      and thus they were doomed to perpetual contemplation of their
      noses—a view puggish and snubby in a wonderful, if not positively
      in an awful degree.

      “‘When the monster had nearly reached the shore where we stood,
      it suddenly pushed out one of its eyes to a great extent, and
      emitted from it a terrible flash of fire, accompanied by a dense
      cloud of smoke, and a noise that I can compare to nothing but
      thunder. As the smoke cleared away, we saw one of the odd
      man-animals standing near the head of the large beast with a
      trumpet in his hand, through which (putting it to his mouth) he
      presently addressed us in loud, harsh, and disagreeable accents,
      that, perhaps, we should have mistaken for language, had they not
      come altogether through the nose.

      “‘Being thus evidently spoken to, I was at a loss how to reply,
      as I could in no manner understand what was said; and in this
      difficulty I turned to the porter, who was near swooning through
      affright, and demanded of him his opinion as to what species of
      monster it was, what it wanted, and what kind of creatures those
      were that so swarmed upon its back. To this the porter replied,
      as well as he could for trepidation, that he had once before
      heard of this sea-beast; that it was a cruel demon, with bowels
      of sulphur and blood of fire, created by evil genii as the means
      of inflicting misery upon mankind; that the things upon its back
      were vermin, such as sometimes infest cats and dogs, only a
      little larger and more savage; and that these vermin had their
      uses, however evil—for, through the torture they caused the beast
      by their nibbling and stingings, it was goaded into that degree
      of wrath which was requisite to make it roar and commit ill, and
      so fulfil the vengeful and malicious designs of the wicked genii.

      “This account determined me to take to my heels, and, without
      once even looking behind me, I ran at full speed up into the
      hills, while the porter ran equally fast, although nearly in an
      opposite direction, so that, by these means, he finally made his
      escape with my bundles, of which I have no doubt he took
      excellent care—although this is a point I cannot determine, as I
      do not remember that I ever beheld him again.

      “‘For myself, I was so hotly pursued by a swarm of the men-vermin
      (who had come to the shore in boats) that I was very soon
      overtaken, bound hand and foot, and conveyed to the beast, which
      immediately swam out again into the middle of the sea.

      “‘I now bitterly repented my folly in quitting a comfortable home
      to peril my life in such adventures as this; but regret being
      useless, I made the best of my condition, and exerted myself to
      secure the goodwill of the man-animal that owned the trumpet, and
      who appeared to exercise authority over his fellows. I succeeded
      so well in this endeavor that, in a few days, the creature
      bestowed upon me various tokens of his favor, and in the end even
      went to the trouble of teaching me the rudiments of what it was
      vain enough to denominate its language; so that, at length, I was
      enabled to converse with it readily, and came to make it
      comprehend the ardent desire I had of seeing the world.

      “‘Washish squashish squeak, Sinbad, hey-diddle diddle, grunt unt
      grumble, hiss, fiss, whiss,’ said he to me, one day after
      dinner—but I beg a thousand pardons, I had forgotten that your
      majesty is not conversant with the dialect of the Cock-neighs (so
      the man-animals were called; I presume because their language
      formed the connecting link between that of the horse and that of
      the rooster). With your permission, I will translate. ‘Washish
      squashish,’ and so forth:—that is to say, ‘I am happy to find, my
      dear Sinbad, that you are really a very excellent fellow; we are
      now about doing a thing which is called circumnavigating the
      globe; and since you are so desirous of seeing the world, I will
      strain a point and give you a free passage upon back of the
      beast.’”

      When the Lady Scheherazade had proceeded thus far, relates the
      “Isitsöornot,” the king turned over from his left side to his
      right, and said:

      “It is, in fact, very surprising, my dear queen, that you
      omitted, hitherto, these latter adventures of Sinbad. Do you know
      I think them exceedingly entertaining and strange?”

      The king having thus expressed himself, we are told, the fair
      Scheherazade resumed her history in the following words:

      “Sinbad went on in this manner with his narrative—‘I thanked the
      man-animal for its kindness, and soon found myself very much at
      home on the beast, which swam at a prodigious rate through the
      ocean; although the surface of the latter is, in that part of the
      world, by no means flat, but round like a pomegranate, so that we
      went—so to say—either up hill or down hill all the time.’

      “That I think, was very singular,” interrupted the king.

      “Nevertheless, it is quite true,” replied Scheherazade.

      “I have my doubts,” rejoined the king; “but, pray, be so good as
      to go on with the story.”

      “I will,” said the queen. “‘The beast,’ continued Sinbad to the
      caliph, ‘swam, as I have related, up hill and down hill until, at
      length, we arrived at an island, many hundreds of miles in
      circumference, but which, nevertheless, had been built in the
      middle of the sea by a colony of little things like
      caterpillars.’” (*1)

      “Hum!” said the king.

      “‘Leaving this island,’ said Sinbad—(for Scheherazade, it must be
      understood, took no notice of her husband’s ill-mannered
      ejaculation) ‘leaving this island, we came to another where the
      forests were of solid stone, and so hard that they shivered to
      pieces the finest-tempered axes with which we endeavoured to cut
      them down.’” (*2)

      “Hum!” said the king, again; but Scheherazade, paying him no
      attention, continued in the language of Sinbad.

      “‘Passing beyond this last island, we reached a country where
      there was a cave that ran to the distance of thirty or forty
      miles within the bowels of the earth, and that contained a
      greater number of far more spacious and more magnificent palaces
      than are to be found in all Damascus and Bagdad. From the roofs
      of these palaces there hung myriads of gems, like diamonds, but
      larger than men; and in among the streets of towers and pyramids
      and temples, there flowed immense rivers as black as ebony, and
      swarming with fish that had no eyes.’” (*3)

      “Hum!” said the king.

      “‘We then swam into a region of the sea where we found a lofty
      mountain, down whose sides there streamed torrents of melted
      metal, some of which were twelve miles wide and sixty miles long
      (*4); while from an abyss on the summit, issued so vast a
      quantity of ashes that the sun was entirely blotted out from the
      heavens, and it became darker than the darkest midnight; so that
      when we were even at the distance of a hundred and fifty miles
      from the mountain, it was impossible to see the whitest object,
      however close we held it to our eyes.’” (*5)

      “Hum!” said the king.

      “‘After quitting this coast, the beast continued his voyage until
      we met with a land in which the nature of things seemed
      reversed—for we here saw a great lake, at the bottom of which,
      more than a hundred feet beneath the surface of the water, there
      flourished in full leaf a forest of tall and luxuriant trees.’”
      (*6)

      “Hoo!” said the king.

      “Some hundred miles farther on brought us to a climate where the
      atmosphere was so dense as to sustain iron or steel, just as our
      own does feather.’” (*7)

      “Fiddle de dee,” said the king.

      “Proceeding still in the same direction, we presently arrived at
      the most magnificent region in the whole world. Through it there
      meandered a glorious river for several thousands of miles. This
      river was of unspeakable depth, and of a transparency richer than
      that of amber. It was from three to six miles in width; and its
      banks which arose on either side to twelve hundred feet in
      perpendicular height, were crowned with ever-blossoming trees and
      perpetual sweet-scented flowers, that made the whole territory
      one gorgeous garden; but the name of this luxuriant land was the
      Kingdom of Horror, and to enter it was inevitable death.’” (*8)

      “Humph!” said the king.

      “‘We left this kingdom in great haste, and, after some days, came
      to another, where we were astonished to perceive myriads of
      monstrous animals with horns resembling scythes upon their heads.
      These hideous beasts dig for themselves vast caverns in the soil,
      of a funnel shape, and line the sides of them with rocks, so
      disposed one upon the other that they fall instantly, when
      trodden upon by other animals, thus precipitating them into the
      monster’s dens, where their blood is immediately sucked, and
      their carcasses afterwards hurled contemptuously out to an
      immense distance from “the caverns of death."’” (*9)

      “Pooh!” said the king.

      “‘Continuing our progress, we perceived a district with
      vegetables that grew not upon any soil but in the air. (*10)
      There were others that sprang from the substance of other
      vegetables; (*11) others that derived their substance from the
      bodies of living animals; (*12) and then again, there were others
      that glowed all over with intense fire; (*13) others that moved
      from place to place at pleasure, (*14) and what was still more
      wonderful, we discovered flowers that lived and breathed and
      moved their limbs at will and had, moreover, the detestable
      passion of mankind for enslaving other creatures, and confining
      them in horrid and solitary prisons until the fulfillment of
      appointed tasks.’” (*15)

      “Pshaw!” said the king.

      “‘Quitting this land, we soon arrived at another in which the
      bees and the birds are mathematicians of such genius and
      erudition, that they give daily instructions in the science of
      geometry to the wise men of the empire. The king of the place
      having offered a reward for the solution of two very difficult
      problems, they were solved upon the spot—the one by the bees, and
      the other by the birds; but the king keeping their solution a
      secret, it was only after the most profound researches and labor,
      and the writing of an infinity of big books, during a long series
      of years, that the men-mathematicians at length arrived at the
      identical solutions which had been given upon the spot by the
      bees and by the birds.’” (*16)

      “Oh my!” said the king.

      “‘We had scarcely lost sight of this empire when we found
      ourselves close upon another, from whose shores there flew over
      our heads a flock of fowls a mile in breadth, and two hundred and
      forty miles long; so that, although they flew a mile during every
      minute, it required no less than four hours for the whole flock
      to pass over us—in which there were several millions of millions
      of fowl.’” (*17)

      “Oh fy!” said the king.

      “‘No sooner had we got rid of these birds, which occasioned us
      great annoyance, than we were terrified by the appearance of a
      fowl of another kind, and infinitely larger than even the rocs
      which I met in my former voyages; for it was bigger than the
      biggest of the domes on your seraglio, oh, most Munificent of
      Caliphs. This terrible fowl had no head that we could perceive,
      but was fashioned entirely of belly, which was of a prodigious
      fatness and roundness, of a soft-looking substance, smooth,
      shining and striped with various colors. In its talons, the
      monster was bearing away to his eyrie in the heavens, a house
      from which it had knocked off the roof, and in the interior of
      which we distinctly saw human beings, who, beyond doubt, were in
      a state of frightful despair at the horrible fate which awaited
      them. We shouted with all our might, in the hope of frightening
      the bird into letting go of its prey, but it merely gave a snort
      or puff, as if of rage and then let fall upon our heads a heavy
      sack which proved to be filled with sand!’”

      “Stuff!” said the king.

      “‘It was just after this adventure that we encountered a
      continent of immense extent and prodigious solidity, but which,
      nevertheless, was supported entirely upon the back of a sky-blue
      cow that had no fewer than four hundred horns.’” (*18)

      “That, now, I believe,” said the king, “because I have read
      something of the kind before, in a book.”

      “‘We passed immediately beneath this continent, (swimming in
      between the legs of the cow), and, after some hours, found
      ourselves in a wonderful country indeed, which, I was informed by
      the man-animal, was his own native land, inhabited by things of
      his own species. This elevated the man-animal very much in my
      esteem, and in fact, I now began to feel ashamed of the
      contemptuous familiarity with which I had treated him; for I
      found that the man-animals in general were a nation of the most
      powerful magicians, who lived with worms in their brain, (*19)
      which, no doubt, served to stimulate them by their painful
      writhings and wrigglings to the most miraculous efforts of
      imagination!’”

      “Nonsense!” said the king.

      “‘Among the magicians, were domesticated several animals of very
      singular kinds; for example, there was a huge horse whose bones
      were iron and whose blood was boiling water. In place of corn, he
      had black stones for his usual food; and yet, in spite of so hard
      a diet, he was so strong and swift that he would drag a load more
      weighty than the grandest temple in this city, at a rate
      surpassing that of the flight of most birds.’” (*20)

      “Twattle!” said the king.

      “‘I saw, also, among these people a hen without feathers, but
      bigger than a camel; instead of flesh and bone she had iron and
      brick; her blood, like that of the horse, (to whom, in fact, she
      was nearly related,) was boiling water; and like him she ate
      nothing but wood or black stones. This hen brought forth very
      frequently, a hundred chickens in the day; and, after birth, they
      took up their residence for several weeks within the stomach of
      their mother.’” (*21)

      “Fal lal!” said the king.

      “‘One of this nation of mighty conjurors created a man out of
      brass and wood, and leather, and endowed him with such ingenuity
      that he would have beaten at chess, all the race of mankind with
      the exception of the great Caliph, Haroun Alraschid. (*22)
      Another of these magi constructed (of like material) a creature
      that put to shame even the genius of him who made it; for so
      great were its reasoning powers that, in a second, it performed
      calculations of so vast an extent that they would have required
      the united labor of fifty thousand fleshy men for a year. (*23)
      But a still more wonderful conjuror fashioned for himself a
      mighty thing that was neither man nor beast, but which had brains
      of lead, intermixed with a black matter like pitch, and fingers
      that it employed with such incredible speed and dexterity that it
      would have had no trouble in writing out twenty thousand copies
      of the Koran in an hour, and this with so exquisite a precision,
      that in all the copies there should not be found one to vary from
      another by the breadth of the finest hair. This thing was of
      prodigious strength, so that it erected or overthrew the
      mightiest empires at a breath; but its powers were exercised
      equally for evil and for good.’”

      “Ridiculous!” said the king.

      “‘Among this nation of necromancers there was also one who had in
      his veins the blood of the salamanders; for he made no scruple of
      sitting down to smoke his chibouc in a red-hot oven until his
      dinner was thoroughly roasted upon its floor. (*24) Another had
      the faculty of converting the common metals into gold, without
      even looking at them during the process. (*25) Another had such a
      delicacy of touch that he made a wire so fine as to be invisible.
      (*26) Another had such quickness of perception that he counted
      all the separate motions of an elastic body, while it was
      springing backward and forward at the rate of nine hundred
      millions of times in a second.’” (*27)

      “Absurd!” said the king.

      “‘Another of these magicians, by means of a fluid that nobody
      ever yet saw, could make the corpses of his friends brandish
      their arms, kick out their legs, fight, or even get up and dance
      at his will. (*28) Another had cultivated his voice to so great
      an extent that he could have made himself heard from one end of
      the world to the other. (*29) Another had so long an arm that he
      could sit down in Damascus and indite a letter at Bagdad—or
      indeed at any distance whatsoever. (*30) Another commanded the
      lightning to come down to him out of the heavens, and it came at
      his call; and served him for a plaything when it came. Another
      took two loud sounds and out of them made a silence. Another
      constructed a deep darkness out of two brilliant lights. (*31)
      Another made ice in a red-hot furnace. (*32) Another directed the
      sun to paint his portrait, and the sun did. (*33) Another took
      this luminary with the moon and the planets, and having first
      weighed them with scrupulous accuracy, probed into their depths
      and found out the solidity of the substance of which they were
      made. But the whole nation is, indeed, of so surprising a
      necromantic ability, that not even their infants, nor their
      commonest cats and dogs have any difficulty in seeing objects
      that do not exist at all, or that for twenty millions of years
      before the birth of the nation itself had been blotted out from
      the face of creation.’” (*34)

      “Preposterous!” said the king.

      “‘The wives and daughters of these incomparably great and wise
      magi,’” continued Scheherazade, without being in any manner
      disturbed by these frequent and most ungentlemanly interruptions
      on the part of her husband—“‘the wives and daughters of these
      eminent conjurers are every thing that is accomplished and
      refined; and would be every thing that is interesting and
      beautiful, but for an unhappy fatality that besets them, and from
      which not even the miraculous powers of their husbands and
      fathers has, hitherto, been adequate to save. Some fatalities
      come in certain shapes, and some in others—but this of which I
      speak has come in the shape of a crotchet.’”

      “A what?” said the king.

      “‘A crotchet’” said Scheherazade. “‘One of the evil genii, who
      are perpetually upon the watch to inflict ill, has put it into
      the heads of these accomplished ladies that the thing which we
      describe as personal beauty consists altogether in the
      protuberance of the region which lies not very far below the
      small of the back. Perfection of loveliness, they say, is in the
      direct ratio of the extent of this lump. Having been long
      possessed of this idea, and bolsters being cheap in that country,
      the days have long gone by since it was possible to distinguish a
      woman from a dromedary—’”

      “Stop!” said the king—“I can’t stand that, and I won’t. You have
      already given me a dreadful headache with your lies. The day,
      too, I perceive, is beginning to break. How long have we been
      married?—my conscience is getting to be troublesome again. And
      then that dromedary touch—do you take me for a fool? Upon the
      whole, you might as well get up and be throttled.”

      These words, as I learn from the “Isitsöornot,” both grieved and
      astonished Scheherazade; but, as she knew the king to be a man of
      scrupulous integrity, and quite unlikely to forfeit his word, she
      submitted to her fate with a good grace. She derived, however,
      great consolation, (during the tightening of the bowstring,) from
      the reflection that much of the history remained still untold,
      and that the petulance of her brute of a husband had reaped for
      him a most righteous reward, in depriving him of many
      inconceivable adventures.




A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM.


  The ways of God in Nature, as in Providence, are not as our ways; 
  nor are the models that we frame any way commensurate to the
  vastness, profundity, and unsearchableness of His works, _which have
  a depth in them greater than the well of Democritus_.

—_Joseph Glanville_.

      We had now reached the summit of the loftiest crag. For some
      minutes the old man seemed too much exhausted to speak.

      “Not long ago,” said he at length, “and I could have guided you
      on this route as well as the youngest of my sons; but, about
      three years past, there happened to me an event such as never
      happened to mortal man—or at least such as no man ever survived
      to tell of—and the six hours of deadly terror which I then
      endured have broken me up body and soul. You suppose me a _very_
      old man—but I am not. It took less than a single day to change
      these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and
      to unstring my nerves, so that I tremble at the least exertion,
      and am frightened at a shadow. Do you know I can scarcely look
      over this little cliff without getting giddy?”

      The “little cliff,” upon whose edge he had so carelessly thrown
      himself down to rest that the weightier portion of his body hung
      over it, while he was only kept from falling by the tenure of his
      elbow on its extreme and slippery edge—this “little cliff” arose,
      a sheer unobstructed precipice of black shining rock, some
      fifteen or sixteen hundred feet from the world of crags beneath
      us. Nothing would have tempted me to within half a dozen yards of
      its brink. In truth so deeply was I excited by the perilous
      position of my companion, that I fell at full length upon the
      ground, clung to the shrubs around me, and dared not even glance
      upward at the sky—while I struggled in vain to divest myself of
      the idea that the very foundations of the mountain were in danger
      from the fury of the winds. It was long before I could reason
      myself into sufficient courage to sit up and look out into the
      distance.

      “You must get over these fancies,” said the guide, “for I have
      brought you here that you might have the best possible view of
      the scene of that event I mentioned—and to tell you the whole
      story with the spot just under your eye.”

      “We are now,” he continued, in that particularizing manner which
      distinguished him—“we are now close upon the Norwegian coast—in
      the sixty-eighth degree of latitude—in the great province of
      Nordland—and in the dreary district of Lofoden. The mountain upon
      whose top we sit is Helseggen, the Cloudy. Now raise yourself up
      a little higher—hold on to the grass if you feel giddy—so—and
      look out, beyond the belt of vapor beneath us, into the sea.”

      I looked dizzily, and beheld a wide expanse of ocean, whose
      waters wore so inky a hue as to bring at once to my mind the
      Nubian geographer’s account of the _Mare Tenebrarum_. A panorama
      more deplorably desolate no human imagination can conceive. To
      the right and left, as far as the eye could reach, there lay
      outstretched, like ramparts of the world, lines of horridly black
      and beetling cliff, whose character of gloom was but the more
      forcibly illustrated by the surf which reared high up against its
      white and ghastly crest, howling and shrieking forever. Just
      opposite the promontory upon whose apex we were placed, and at a
      distance of some five or six miles out at sea, there was visible
      a small, bleak-looking island; or, more properly, its position
      was discernible through the wilderness of surge in which it was
      enveloped. About two miles nearer the land, arose another of
      smaller size, hideously craggy and barren, and encompassed at
      various intervals by a cluster of dark rocks.

      The appearance of the ocean, in the space between the more
      distant island and the shore, had something very unusual about
      it. Although, at the time, so strong a gale was blowing landward
      that a brig in the remote offing lay to under a double-reefed
      trysail, and constantly plunged her whole hull out of sight,
      still there was here nothing like a regular swell, but only a
      short, quick, angry cross dashing of water in every direction—as
      well in the teeth of the wind as otherwise. Of foam there was
      little except in the immediate vicinity of the rocks.

      “The island in the distance,” resumed the old man, “is called by
      the Norwegians Vurrgh. The one midway is Moskoe. That a mile to
      the northward is Ambaaren. Yonder are Islesen, Hotholm,
      Keildhelm, Suarven, and Buckholm. Farther off—between Moskoe and
      Vurrgh—are Otterholm, Flimen, Sandflesen, and Stockholm. These
      are the true names of the places—but why it has been thought
      necessary to name them at all, is more than either you or I can
      understand. Do you hear anything? Do you see any change in the
      water?”

      We had now been about ten minutes upon the top of Helseggen, to
      which we had ascended from the interior of Lofoden, so that we
      had caught no glimpse of the sea until it had burst upon us from
      the summit. As the old man spoke, I became aware of a loud and
      gradually increasing sound, like the moaning of a vast herd of
      buffaloes upon an American prairie; and at the same moment I
      perceived that what seamen term the _chopping_ character of the
      ocean beneath us, was rapidly changing into a current which set
      to the eastward. Even while I gazed, this current acquired a
      monstrous velocity. Each moment added to its speed—to its
      headlong impetuosity. In five minutes the whole sea, as far as
      Vurrgh, was lashed into ungovernable fury; but it was between
      Moskoe and the coast that the main uproar held its sway. Here the
      vast bed of the waters, seamed and scarred into a thousand
      conflicting channels, burst suddenly into phrensied
      convulsion—heaving, boiling, hissing—gyrating in gigantic and
      innumerable vortices, and all whirling and plunging on to the
      eastward with a rapidity which water never elsewhere assumes
      except in precipitous descents.

      In a few minutes more, there came over the scene another radical
      alteration. The general surface grew somewhat more smooth, and
      the whirlpools, one by one, disappeared, while prodigious streaks
      of foam became apparent where none had been seen before. These
      streaks, at length, spreading out to a great distance, and
      entering into combination, took unto themselves the gyratory
      motion of the subsided vortices, and seemed to form the germ of
      another more vast. Suddenly—very suddenly—this assumed a distinct
      and definite existence, in a circle of more than a mile in
      diameter. The edge of the whirl was represented by a broad belt
      of gleaming spray; but no particle of this slipped into the mouth
      of the terrific funnel, whose interior, as far as the eye could
      fathom it, was a smooth, shining, and jet-black wall of water,
      inclined to the horizon at an angle of some forty-five degrees,
      speeding dizzily round and round with a swaying and sweltering
      motion, and sending forth to the winds an appalling voice, half
      shriek, half roar, such as not even the mighty cataract of
      Niagara ever lifts up in its agony to Heaven.

      The mountain trembled to its very base, and the rock rocked. I
      threw myself upon my face, and clung to the scant herbage in an
      excess of nervous agitation.

      “This,” said I at length, to the old man—“this _can_ be nothing
      else than the great whirlpool of the Maelström.”

      “So it is sometimes termed,” said he. “We Norwegians call it the
      Moskoe-ström, from the island of Moskoe in the midway.”

      The ordinary accounts of this vortex had by no means prepared me
      for what I saw. That of Jonas Ramus, which is perhaps the most
      circumstantial of any, cannot impart the faintest conception
      either of the magnificence, or of the horror of the scene—or of
      the wild bewildering sense of _the novel_ which confounds the
      beholder. I am not sure from what point of view the writer in
      question surveyed it, nor at what time; but it could neither have
      been from the summit of Helseggen, nor during a storm. There are
      some passages of his description, nevertheless, which may be
      quoted for their details, although their effect is exceedingly
      feeble in conveying an impression of the spectacle.

      “Between Lofoden and Moskoe,” he says, “the depth of the water is
      between thirty-six and forty fathoms; but on the other side,
      toward Ver (Vurrgh) this depth decreases so as not to afford a
      convenient passage for a vessel, without the risk of splitting on
      the rocks, which happens even in the calmest weather. When it is
      flood, the stream runs up the country between Lofoden and Moskoe
      with a boisterous rapidity; but the roar of its impetuous ebb to
      the sea is scarce equalled by the loudest and most dreadful
      cataracts; the noise being heard several leagues off, and the
      vortices or pits are of such an extent and depth, that if a ship
      comes within its attraction, it is inevitably absorbed and
      carried down to the bottom, and there beat to pieces against the
      rocks; and when the water relaxes, the fragments thereof are
      thrown up again. But these intervals of tranquility are only at
      the turn of the ebb and flood, and in calm weather, and last but
      a quarter of an hour, its violence gradually returning. When the
      stream is most boisterous, and its fury heightened by a storm, it
      is dangerous to come within a Norway mile of it. Boats, yachts,
      and ships have been carried away by not guarding against it
      before they were within its reach. It likewise happens
      frequently, that whales come too near the stream, and are
      overpowered by its violence; and then it is impossible to
      describe their howlings and bellowings in their fruitless
      struggles to disengage themselves. A bear once, attempting to
      swim from Lofoden to Moskoe, was caught by the stream and borne
      down, while he roared terribly, so as to be heard on shore. Large
      stocks of firs and pine trees, after being absorbed by the
      current, rise again broken and torn to such a degree as if
      bristles grew upon them. This plainly shows the bottom to consist
      of craggy rocks, among which they are whirled to and fro. This
      stream is regulated by the flux and reflux of the sea—it being
      constantly high and low water every six hours. In the year 1645,
      early in the morning of Sexagesima Sunday, it raged with such
      noise and impetuosity that the very stones of the houses on the
      coast fell to the ground.”

      In regard to the depth of the water, I could not see how this
      could have been ascertained at all in the immediate vicinity of
      the vortex. The “forty fathoms” must have reference only to
      portions of the channel close upon the shore either of Moskoe or
      Lofoden. The depth in the centre of the Moskoe-ström must be
      immeasurably greater; and no better proof of this fact is
      necessary than can be obtained from even the sidelong glance into
      the abyss of the whirl which may be had from the highest crag of
      Helseggen. Looking down from this pinnacle upon the howling
      Phlegethon below, I could not help smiling at the simplicity with
      which the honest Jonas Ramus records, as a matter difficult of
      belief, the anecdotes of the whales and the bears; for it
      appeared to me, in fact, a self-evident thing, that the largest
      ship of the line in existence, coming within the influence of
      that deadly attraction, could resist it as little as a feather
      the hurricane, and must disappear bodily and at once.

      The attempts to account for the phenomenon—some of which, I
      remember, seemed to me sufficiently plausible in perusal—now wore
      a very different and unsatisfactory aspect. The idea generally
      received is that this, as well as three smaller vortices among
      the Ferroe islands, “have no other cause than the collision of
      waves rising and falling, at flux and reflux, against a ridge of
      rocks and shelves, which confines the water so that it
      precipitates itself like a cataract; and thus the higher the
      flood rises, the deeper must the fall be, and the natural result
      of all is a whirlpool or vortex, the prodigious suction of which
      is sufficiently known by lesser experiments.”—These are the words
      of the Encyclopædia Britannica. Kircher and others imagine that
      in the centre of the channel of the Maelström is an abyss
      penetrating the globe, and issuing in some very remote part—the
      Gulf of Bothnia being somewhat decidedly named in one instance.
      This opinion, idle in itself, was the one to which, as I gazed,
      my imagination most readily assented; and, mentioning it to the
      guide, I was rather surprised to hear him say that, although it
      was the view almost universally entertained of the subject by the
      Norwegians, it nevertheless was not his own. As to the former
      notion he confessed his inability to comprehend it; and here I
      agreed with him—for, however conclusive on paper, it becomes
      altogether unintelligible, and even absurd, amid the thunder of
      the abyss.

      “You have had a good look at the whirl now,” said the old man,
      “and if you will creep round this crag, so as to get in its lee,
      and deaden the roar of the water, I will tell you a story that
      will convince you I ought to know something of the Moskoe-ström.”

      I placed myself as desired, and he proceeded.

      “Myself and my two brothers once owned a schooner-rigged smack of
      about seventy tons burthen, with which we were in the habit of
      fishing among the islands beyond Moskoe, nearly to Vurrgh. In all
      violent eddies at sea there is good fishing, at proper
      opportunities, if one has only the courage to attempt it; but
      among the whole of the Lofoden coastmen, we three were the only
      ones who made a regular business of going out to the islands, as
      I tell you. The usual grounds are a great way lower down to the
      southward. There fish can be got at all hours, without much risk,
      and therefore these places are preferred. The choice spots over
      here among the rocks, however, not only yield the finest variety,
      but in far greater abundance; so that we often got in a single
      day, what the more timid of the craft could not scrape together
      in a week. In fact, we made it a matter of desperate
      speculation—the risk of life standing instead of labor, and
      courage answering for capital.

      “We kept the smack in a cove about five miles higher up the coast
      than this; and it was our practice, in fine weather, to take
      advantage of the fifteen minutes’ slack to push across the main
      channel of the Moskoe-ström, far above the pool, and then drop
      down upon anchorage somewhere near Otterholm, or Sandflesen,
      where the eddies are not so violent as elsewhere. Here we used to
      remain until nearly time for slack-water again, when we weighed
      and made for home. We never set out upon this expedition without
      a steady side wind for going and coming—one that we felt sure
      would not fail us before our return—and we seldom made a
      mis-calculation upon this point. Twice, during six years, we were
      forced to stay all night at anchor on account of a dead calm,
      which is a rare thing indeed just about here; and once we had to
      remain on the grounds nearly a week, starving to death, owing to
      a gale which blew up shortly after our arrival, and made the
      channel too boisterous to be thought of. Upon this occasion we
      should have been driven out to sea in spite of everything, (for
      the whirlpools threw us round and round so violently, that, at
      length, we fouled our anchor and dragged it) if it had not been
      that we drifted into one of the innumerable cross currents—here
      to-day and gone to-morrow—which drove us under the lee of Flimen,
      where, by good luck, we brought up.

      “I could not tell you the twentieth part of the difficulties we
      encountered ‘on the grounds’—it is a bad spot to be in, even in
      good weather—but we made shift always to run the gauntlet of the
      Moskoe-ström itself without accident; although at times my heart
      has been in my mouth when we happened to be a minute or so behind
      or before the slack. The wind sometimes was not as strong as we
      thought it at starting, and then we made rather less way than we
      could wish, while the current rendered the smack unmanageable. My
      eldest brother had a son eighteen years old, and I had two stout
      boys of my own. These would have been of great assistance at such
      times, in using the sweeps, as well as afterward in fishing—but,
      somehow, although we ran the risk ourselves, we had not the heart
      to let the young ones get into the danger—for, after all is said
      and done, it _was_ a horrible danger, and that is the truth.

      “It is now within a few days of three years since what I am going
      to tell you occurred. It was on the tenth day of July, 18—, a day
      which the people of this part of the world will never forget—for
      it was one in which blew the most terrible hurricane that ever
      came out of the heavens. And yet all the morning, and indeed
      until late in the afternoon, there was a gentle and steady breeze
      from the south-west, while the sun shone brightly, so that the
      oldest seaman among us could not have foreseen what was to
      follow.

      “The three of us—my two brothers and myself—had crossed over to
      the islands about two o’clock P. M., and had soon nearly loaded
      the smack with fine fish, which, we all remarked, were more
      plenty that day than we had ever known them. It was just seven,
      _by my watch_, when we weighed and started for home, so as to
      make the worst of the Ström at slack water, which we knew would
      be at eight.

      “We set out with a fresh wind on our starboard quarter, and for
      some time spanked along at a great rate, never dreaming of
      danger, for indeed we saw not the slightest reason to apprehend
      it. All at once we were taken aback by a breeze from over
      Helseggen. This was most unusual—something that had never
      happened to us before—and I began to feel a little uneasy,
      without exactly knowing why. We put the boat on the wind, but
      could make no headway at all for the eddies, and I was upon the
      point of proposing to return to the anchorage, when, looking
      astern, we saw the whole horizon covered with a singular
      copper-colored cloud that rose with the most amazing velocity.

      “In the meantime the breeze that had headed us off fell away, and
      we were dead becalmed, drifting about in every direction. This
      state of things, however, did not last long enough to give us
      time to think about it. In less than a minute the storm was upon
      us—in less than two the sky was entirely overcast—and what with
      this and the driving spray, it became suddenly so dark that we
      could not see each other in the smack.

      “Such a hurricane as then blew it is folly to attempt describing.
      The oldest seaman in Norway never experienced any thing like it.
      We had let our sails go by the run before it cleverly took us;
      but, at the first puff, both our masts went by the board as if
      they had been sawed off—the mainmast taking with it my youngest
      brother, who had lashed himself to it for safety.

      “Our boat was the lightest feather of a thing that ever sat upon
      water. It had a complete flush deck, with only a small hatch near
      the bow, and this hatch it had always been our custom to batten
      down when about to cross the Ström, by way of precaution against
      the chopping seas. But for this circumstance we should have
      foundered at once—for we lay entirely buried for some moments.
      How my elder brother escaped destruction I cannot say, for I
      never had an opportunity of ascertaining. For my part, as soon as
      I had let the foresail run, I threw myself flat on deck, with my
      feet against the narrow gunwale of the bow, and with my hands
      grasping a ring-bolt near the foot of the fore-mast. It was mere
      instinct that prompted me to do this—which was undoubtedly the
      very best thing I could have done—for I was too much flurried to
      think.

      “For some moments we were completely deluged, as I say, and all
      this time I held my breath, and clung to the bolt. When I could
      stand it no longer I raised myself upon my knees, still keeping
      hold with my hands, and thus got my head clear. Presently our
      little boat gave herself a shake, just as a dog does in coming
      out of the water, and thus rid herself, in some measure, of the
      seas. I was now trying to get the better of the stupor that had
      come over me, and to collect my senses so as to see what was to
      be done, when I felt somebody grasp my arm. It was my elder
      brother, and my heart leaped for joy, for I had made sure that he
      was overboard—but the next moment all this joy was turned into
      horror—for he put his mouth close to my ear, and screamed out the
      word ‘_Moskoe-ström!_’

      “No one ever will know what my feelings were at that moment. I
      shook from head to foot as if I had had the most violent fit of
      the ague. I knew what he meant by that one word well enough—I
      knew what he wished to make me understand. With the wind that now
      drove us on, we were bound for the whirl of the Ström, and
      nothing could save us!

      “You perceive that in crossing the Ström _channel_, we always
      went a long way up above the whirl, even in the calmest weather,
      and then had to wait and watch carefully for the slack—but now we
      were driving right upon the pool itself, and in such a hurricane
      as this! ‘To be sure,’ I thought, ‘we shall get there just about
      the slack—there is some little hope in that’—but in the next
      moment I cursed myself for being so great a fool as to dream of
      hope at all. I knew very well that we were doomed, had we been
      ten times a ninety-gun ship.

      “By this time the first fury of the tempest had spent itself, or
      perhaps we did not feel it so much, as we scudded before it, but
      at all events the seas, which at first had been kept down by the
      wind, and lay flat and frothing, now got up into absolute
      mountains. A singular change, too, had come over the heavens.
      Around in every direction it was still as black as pitch, but
      nearly overhead there burst out, all at once, a circular rift of
      clear sky—as clear as I ever saw—and of a deep bright blue—and
      through it there blazed forth the full moon with a lustre that I
      never before knew her to wear. She lit up every thing about us
      with the greatest distinctness—but, oh God, what a scene it was
      to light up!

      “I now made one or two attempts to speak to my brother—but, in
      some manner which I could not understand, the din had so
      increased that I could not make him hear a single word, although
      I screamed at the top of my voice in his ear. Presently he shook
      his head, looking as pale as death, and held up one of his
      fingers, as if to say _‘listen! ‘_

      “At first I could not make out what he meant—but soon a hideous
      thought flashed upon me. I dragged my watch from its fob. It was
      not going. I glanced at its face by the moonlight, and then burst
      into tears as I flung it far away into the ocean. _It had run
      down at seven o’clock! We were behind the time of the slack, and
      the whirl of the Ström was in full fury!_

      “When a boat is well built, properly trimmed, and not deep laden,
      the waves in a strong gale, when she is going large, seem always
      to slip from beneath her—which appears very strange to a
      landsman—and this is what is called _riding_, in sea phrase.

      “Well, so far we had ridden the swells very cleverly; but
      presently a gigantic sea happened to take us right under the
      counter, and bore us with it as it rose—up—up—as if into the sky.
      I would not have believed that any wave could rise so high. And
      then down we came with a sweep, a slide, and a plunge, that made
      me feel sick and dizzy, as if I was falling from some lofty
      mountain-top in a dream. But while we were up I had thrown a
      quick glance around—and that one glance was all sufficient. I saw
      our exact position in an instant. The Moskoe-Ström whirlpool was
      about a quarter of a mile dead ahead—but no more like the
      every-day Moskoe-Ström than the whirl as you now see it, is like
      a mill-race. If I had not known where we were, and what we had to
      expect, I should not have recognised the place at all. As it was,
      I involuntarily closed my eyes in horror. The lids clenched
      themselves together as if in a spasm.

      “It could not have been more than two minutes afterward until we
      suddenly felt the waves subside, and were enveloped in foam. The
      boat made a sharp half turn to larboard, and then shot off in its
      new direction like a thunderbolt. At the same moment the roaring
      noise of the water was completely drowned in a kind of shrill
      shriek—such a sound as you might imagine given out by the
      waste-pipes of many thousand steam-vessels, letting off their
      steam all together. We were now in the belt of surf that always
      surrounds the whirl; and I thought, of course, that another
      moment would plunge us into the abyss, down which we could only
      see indistinctly on account of the amazing velocity with which we
      wore borne along. The boat did not seem to sink into the water at
      all, but to skim like an air-bubble upon the surface of the
      surge. Her starboard side was next the whirl, and on the larboard
      arose the world of ocean we had left. It stood like a huge
      writhing wall between us and the horizon.

      “It may appear strange, but now, when we were in the very jaws of
      the gulf, I felt more composed than when we were only approaching
      it. Having made up my mind to hope no more, I got rid of a great
      deal of that terror which unmanned me at first. I suppose it was
      despair that strung my nerves.

      “It may look like boasting—but what I tell you is truth—I began
      to reflect how magnificent a thing it was to die in such a
      manner, and how foolish it was in me to think of so paltry a
      consideration as my own individual life, in view of so wonderful
      a manifestation of God’s power. I do believe that I blushed with
      shame when this idea crossed my mind. After a little while I
      became possessed with the keenest curiosity about the whirl
      itself. I positively felt a _wish_ to explore its depths, even at
      the sacrifice I was going to make; and my principal grief was
      that I should never be able to tell my old companions on shore
      about the mysteries I should see. These, no doubt, were singular
      fancies to occupy a man’s mind in such extremity—and I have often
      thought since, that the revolutions of the boat around the pool
      might have rendered me a little light-headed.

      “There was another circumstance which tended to restore my
      self-possession; and this was the cessation of the wind, which
      could not reach us in our present situation—for, as you saw
      yourself, the belt of surf is considerably lower than the general
      bed of the ocean, and this latter now towered above us, a high,
      black, mountainous ridge. If you have never been at sea in a
      heavy gale, you can form no idea of the confusion of mind
      occasioned by the wind and spray together. They blind, deafen,
      and strangle you, and take away all power of action or
      reflection. But we were now, in a great measure, rid of these
      annoyances—just as death-condemned felons in prison are allowed
      petty indulgences, forbidden them while their doom is yet
      uncertain.

      “How often we made the circuit of the belt it is impossible to
      say. We careered round and round for perhaps an hour, flying
      rather than floating, getting gradually more and more into the
      middle of the surge, and then nearer and nearer to its horrible
      inner edge. All this time I had never let go of the ring-bolt. My
      brother was at the stern, holding on to a small empty water-cask
      which had been securely lashed under the coop of the counter, and
      was the only thing on deck that had not been swept overboard when
      the gale first took us. As we approached the brink of the pit he
      let go his hold upon this, and made for the ring, from which, in
      the agony of his terror, he endeavored to force my hands, as it
      was not large enough to afford us both a secure grasp. I never
      felt deeper grief than when I saw him attempt this act—although I
      knew he was a madman when he did it—a raving maniac through sheer
      fright. I did not care, however, to contest the point with him. I
      knew it could make no difference whether either of us held on at
      all; so I let him have the bolt, and went astern to the cask.
      This there was no great difficulty in doing; for the smack flew
      round steadily enough, and upon an even keel—only swaying to and
      fro, with the immense sweeps and swelters of the whirl. Scarcely
      had I secured myself in my new position, when we gave a wild
      lurch to starboard, and rushed headlong into the abyss. I
      muttered a hurried prayer to God, and thought all was over.

      “As I felt the sickening sweep of the descent, I had
      instinctively tightened my hold upon the barrel, and closed my
      eyes. For some seconds I dared not open them—while I expected
      instant destruction, and wondered that I was not already in my
      death-struggles with the water. But moment after moment elapsed.
      I still lived. The sense of falling had ceased; and the motion of
      the vessel seemed much as it had been before, while in the belt
      of foam, with the exception that she now lay more along. I took
      courage, and looked once again upon the scene.

      “Never shall I forget the sensations of awe, horror, and
      admiration with which I gazed about me. The boat appeared to be
      hanging, as if by magic, midway down, upon the interior surface
      of a funnel vast in circumference, prodigious in depth, and whose
      perfectly smooth sides might have been mistaken for ebony, but
      for the bewildering rapidity with which they spun around, and for
      the gleaming and ghastly radiance they shot forth, as the rays of
      the full moon, from that circular rift amid the clouds which I
      have already described, streamed in a flood of golden glory along
      the black walls, and far away down into the inmost recesses of
      the abyss.

      “At first I was too much confused to observe anything accurately.
      The general burst of terrific grandeur was all that I beheld.
      When I recovered myself a little, however, my gaze fell
      instinctively downward. In this direction I was able to obtain an
      unobstructed view, from the manner in which the smack hung on the
      inclined surface of the pool. She was quite upon an even
      keel—that is to say, her deck lay in a plane parallel with that
      of the water—but this latter sloped at an angle of more than
      forty-five degrees, so that we seemed to be lying upon our
      beam-ends. I could not help observing, nevertheless, that I had
      scarcely more difficulty in maintaining my hold and footing in
      this situation, than if we had been upon a dead level; and this,
      I suppose, was owing to the speed at which we revolved.

      “The rays of the moon seemed to search the very bottom of the
      profound gulf; but still I could make out nothing distinctly, on
      account of a thick mist in which everything there was enveloped,
      and over which there hung a magnificent rainbow, like that narrow
      and tottering bridge which Mussulmen say is the only pathway
      between Time and Eternity. This mist, or spray, was no doubt
      occasioned by the clashing of the great walls of the funnel, as
      they all met together at the bottom—but the yell that went up to
      the Heavens from out of that mist, I dare not attempt to
      describe.

      “Our first slide into the abyss itself, from the belt of foam
      above, had carried us a great distance down the slope; but our
      farther descent was by no means proportionate. Round and round we
      swept—not with any uniform movement—but in dizzying swings and
      jerks, that sent us sometimes only a few hundred yards—sometimes
      nearly the complete circuit of the whirl. Our progress downward,
      at each revolution, was slow, but very perceptible.

      “Looking about me upon the wide waste of liquid ebony on which we
      were thus borne, I perceived that our boat was not the only
      object in the embrace of the whirl. Both above and below us were
      visible fragments of vessels, large masses of building timber and
      trunks of trees, with many smaller articles, such as pieces of
      house furniture, broken boxes, barrels and staves. I have already
      described the unnatural curiosity which had taken the place of my
      original terrors. It appeared to grow upon me as I drew nearer
      and nearer to my dreadful doom. I now began to watch, with a
      strange interest, the numerous things that floated in our
      company. I _must_ have been delirious, for I even sought
      _amusement_ in speculating upon the relative velocities of their
      several descents toward the foam below. ‘This fir tree,’ I found
      myself at one time saying, ‘will certainly be the next thing that
      takes the awful plunge and disappears,’—and then I was
      disappointed to find that the wreck of a Dutch merchant ship
      overtook it and went down before. At length, after making several
      guesses of this nature, and being deceived in all—this fact—the
      fact of my invariable miscalculation, set me upon a train of
      reflection that made my limbs again tremble, and my heart beat
      heavily once more.

      “It was not a new terror that thus affected me, but the dawn of a
      more exciting _hope_. This hope arose partly from memory, and
      partly from present observation. I called to mind the great
      variety of buoyant matter that strewed the coast of Lofoden,
      having been absorbed and then thrown forth by the Moskoe-ström.
      By far the greater number of the articles were shattered in the
      most extraordinary way—so chafed and roughened as to have the
      appearance of being stuck full of splinters—but then I distinctly
      recollected that there were _some_ of them which were not
      disfigured at all. Now I could not account for this difference
      except by supposing that the roughened fragments were the only
      ones which had been _completely absorbed_—that the others had
      entered the whirl at so late a period of the tide, or, for some
      reason, had descended so slowly after entering, that they did not
      reach the bottom before the turn of the flood came, or of the
      ebb, as the case might be. I conceived it possible, in either
      instance, that they might thus be whirled up again to the level
      of the ocean, without undergoing the fate of those which had been
      drawn in more early, or absorbed more rapidly. I made, also,
      three important observations. The first was, that, as a general
      rule, the larger the bodies were, the more rapid their
      descent—the second, that, between two masses of equal extent, the
      one spherical, and the other _of any other shape_, the
      superiority in speed of descent was with the sphere—the third,
      that, between two masses of equal size, the one cylindrical, and
      the other of any other shape, the cylinder was absorbed the more
      slowly. Since my escape, I have had several conversations on this
      subject with an old school-master of the district; and it was
      from him that I learned the use of the words ‘cylinder’ and
      ‘sphere.’ He explained to me—although I have forgotten the
      explanation—how what I observed was, in fact, the natural
      consequence of the forms of the floating fragments—and showed me
      how it happened that a cylinder, swimming in a vortex, offered
      more resistance to its suction, and was drawn in with greater
      difficulty than an equally bulky body, of any form whatever. (*1)

      “There was one startling circumstance which went a great way in
      enforcing these observations, and rendering me anxious to turn
      them to account, and this was that, at every revolution, we
      passed something like a barrel, or else the yard or the mast of a
      vessel, while many of these things, which had been on our level
      when I first opened my eyes upon the wonders of the whirlpool,
      were now high up above us, and seemed to have moved but little
      from their original station.

      “I no longer hesitated what to do. I resolved to lash myself
      securely to the water cask upon which I now held, to cut it loose
      from the counter, and to throw myself with it into the water. I
      attracted my brother’s attention by signs, pointed to the
      floating barrels that came near us, and did everything in my
      power to make him understand what I was about to do. I thought at
      length that he comprehended my design—but, whether this was the
      case or not, he shook his head despairingly, and refused to move
      from his station by the ring-bolt. It was impossible to reach
      him; the emergency admitted of no delay; and so, with a bitter
      struggle, I resigned him to his fate, fastened myself to the cask
      by means of the lashings which secured it to the counter, and
      precipitated myself with it into the sea, without another
      moment’s hesitation.

      “The result was precisely what I had hoped it might be. As it is
      myself who now tell you this tale—as you see that I _did_
      escape—and as you are already in possession of the mode in which
      this escape was effected, and must therefore anticipate all that
      I have farther to say—I will bring my story quickly to
      conclusion. It might have been an hour, or thereabout, after my
      quitting the smack, when, having descended to a vast distance
      beneath me, it made three or four wild gyrations in rapid
      succession, and, bearing my loved brother with it, plunged
      headlong, at once and forever, into the chaos of foam below. The
      barrel to which I was attached sunk very little farther than half
      the distance between the bottom of the gulf and the spot at which
      I leaped overboard, before a great change took place in the
      character of the whirlpool. The slope of the sides of the vast
      funnel became momently less and less steep. The gyrations of the
      whirl grew, gradually, less and less violent. By degrees, the
      froth and the rainbow disappeared, and the bottom of the gulf
      seemed slowly to uprise. The sky was clear, the winds had gone
      down, and the full moon was setting radiantly in the west, when I
      found myself on the surface of the ocean, in full view of the
      shores of Lofoden, and above the spot where the pool of the
      Moskoe-ström _had been_. It was the hour of the slack—but the sea
      still heaved in mountainous waves from the effects of the
      hurricane. I was borne violently into the channel of the Ström,
      and in a few minutes was hurried down the coast into the
      ‘grounds’ of the fishermen. A boat picked me up—exhausted from
      fatigue—and (now that the danger was removed) speechless from the
      memory of its horror. Those who drew me on board were my old
      mates and daily companions—but they knew me no more than they
      would have known a traveller from the spirit-land. My hair which
      had been raven-black the day before, was as white as you see it
      now. They say too that the whole expression of my countenance had
      changed. I told them my story—they did not believe it. I now tell
      it to _you_—and I can scarcely expect you to put more faith in it
      than did the merry fishermen of Lofoden.”




VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY


      After the very minute and elaborate paper by Arago, to say
      nothing of the summary in ‘Silliman’s Journal,’ with the detailed
      statement just published by Lieutenant Maury, it will not be
      supposed, of course, that in offering a few hurried remarks in
      reference to Von Kempelen’s discovery, I have any design to look
      at the subject in a scientific point of view. My object is
      simply, in the first place, to say a few words of Von Kempelen
      himself (with whom, some years ago, I had the honor of a slight
      personal acquaintance), since every thing which concerns him must
      necessarily, at this moment, be of interest; and, in the second
      place, to look in a general way, and speculatively, at the
      results of the discovery.

      It may be as well, however, to premise the cursory observations
      which I have to offer, by denying, very decidedly, what seems to
      be a general impression (gleaned, as usual in a case of this
      kind, from the newspapers), viz.: that this discovery, astounding
      as it unquestionably is, is unanticipated.

      By reference to the ‘Diary of Sir Humphrey Davy’ (Cottle and
      Munroe, London, pp. 150), it will be seen at pp. 53 and 82, that
      this illustrious chemist had not only conceived the idea now in
      question, but had actually made no inconsiderable progress,
      experimentally, in the very identical analysis now so
      triumphantly brought to an issue by Von Kempelen, who although he
      makes not the slightest allusion to it, is, without doubt (I say
      it unhesitatingly, and can prove it, if required), indebted to
      the ‘Diary’ for at least the first hint of his own undertaking.

      The paragraph from the ‘Courier and Enquirer,’ which is now going
      the rounds of the press, and which purports to claim the
      invention for a Mr. Kissam, of Brunswick, Maine, appears to me, I
      confess, a little apocryphal, for several reasons; although there
      is nothing either impossible or very improbable in the statement
      made. I need not go into details. My opinion of the paragraph is
      founded principally upon its manner. It does not look true.
      Persons who are narrating facts, are seldom so particular as Mr.
      Kissam seems to be, about day and date and precise location.
      Besides, if Mr. Kissam actually did come upon the discovery he
      says he did, at the period designated—nearly eight years ago—how
      happens it that he took no steps, on the instant, to reap the
      immense benefits which the merest bumpkin must have known would
      have resulted to him individually, if not to the world at large,
      from the discovery? It seems to me quite incredible that any man
      of common understanding could have discovered what Mr. Kissam
      says he did, and yet have subsequently acted so like a baby—so
      like an owl—as Mr. Kissam admits that he did. By-the-way, who is
      Mr. Kissam? and is not the whole paragraph in the ‘Courier and
      Enquirer’ a fabrication got up to ‘make a talk’? It must be
      confessed that it has an amazingly moon-hoaxy-air. Very little
      dependence is to be placed upon it, in my humble opinion; and if
      I were not well aware, from experience, how very easily men of
      science are mystified, on points out of their usual range of
      inquiry, I should be profoundly astonished at finding so eminent
      a chemist as Professor Draper, discussing Mr. Kissam’s (or is it
      Mr. Quizzem’s?) pretensions to the discovery, in so serious a
      tone.

      But to return to the ‘Diary’ of Sir Humphrey Davy. This pamphlet
      was not designed for the public eye, even upon the decease of the
      writer, as any person at all conversant with authorship may
      satisfy himself at once by the slightest inspection of the style.
      At page 13, for example, near the middle, we read, in reference
      to his researches about the protoxide of azote: ‘In less than
      half a minute the respiration being continued, diminished
      gradually and were succeeded by analogous to gentle pressure on
      all the muscles.’ That the respiration was not ‘diminished,’ is
      not only clear by the subsequent context, but by the use of the
      plural, ‘were.’ The sentence, no doubt, was thus intended: ‘In
      less than half a minute, the respiration [being continued, these
      feelings] diminished gradually, and were succeeded by [a
      sensation] analogous to gentle pressure on all the muscles.’ A
      hundred similar instances go to show that the MS. so
      inconsiderately published, was merely a rough note-book, meant
      only for the writer’s own eye, but an inspection of the pamphlet
      will convince almost any thinking person of the truth of my
      suggestion. The fact is, Sir Humphrey Davy was about the last man
      in the world to commit himself on scientific topics. Not only had
      he a more than ordinary dislike to quackery, but he was morbidly
      afraid of appearing empirical; so that, however fully he might
      have been convinced that he was on the right track in the matter
      now in question, he would never have spoken out, until he had
      every thing ready for the most practical demonstration. I verily
      believe that his last moments would have been rendered wretched,
      could he have suspected that his wishes in regard to burning this
      ‘Diary’ (full of crude speculations) would have been unattended
      to; as, it seems, they were. I say ‘his wishes,’ for that he
      meant to include this note-book among the miscellaneous papers
      directed ‘to be burnt,’ I think there can be no manner of doubt.
      Whether it escaped the flames by good fortune or by bad, yet
      remains to be seen. That the passages quoted above, with the
      other similar ones referred to, gave Von Kempelen the hint, I do
      not in the slightest degree question; but I repeat, it yet
      remains to be seen whether this momentous discovery itself
      (momentous under any circumstances) will be of service or
      disservice to mankind at large. That Von Kempelen and his
      immediate friends will reap a rich harvest, it would be folly to
      doubt for a moment. They will scarcely be so weak as not to
      ‘realize,’ in time, by large purchases of houses and land, with
      other property of intrinsic value.

      In the brief account of Von Kempelen which appeared in the ‘Home
      Journal,’ and has since been extensively copied, several
      misapprehensions of the German original seem to have been made by
      the translator, who professes to have taken the passage from a
      late number of the Presburg ‘Schnellpost.’ ‘Viele’ has evidently
      been misconceived (as it often is), and what the translator
      renders by ‘sorrows,’ is probably ‘lieden,’ which, in its true
      version, ‘sufferings,’ would give a totally different complexion
      to the whole account; but, of course, much of this is merely
      guess, on my part.

      Von Kempelen, however, is by no means ‘a misanthrope,’ in
      appearance, at least, whatever he may be in fact. My acquaintance
      with him was casual altogether; and I am scarcely warranted in
      saying that I know him at all; but to have seen and conversed
      with a man of so _prodigious_ a notoriety as he has attained, or
      _will_ attain in a few days, is not a small matter, as times go.

      “The Literary World” speaks of him, confidently, as a native of
      Presburg (misled, perhaps, by the account in “The Home Journal”)
      but I am pleased in being able to state _positively_, since I
      have it from his own lips, that he was born in Utica, in the
      State of New York, although both his parents, I believe, are of
      Presburg descent. The family is connected, in some way, with
      Mäelzel, of Automaton-chess-player memory. In person, he is short
      and stout, with large, _fat_, blue eyes, sandy hair and whiskers,
      a wide but pleasing mouth, fine teeth, and I think a Roman nose.
      There is some defect in one of his feet. His address is frank,
      and his whole manner noticeable for bonhomie. Altogether, he
      looks, speaks, and acts as little like ‘a misanthrope’ as any man
      I ever saw. We were fellow-sojourners for a week about six years
      ago, at Earl’s Hotel, in Providence, Rhode Island; and I presume
      that I conversed with him, at various times, for some three or
      four hours altogether. His principal topics were those of the
      day; and nothing that fell from him led me to suspect his
      scientific attainments. He left the hotel before me, intending to
      go to New York, and thence to Bremen; it was in the latter city
      that his great discovery was first made public; or, rather, it
      was there that he was first suspected of having made it. This is
      about all that I personally know of the now immortal Von
      Kempelen; but I have thought that even these few details would
      have interest for the public.

      There can be little question that most of the marvellous rumors
      afloat about this affair are pure inventions, entitled to about
      as much credit as the story of Aladdin’s lamp; and yet, in a case
      of this kind, as in the case of the discoveries in California, it
      is clear that the truth may be stranger than fiction. The
      following anecdote, at least, is so well authenticated, that we
      may receive it implicitly.

      Von Kempelen had never been even tolerably well off during his
      residence at Bremen; and often, it was well known, he had been
      put to extreme shifts in order to raise trifling sums. When the
      great excitement occurred about the forgery on the house of
      Gutsmuth & Co., suspicion was directed toward Von Kempelen, on
      account of his having purchased a considerable property in
      Gasperitch Lane, and his refusing, when questioned, to explain
      how he became possessed of the purchase money. He was at length
      arrested, but nothing decisive appearing against him, was in the
      end set at liberty. The police, however, kept a strict watch upon
      his movements, and thus discovered that he left home frequently,
      taking always the same road, and invariably giving his watchers
      the slip in the neighborhood of that labyrinth of narrow and
      crooked passages known by the flash name of the ‘Dondergat.’
      Finally, by dint of great perseverance, they traced him to a
      garret in an old house of seven stories, in an alley called
      Flatzplatz,—and, coming upon him suddenly, found him, as they
      imagined, in the midst of his counterfeiting operations. His
      agitation is represented as so excessive that the officers had
      not the slightest doubt of his guilt. After hand-cuffing him,
      they searched his room, or rather rooms, for it appears he
      occupied all the mansarde.

      Opening into the garret where they caught him, was a closet, ten
      feet by eight, fitted up with some chemical apparatus, of which
      the object has not yet been ascertained. In one corner of the
      closet was a very small furnace, with a glowing fire in it, and
      on the fire a kind of duplicate crucible—two crucibles connected
      by a tube. One of these crucibles was nearly full of lead in a
      state of fusion, but not reaching up to the aperture of the tube,
      which was close to the brim. The other crucible had some liquid
      in it, which, as the officers entered, seemed to be furiously
      dissipating in vapor. They relate that, on finding himself taken,
      Kempelen seized the crucibles with both hands (which were encased
      in gloves that afterwards turned out to be asbestic), and threw
      the contents on the tiled floor. It was now that they hand-cuffed
      him; and before proceeding to ransack the premises they searched
      his person, but nothing unusual was found about him, excepting a
      paper parcel, in his coat-pocket, containing what was afterward
      ascertained to be a mixture of antimony and some unknown
      substance, in nearly, but not quite, equal proportions. All
      attempts at analyzing the unknown substance have, so far, failed,
      but that it will ultimately be analyzed, is not to be doubted.

      Passing out of the closet with their prisoner, the officers went
      through a sort of ante-chamber, in which nothing material was
      found, to the chemist’s sleeping-room. They here rummaged some
      drawers and boxes, but discovered only a few papers, of no
      importance, and some good coin, silver and gold. At length,
      looking under the bed, they saw a large, common hair trunk,
      without hinges, hasp, or lock, and with the top lying carelessly
      across the bottom portion. Upon attempting to draw this trunk out
      from under the bed, they found that, with their united strength
      (there were three of them, all powerful men), they ‘could not
      stir it one inch.’ Much astonished at this, one of them crawled
      under the bed, and looking into the trunk, said:

      ‘No wonder we couldn’t move it—why it’s full to the brim of old
      bits of brass!’

      Putting his feet, now, against the wall so as to get a good
      purchase, and pushing with all his force, while his companions
      pulled with all theirs, the trunk, with much difficulty, was slid
      out from under the bed, and its contents examined. The supposed
      brass with which it was filled was all in small, smooth pieces,
      varying from the size of a pea to that of a dollar; but the
      pieces were irregular in shape, although more or less
      flat-looking, upon the whole, “very much as lead looks when
      thrown upon the ground in a molten state, and there suffered to
      grow cool.” Now, not one of these officers for a moment suspected
      this metal to be anything _but_ brass. The idea of its being
      _gold_ never entered their brains, of course; how _could_ such a
      wild fancy have entered it? And their astonishment may be well
      conceived, when the next day it became known, all over Bremen,
      that the “lot of brass” which they had carted so contemptuously
      to the police office, without putting themselves to the trouble
      of pocketing the smallest scrap, was not only gold—real gold—but
      gold far finer than any employed in coinage—gold, in fact,
      absolutely pure, virgin, without the slightest appreciable alloy.

      I need not go over the details of Von Kempelen’s confession (as
      far as it went) and release, for these are familiar to the
      public. That he has actually realized, in spirit and in effect,
      if not to the letter, the old chimaera of the philosopher’s
      stone, no sane person is at liberty to doubt. The opinions of
      Arago are, of course, entitled to the greatest consideration; but
      he is by no means infallible; and what he says of bismuth, in his
      report to the Academy, must be taken _cum grano salis_. The
      simple truth is, that up to this period all analysis has failed;
      and until Von Kempelen chooses to let us have the key to his own
      published enigma, it is more than probable that the matter will
      remain, for years, in statu quo. All that as yet can fairly be
      said to be known is, that ‘Pure gold can be made at will, and
      very readily from lead in connection with certain other
      substances, in kind and in proportions, unknown.’

      Speculation, of course, is busy as to the immediate and ultimate
      results of this discovery—a discovery which few thinking persons
      will hesitate in referring to an increased interest in the matter
      of gold generally, by the late developments in California; and
      this reflection brings us inevitably to another—the exceeding
      inopportuneness of Von Kempelen’s analysis. If many were
      prevented from adventuring to California, by the mere
      apprehension that gold would so materially diminish in value, on
      account of its plentifulness in the mines there, as to render the
      speculation of going so far in search of it a doubtful one—what
      impression will be wrought now, upon the minds of those about to
      emigrate, and especially upon the minds of those actually in the
      mineral region, by the announcement of this astounding discovery
      of Von Kempelen? a discovery which declares, in so many words,
      that beyond its intrinsic worth for manufacturing purposes
      (whatever that worth may be), gold now is, or at least soon will
      be (for it cannot be supposed that Von Kempelen can long retain
      his secret), of no greater value than lead, and of far inferior
      value to silver. It is, indeed, exceedingly difficult to
      speculate prospectively upon the consequences of the discovery,
      but one thing may be positively maintained—that the announcement
      of the discovery six months ago would have had material influence
      in regard to the settlement of California.

      In Europe, as yet, the most noticeable results have been a rise
      of two hundred per cent. in the price of lead, and nearly
      twenty-five per cent. that of silver.




MESMERIC REVELATION


Whatever doubt may still envelop the _rationale_ of mesmerism, its
startling _facts_ are now almost universally admitted. Of these latter,
those who doubt, are your mere doubters by profession—an unprofitable
and disreputable tribe. There can be no more absolute waste of time
than the attempt to _prove_, at the present day, that man, by mere
exercise of will, can so impress his fellow, as to cast him into an
abnormal condition, of which the phenomena resemble very closely those
of _death_, or at least resemble them more nearly than they do the
phenomena of any other normal condition within our cognizance; that,
while in this state, the person so impressed employs only with effort,
and then feebly, the external organs of sense, yet perceives, with
keenly refined perception, and through channels supposed unknown,
matters beyond the scope of the physical organs; that, moreover, his
intellectual faculties are wonderfully exalted and invigorated; that
his sympathies with the person so impressing him are profound; and,
finally, that his susceptibility to the impression increases with its
frequency, while, in the same proportion, the peculiar phenomena
elicited are more extended and more _pronounced_.

I say that these—which are the laws of mesmerism in its general
features—it would be supererogation to demonstrate; nor shall I inflict
upon my readers so needless a demonstration; to-day. My purpose at
present is a very different one indeed. I am impelled, even in the
teeth of a world of prejudice, to detail without comment the very
remarkable substance of a colloquy, occurring between a sleep-waker and
myself.

I had been long in the habit of mesmerizing the person in question (Mr.
Vankirk), and the usual acute susceptibility and exaltation of the
mesmeric perception had supervened. For many months he had been
laboring under confirmed phthisis, the more distressing effects of
which had been relieved by my manipulations; and on the night of
Wednesday, the fifteenth instant, I was summoned to his bedside.

The invalid was suffering with acute pain in the region of the heart,
and breathed with great difficulty, having all the ordinary symptoms of
asthma. In spasms such as these he had usually found relief from the
application of mustard to the nervous centres, but to-night this had
been attempted in vain.

As I entered his room he greeted me with a cheerful smile, and although
evidently in much bodily pain, appeared to be, mentally, quite at ease.

“I sent for you to-night,” he said, “not so much to administer to my
bodily ailment, as to satisfy me concerning certain psychal impressions
which, of late, have occasioned me much anxiety and surprise. I need
not tell you how sceptical I have hitherto been on the topic of the
soul’s immortality. I cannot deny that there has always existed, as if
in that very soul which I have been denying, a vague half-sentiment of
its own existence. But this half-sentiment at no time amounted to
conviction. With it my reason had nothing to do. All attempts at
logical inquiry resulted, indeed, in leaving me more sceptical than
before. I had been advised to study Cousin. I studied him in his own
works as well as in those of his European and American echoes. The
‘Charles Elwood’ of Mr. Brownson, for example, was placed in my hands.
I read it with profound attention. Throughout I found it logical, but
the portions which were not _merely_ logical were unhappily the initial
arguments of the disbelieving hero of the book. In his summing up it
seemed evident to me that the reasoner had not even succeeded in
convincing himself. His end had plainly forgotten his beginning, like
the government of Trinculo. In short, I was not long in perceiving that
if man is to be intellectually convinced of his own immortality, he
will never be so convinced by the mere abstractions which have been so
long the fashion of the moralists of England, of France, and of
Germany. Abstractions may amuse and exercise, but take no hold on the
mind. Here upon earth, at least, philosophy, I am persuaded, will
always in vain call upon us to look upon qualities as things. The will
may assent—the soul—the intellect, never.

“I repeat, then, that I only half felt, and never intellectually
believed. But latterly there has been a certain deepening of the
feeling, until it has come so nearly to resemble the acquiescence of
reason, that I find it difficult to distinguish between the two. I am
enabled, too, plainly to trace this effect to the mesmeric influence. I
cannot better explain my meaning than by the hypothesis that the
mesmeric exaltation enables me to perceive a train of ratiocination
which, in my abnormal existence, convinces, but which, in full
accordance with the mesmeric phenomena, does not extend, except through
its _effect_, into my normal condition. In sleep-waking, the reasoning
and its conclusion—the cause and its effect—are present together. In my
natural state, the cause vanishing, the effect only, and perhaps only
partially, remains.

“These considerations have led me to think that some good results might
ensue from a series of well-directed questions propounded to me while
mesmerized. You have often observed the profound self-cognizance
evinced by the sleep-waker—the extensive knowledge he displays upon all
points relating to the mesmeric condition itself; and from this
self-cognizance may be deduced hints for the proper conduct of a
catechism.”

I consented of course to make this experiment.  A few passes threw Mr.
Vankirk into the mesmeric sleep. His breathing became immediately more
easy, and he seemed to suffer no physical uneasiness. The following
conversation then ensued:—V. in the dialogue representing the patient,
and P. myself.

      _P._ Are you asleep?

      _V._ Yes—no; I would rather sleep more soundly.

      _P._ [_After a few more passes._] Do you sleep now?

      _V._ Yes.

      _P._ How do you think your present illness will result?

      _V._ [_After a long hesitation and speaking as if with effort_.]
      I must die.

      _P._ Does the idea of death afflict you?

      _V._ [_Very quickly_.] No—no!

      _P._ Are you pleased with the prospect?

      _V._ If I were awake I should like to die, but now it is no
      matter. The mesmeric condition is so near death as to content me.

      _P._ I wish you would explain yourself, Mr. Vankirk.

      _V._ I am willing to do so, but it requires more effort than I
      feel able to make. You do not question me properly.

      _P._ What then shall I ask?

      _V._ You must begin at the beginning.

      _P._ The beginning! But where is the beginning?

      _V._ You know that the beginning is GOD. [_This was said in a
      low, fluctuating tone, and with every sign of the most profound
      veneration_.]

      _P._ What then, is God?

      _V._ [_Hesitating for many minutes._] I cannot tell.

      _P._ Is not God spirit?

      _V._ While I was awake I knew what you meant by “spirit,” but now
      it seems only a word—such, for instance, as truth, beauty—a
      quality, I mean.

      _P._ Is not God immaterial?

      _V._ There is no immateriality—it is a mere word. That which is
      not matter, is not at all—unless qualities are things.

      _P._ Is God, then, material?

      _V._ No. [_This reply startled me very much._]

      _P._ What, then, is he?

      _V._ [_After a long pause, and mutteringly._] I see—but it is a
      thing difficult to tell. [_Another long pause._] He is not
      spirit, for he exists. Nor is he matter, as _you understand it_.
      But there are _gradations_ of matter of which man knows nothing;
      the grosser impelling the finer, the finer pervading the grosser.
      The atmosphere, for example, impels the electric principle, while
      the electric principle permeates the atmosphere. These gradations
      of matter increase in rarity or fineness, until we arrive at a
      matter _unparticled_—without particles—indivisible—_one;_ and
      here the law of impulsion and permeation is modified. The
      ultimate, or unparticled matter, not only permeates all things
      but impels all things; and thus _is_ all things within itself.
      This matter is God. What men attempt to embody in the word
      “thought,” is this matter in motion.

      _P._ The metaphysicians maintain that all action is reducible to
      motion and thinking, and that the latter is the origin of the
      former.

      _V._ Yes; and I now see the confusion of idea. Motion is the
      action of _mind_, not of _thinking_. The unparticled matter, or
      God, in quiescence, is (as nearly as we can conceive it) what men
      call mind. And the power of self-movement (equivalent in effect
      to human volition) is, in the unparticled matter, the result of
      its unity and omniprevalence; _how_ I know not, and now clearly
      see that I shall never know. But the unparticled matter, set in
      motion by a law, or quality, existing within itself, is thinking.

      _P._ Can you give me no more precise idea of what you term the
      unparticled matter?

      _V._ The matters of which man is cognizant escape the senses in
      gradation. We have, for example, a metal, a piece of wood, a drop
      of water, the atmosphere, a gas, caloric, electricity, the
      luminiferous ether. Now we call all these things matter, and
      embrace all matter in one general definition; but in spite of
      this, there can be no two ideas more essentially distinct than
      that which we attach to a metal, and that which we attach to the
      luminiferous ether. When we reach the latter, we feel an almost
      irresistible inclination to class it with spirit, or with
      nihility. The only consideration which restrains us is our
      conception of its atomic constitution; and here, even, we have to
      seek aid from our notion of an atom, as something possessing in
      infinite minuteness, solidity, palpability, weight. Destroy the
      idea of the atomic constitution and we should no longer be able
      to regard the ether as an entity, or at least as matter. For want
      of a better word we might term it spirit. Take, now, a step
      beyond the luminiferous ether—conceive a matter as much more rare
      than the ether, as this ether is more rare than the metal, and we
      arrive at once (in spite of all the school dogmas) at a unique
      mass—an unparticled matter. For although we may admit infinite
      littleness in the atoms themselves, the infinitude of littleness
      in the spaces between them is an absurdity. There will be a
      point—there will be a degree of rarity, at which, if the atoms
      are sufficiently numerous, the interspaces must vanish, and the
      mass absolutely coalesce. But the consideration of the atomic
      constitution being now taken away, the nature of the mass
      inevitably glides into what we conceive of spirit. It is clear,
      however, that it is as fully matter as before. The truth is, it
      is impossible to conceive spirit, since it is impossible to
      imagine what is not. When we flatter ourselves that we have
      formed its conception, we have merely deceived our understanding
      by the consideration of infinitely rarified matter.

      _P._ There seems to me an insurmountable objection to the idea of
      absolute coalescence;—and that is the very slight resistance
      experienced by the heavenly bodies in their revolutions through
      space—a resistance now ascertained, it is true, to exist in
      _some_ degree, but which is, nevertheless, so slight as to have
      been quite overlooked by the sagacity even of Newton. We know
      that the resistance of bodies is, chiefly, in proportion to their
      density. Absolute coalescence is absolute density. Where there
      are no interspaces, there can be no yielding. An ether,
      absolutely dense, would put an infinitely more effectual stop to
      the progress of a star than would an ether of adamant or of iron.

      _V._ Your objection is answered with an ease which is nearly in
      the ratio of its apparent unanswerability.—As regards the
      progress of the star, it can make no difference whether the star
      passes through the ether _or the ether through it_. There is no
      astronomical error more unaccountable than that which reconciles
      the known retardation of the comets with the idea of their
      passage through an ether: for, however rare this ether be
      supposed, it would put a stop to all sidereal revolution in a
      very far briefer period than has been admitted by those
      astronomers who have endeavored to slur over a point which they
      found it impossible to comprehend. The retardation actually
      experienced is, on the other hand, about that which might be
      expected from the _friction_ of the ether in the instantaneous
      passage through the orb. In the one case, the retarding force is
      momentary and complete within itself—in the other it is endlessly
      accumulative.

      _P._ But in all this—in this identification of mere matter with
      God—is there nothing of irreverence? [_I was forced to repeat
      this question before the sleep-waker fully comprehended my
      meaning_.]

      _V._ Can you say _why_ matter should be less reverenced than
      mind? But you forget that the matter of which I speak is, in all
      respects, the very “mind” or “spirit” of the schools, so far as
      regards its high capacities, and is, moreover, the “matter” of
      these schools at the same time. God, with all the powers
      attributed to spirit, is but the perfection of matter.

      _P._ You assert, then, that the unparticled matter, in motion, is
      thought?

      _V._ In general, this motion is the universal thought of the
      universal mind. This thought creates. All created things are but
      the thoughts of God.

      _P._ You say, “in general.”

      _V._ Yes. The universal mind is God. For new individualities,
      _matter_ is necessary.

      _P._ But you now speak of “mind” and “matter” as do the
      metaphysicians.

      _V._ Yes—to avoid confusion. When I say “mind,” I mean the
      unparticled or ultimate matter; by “matter,” I intend all else.

      _P._ You were saying that “for new individualities matter is
      necessary.”

      _V._ Yes; for mind, existing unincorporate, is merely God. To
      create individual, thinking beings, it was necessary to incarnate
      portions of the divine mind. Thus man is individualized. Divested
      of corporate investiture, he were God. Now, the particular motion
      of the incarnated portions of the unparticled matter is the
      thought of man; as the motion of the whole is that of God.

      _P._ You say that divested of the body man will be God?

      _V._ [_After much hesitation._] I could not have said this; it is
      an absurdity.

      _P._ [_Referring to my notes._] You _did_ say that “divested of
      corporate investiture man were God.”

      _V._ And this is true. Man thus divested _would be_ God—would be
      unindividualized. But he can never be thus divested—at least
      never _will be_—else we must imagine an action of God returning
      upon itself—a purposeless and futile action. Man is a creature.
      Creatures are thoughts of God. It is the nature of thought to be
      irrevocable.

      _P._ I do not comprehend. You say that man will never put off the
      body?

      _V._ I say that he will never be bodiless.

      _P._ Explain.

      _V._ There are two bodies—the rudimental and the complete;
      corresponding with the two conditions of the worm and the
      butterfly. What we call “death,” is but the painful
      metamorphosis. Our present incarnation is progressive,
      preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate,
      immortal. The ultimate life is the full design.

      _P._ But of the worm’s metamorphosis we are palpably cognizant.

      _V._ _We_, certainly—but not the worm. The matter of which our
      rudimental body is composed, is within the ken of the organs of
      that body; or, more distinctly, our rudimental organs are adapted
      to the matter of which is formed the rudimental body; but not to
      that of which the ultimate is composed. The ultimate body thus
      escapes our rudimental senses, and we perceive only the shell
      which falls, in decaying, from the inner form; not that inner
      form itself; but this inner form, as well as the shell, is
      appreciable by those who have already acquired the ultimate life.

      _P._ You have often said that the mesmeric state very nearly
      resembles death. How is this?

      _V._ When I say that it resembles death, I mean that it resembles
      the ultimate life; for when I am entranced the senses of my
      rudimental life are in abeyance, and I perceive external things
      directly, without organs, through a medium which I shall employ
      in the ultimate, unorganized life.

      _P._ Unorganized?

      _V._ Yes; organs are contrivances by which the individual is
      brought into sensible relation with particular classes and forms
      of matter, to the exclusion of other classes and forms. The
      organs of man are adapted to his rudimental condition, and to
      that only; his ultimate condition, being unorganized, is of
      unlimited comprehension in all points but one—the nature of the
      volition of God—that is to say, the motion of the unparticled
      matter. You will have a distinct idea of the ultimate body by
      conceiving it to be entire brain. This it is _not_; but a
      conception of this nature will bring you near a comprehension of
      what it _is_. A luminous body imparts vibration to the
      luminiferous ether. The vibrations generate similar ones within
      the retina; these again communicate similar ones to the optic
      nerve. The nerve conveys similar ones to the brain; the brain,
      also, similar ones to the unparticled matter which permeates it.
      The motion of this latter is thought, of which perception is the
      first undulation. This is the mode by which the mind of the
      rudimental life communicates with the external world; and this
      external world is, to the rudimental life, limited, through the
      idiosyncrasy of its organs. But in the ultimate, unorganized
      life, the external world reaches the whole body, (which is of a
      substance having affinity to brain, as I have said,) with no
      other intervention than that of an infinitely rarer ether than
      even the luminiferous; and to this ether—in unison with it—the
      whole body vibrates, setting in motion the unparticled matter
      which permeates it. It is to the absence of idiosyncratic organs,
      therefore, that we must attribute the nearly unlimited perception
      of the ultimate life. To rudimental beings, organs are the cages
      necessary to confine them until fledged.

      _P._ You speak of rudimental “beings.” Are there other rudimental
      thinking beings than man?

      _V._ The multitudinous conglomeration of rare matter into nebulæ,
      planets, suns, and other bodies which are neither nebulæ, suns,
      nor planets, is for the sole purpose of supplying _pabulum_ for
      the idiosyncrasy of the organs of an infinity of rudimental
      beings. But for the necessity of the rudimental, prior to the
      ultimate life, there would have been no bodies such as these.
      Each of these is tenanted by a distinct variety of organic,
      rudimental, thinking creatures. In all, the organs vary with the
      features of the place tenanted. At death, or metamorphosis, these
      creatures, enjoying the ultimate life—immortality—and cognizant
      of all secrets but _the one_, act all things and pass everywhere
      by mere volition:—indwelling, not the stars, which to us seem the
      sole palpabilities, and for the accommodation of which we blindly
      deem space created—but that SPACE itself—that infinity of which
      the truly substantive vastness swallows up the
      star-shadows—blotting them out as non-entities from the
      perception of the angels.

      _P._ You say that “but for the _necessity_ of the rudimental
      life” there would have been no stars. But why this necessity?

      _V._ In the inorganic life, as well as in the inorganic matter
      generally, there is nothing to impede the action of one simple
      _unique_ law—the Divine Volition. With the view of producing
      impediment, the organic life and matter, (complex, substantial,
      and law-encumbered,) were contrived.

      _P._ But again—why need this impediment have been produced?

      _V._ The result of law inviolate is perfection—right—negative
      happiness. The result of law violate is imperfection, wrong,
      positive pain. Through the impediments afforded by the number,
      complexity, and substantiality of the laws of organic life and
      matter, the violation of law is rendered, to a certain extent,
      practicable. Thus pain, which in the inorganic life is
      impossible, is possible in the organic.

      _P._ But to what good end is pain thus rendered possible?

      _V._ All things are either good or bad by comparison. A
      sufficient analysis will show that pleasure, in all cases, is but
      the contrast of pain. _Positive_ pleasure is a mere idea. To be
      happy at any one point we must have suffered at the same. Never
      to suffer would have been never to have been blessed. But it has
      been shown that, in the inorganic life, pain cannot be thus the
      necessity for the organic. The pain of the primitive life of
      Earth, is the sole basis of the bliss of the ultimate life in
      Heaven.

      _P._ Still, there is one of your expressions which I find it
      impossible to comprehend—“the truly _substantive_ vastness of
      infinity.”

      _V._ This, probably, is because you have no sufficiently generic
      conception of the term “_substance_” itself. We must not regard
      it as a quality, but as a sentiment:—it is the perception, in
      thinking beings, of the adaptation of matter to their
      organization. There are many things on the Earth, which would be
      nihility to the inhabitants of Venus—many things visible and
      tangible in Venus, which we could not be brought to appreciate as
      existing at all. But to the inorganic beings—to the angels—the
      whole of the unparticled matter is substance—that is to say, the
      whole of what we term “space” is to them the truest
      substantiality;—the stars, meantime, through what we consider
      their materiality, escaping the angelic sense, just in proportion
      as the unparticled matter, through what we consider its
      immateriality, eludes the organic.

      As the sleep-waker pronounced these latter words, in a feeble
      tone, I observed on his countenance a singular expression, which
      somewhat alarmed me, and induced me to awake him at once. No
      sooner had I done this, than, with a bright smile irradiating all
      his features, he fell back upon his pillow and expired. I noticed
      that in less than a minute afterward his corpse had all the stern
      rigidity of stone. His brow was of the coldness of ice. Thus,
      ordinarily, should it have appeared, only after long pressure
      from Azrael’s hand. Had the sleep-waker, indeed, during the
      latter portion of his discourse, been addressing me from out the
      region of the shadows?




THE FACTS IN THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR


      Of course I shall not pretend to consider it any matter for
      wonder, that the extraordinary case of M. Valdemar has excited
      discussion. It would have been a miracle had it not—especially
      under the circumstances. Through the desire of all parties
      concerned, to keep the affair from the public, at least for the
      present, or until we had farther opportunities for
      investigation—through our endeavors to effect this—a garbled or
      exaggerated account made its way into society, and became the
      source of many unpleasant misrepresentations; and, very
      naturally, of a great deal of disbelief.

      It is now rendered necessary that I give the facts—as far as I
      comprehend them myself. They are, succinctly, these:

      My attention, for the last three years, had been repeatedly drawn
      to the subject of Mesmerism; and, about nine months ago it
      occurred to me, quite suddenly, that in the series of experiments
      made hitherto, there had been a very remarkable and most
      unaccountable omission:—no person had as yet been mesmerized in
      articulo mortis. It remained to be seen, first, whether, in such
      condition, there existed in the patient any susceptibility to the
      magnetic influence; secondly, whether, if any existed, it was
      impaired or increased by the condition; thirdly, to what extent,
      or for how long a period, the encroachments of Death might be
      arrested by the process. There were other points to be
      ascertained, but these most excited my curiosity—the last in
      especial, from the immensely important character of its
      consequences.

      In looking around me for some subject by whose means I might test
      these particulars, I was brought to think of my friend, M. Ernest
      Valdemar, the well-known compiler of the “Bibliotheca Forensica,”
      and author (under the nom de plume of Issachar Marx) of the
      Polish versions of “Wallenstein” and “Gargantua.” M. Valdemar,
      who has resided principally at Harlem, N.Y., since the year 1839,
      is (or was) particularly noticeable for the extreme spareness of
      his person—his lower limbs much resembling those of John
      Randolph; and, also, for the whiteness of his whiskers, in
      violent contrast to the blackness of his hair—the latter, in
      consequence, being very generally mistaken for a wig. His
      temperament was markedly nervous, and rendered him a good subject
      for mesmeric experiment. On two or three occasions I had put him
      to sleep with little difficulty, but was disappointed in other
      results which his peculiar constitution had naturally led me to
      anticipate. His will was at no period positively, or thoroughly,
      under my control, and in regard to clairvoyance, I could
      accomplish with him nothing to be relied upon. I always
      attributed my failure at these points to the disordered state of
      his health. For some months previous to my becoming acquainted
      with him, his physicians had declared him in a confirmed
      phthisis. It was his custom, indeed, to speak calmly of his
      approaching dissolution, as of a matter neither to be avoided nor
      regretted.

      When the ideas to which I have alluded first occurred to me, it
      was of course very natural that I should think of M. Valdemar. I
      knew the steady philosophy of the man too well to apprehend any
      scruples from him; and he had no relatives in America who would
      be likely to interfere. I spoke to him frankly upon the subject;
      and, to my surprise, his interest seemed vividly excited. I say
      to my surprise, for, although he had always yielded his person
      freely to my experiments, he had never before given me any tokens
      of sympathy with what I did. His disease was of that character
      which would admit of exact calculation in respect to the epoch of
      its termination in death; and it was finally arranged between us
      that he would send for me about twenty-four hours before the
      period announced by his physicians as that of his decease.

      It is now rather more than seven months since I received, from M.
      Valdemar himself, the subjoined note:

      MY DEAR P——,

      You may as well come now. D—— and F—— are agreed that I cannot
      hold out beyond to-morrow midnight; and I think they have hit the
      time very nearly.

      VALDEMAR

      I received this note within half an hour after it was written,
      and in fifteen minutes more I was in the dying man’s chamber. I
      had not seen him for ten days, and was appalled by the fearful
      alteration which the brief interval had wrought in him. His face
      wore a leaden hue; the eyes were utterly lustreless; and the
      emaciation was so extreme that the skin had been broken through
      by the cheek-bones. His expectoration was excessive. The pulse
      was barely perceptible. He retained, nevertheless, in a very
      remarkable manner, both his mental power and a certain degree of
      physical strength. He spoke with distinctness—took some
      palliative medicines without aid—and, when I entered the room,
      was occupied in penciling memoranda in a pocket-book. He was
      propped up in the bed by pillows. Doctors D—— and F—— were in
      attendance.

      After pressing Valdemar’s hand, I took these gentlemen aside, and
      obtained from them a minute account of the patient’s condition.
      The left lung had been for eighteen months in a semi-osseous or
      cartilaginous state, and was, of course, entirely useless for all
      purposes of vitality. The right, in its upper portion, was also
      partially, if not thoroughly, ossified, while the lower region
      was merely a mass of purulent tubercles, running one into
      another. Several extensive perforations existed; and, at one
      point, permanent adhesion to the ribs had taken place. These
      appearances in the right lobe were of comparatively recent date.
      The ossification had proceeded with very unusual rapidity; no
      sign of it had been discovered a month before, and the adhesion
      had only been observed during the three previous days.
      Independently of the phthisis, the patient was suspected of
      aneurism of the aorta; but on this point the osseous symptoms
      rendered an exact diagnosis impossible. It was the opinion of
      both physicians that M. Valdemar would die about midnight on the
      morrow (Sunday). It was then seven o’clock on Saturday evening.

      On quitting the invalid’s bed-side to hold conversation with
      myself, Doctors D—— and F—— had bidden him a final farewell. It
      had not been their intention to return; but, at my request, they
      agreed to look in upon the patient about ten the next night.

      When they had gone, I spoke freely with M. Valdemar on the
      subject of his approaching dissolution, as well as, more
      particularly, of the experiment proposed. He still professed
      himself quite willing and even anxious to have it made, and urged
      me to commence it at once. A male and a female nurse were in
      attendance; but I did not feel myself altogether at liberty to
      engage in a task of this character with no more reliable
      witnesses than these people, in case of sudden accident, might
      prove. I therefore postponed operations until about eight the
      next night, when the arrival of a medical student with whom I had
      some acquaintance, (Mr. Theodore L—l,) relieved me from farther
      embarrassment. It had been my design, originally, to wait for the
      physicians; but I was induced to proceed, first, by the urgent
      entreaties of M. Valdemar, and secondly, by my conviction that I
      had not a moment to lose, as he was evidently sinking fast.

      Mr. L—l was so kind as to accede to my desire that he would take
      notes of all that occurred, and it is from his memoranda that
      what I now have to relate is, for the most part, either condensed
      or copied verbatim.

      It wanted about five minutes of eight when, taking the patient’s
      hand, I begged him to state, as distinctly as he could, to Mr.
      L—l, whether he (M. Valdemar) was entirely willing that I should
      make the experiment of mesmerizing him in his then condition.

      He replied feebly, yet quite audibly, “Yes, I wish to be. I fear
      you have mesmerized”—adding immediately afterwards: “I fear you
      have deferred it too long.”

      While he spoke thus, I commenced the passes which I had already
      found most effectual in subduing him. He was evidently influenced
      with the first lateral stroke of my hand across his forehead; but
      although I exerted all my powers, no further perceptible effect
      was induced until some minutes after ten o’clock, when Doctors
      D—— and F—— called, according to appointment. I explained to
      them, in a few words, what I designed, and as they opposed no
      objection, saying that the patient was already in the death
      agony, I proceeded without hesitation—exchanging, however, the
      lateral passes for downward ones, and directing my gaze entirely
      into the right eye of the sufferer.

      By this time his pulse was imperceptible and his breathing was
      stertorous, and at intervals of half a minute.

      This condition was nearly unaltered for a quarter of an hour. At
      the expiration of this period, however, a natural although a very
      deep sigh escaped the bosom of the dying man, and the stertorous
      breathing ceased—that is to say, its stertorousness was no longer
      apparent; the intervals were undiminished. The patient’s
      extremities were of an icy coldness.

      At five minutes before eleven I perceived unequivocal signs of
      the mesmeric influence. The glassy roll of the eye was changed
      for that expression of uneasy inward examination which is never
      seen except in cases of sleep-waking, and which it is quite
      impossible to mistake. With a few rapid lateral passes I made the
      lids quiver, as in incipient sleep, and with a few more I closed
      them altogether. I was not satisfied, however, with this, but
      continued the manipulations vigorously, and with the fullest
      exertion of the will, until I had completely stiffened the limbs
      of the slumberer, after placing them in a seemingly easy
      position. The legs were at full length; the arms were nearly so,
      and reposed on the bed at a moderate distance from the loin. The
      head was very slightly elevated.

      When I had accomplished this, it was fully midnight, and I
      requested the gentlemen present to examine M. Valdemar’s
      condition. After a few experiments, they admitted him to be an
      unusually perfect state of mesmeric trance. The curiosity of both
      the physicians was greatly excited. Dr. D—— resolved at once to
      remain with the patient all night, while Dr. F—— took leave with
      a promise to return at daybreak. Mr. L—l and the nurses remained.

      We left M. Valdemar entirely undisturbed until about three
      o’clock in the morning, when I approached him and found him in
      precisely the same condition as when Dr. F—— went away—that is to
      say, he lay in the same position; the pulse was imperceptible;
      the breathing was gentle (scarcely noticeable, unless through the
      application of a mirror to the lips); the eyes were closed
      naturally; and the limbs were as rigid and as cold as marble.
      Still, the general appearance was certainly not that of death.

      As I approached M. Valdemar I made a kind of half effort to
      influence his right arm into pursuit of my own, as I passed the
      latter gently to and fro above his person. In such experiments
      with this patient, I had never perfectly succeeded before, and
      assuredly I had little thought of succeeding now; but to my
      astonishment, his arm very readily, although feebly, followed
      every direction I assigned it with mine. I determined to hazard a
      few words of conversation.

      “M. Valdemar,” I said, “are you asleep?” He made no answer, but I
      perceived a tremor about the lips, and was thus induced to repeat
      the question, again and again. At its third repetition, his whole
      frame was agitated by a very slight shivering; the eyelids
      unclosed themselves so far as to display a white line of the
      ball; the lips moved sluggishly, and from between them, in a
      barely audible whisper, issued the words:

      “Yes;—asleep now. Do not wake me!—let me die so!”

      I here felt the limbs and found them as rigid as ever. The right
      arm, as before, obeyed the direction of my hand. I questioned the
      sleep-waker again:

      “Do you still feel pain in the breast, M. Valdemar?”

      The answer now was immediate, but even less audible than before:

      “No pain—I am dying.”

      I did not think it advisable to disturb him farther just then,
      and nothing more was said or done until the arrival of Dr. F——,
      who came a little before sunrise, and expressed unbounded
      astonishment at finding the patient still alive. After feeling
      the pulse and applying a mirror to the lips, he requested me to
      speak to the sleep-waker again. I did so, saying:

      “M. Valdemar, do you still sleep?”

      As before, some minutes elapsed ere a reply was made; and during
      the interval the dying man seemed to be collecting his energies
      to speak. At my fourth repetition of the question, he said very
      faintly, almost inaudibly:

      “Yes; still asleep—dying.”

      It was now the opinion, or rather the wish, of the physicians,
      that M. Valdemar should be suffered to remain undisturbed in his
      present apparently tranquil condition, until death should
      supervene—and this, it was generally agreed, must now take place
      within a few minutes. I concluded, however, to speak to him once
      more, and merely repeated my previous question.

      While I spoke, there came a marked change over the countenance of
      the sleep-waker. The eyes rolled themselves slowly open, the
      pupils disappearing upwardly; the skin generally assumed a
      cadaverous hue, resembling not so much parchment as white paper;
      and the circular hectic spots which, hitherto, had been strongly
      defined in the centre of each cheek, went out at once. I use this
      expression, because the suddenness of their departure put me in
      mind of nothing so much as the extinguishment of a candle by a
      puff of the breath. The upper lip, at the same time, writhed
      itself away from the teeth, which it had previously covered
      completely; while the lower jaw fell with an audible jerk,
      leaving the mouth widely extended, and disclosing in full view
      the swollen and blackened tongue. I presume that no member of the
      party then present had been unaccustomed to death-bed horrors;
      but so hideous beyond conception was the appearance of M.
      Valdemar at this moment, that there was a general shrinking back
      from the region of the bed.

      I now feel that I have reached a point of this narrative at which
      every reader will be startled into positive disbelief. It is my
      business, however, simply to proceed.

      There was no longer the faintest sign of vitality in M. Valdemar;
      and concluding him to be dead, we were consigning him to the
      charge of the nurses, when a strong vibratory motion was
      observable in the tongue. This continued for perhaps a minute. At
      the expiration of this period, there issued from the distended
      and motionless jaws a voice—such as it would be madness in me to
      attempt describing. There are, indeed, two or three epithets
      which might be considered as applicable to it in part; I might
      say, for example, that the sound was harsh, and broken and
      hollow; but the hideous whole is indescribable, for the simple
      reason that no similar sounds have ever jarred upon the ear of
      humanity. There were two particulars, nevertheless, which I
      thought then, and still think, might fairly be stated as
      characteristic of the intonation—as well adapted to convey some
      idea of its unearthly peculiarity. In the first place, the voice
      seemed to reach our ears—at least mine—from a vast distance, or
      from some deep cavern within the earth. In the second place, it
      impressed me (I fear, indeed, that it will be impossible to make
      myself comprehended) as gelatinous or glutinous matters impress
      the sense of touch.

      I have spoken both of “sound” and of “voice.” I mean to say that
      the sound was one of distinct—of even wonderfully, thrillingly
      distinct—syllabification. M. Valdemar spoke—obviously in reply to
      the question I had propounded to him a few minutes before. I had
      asked him, it will be remembered, if he still slept. He now said:

      “Yes;—no;—I have been sleeping—and now—now—I am dead.”

      No person present even affected to deny, or attempted to repress,
      the unutterable, shuddering horror which these few words, thus
      uttered, were so well calculated to convey. Mr. L—l (the student)
      swooned. The nurses immediately left the chamber, and could not
      be induced to return. My own impressions I would not pretend to
      render intelligible to the reader. For nearly an hour, we busied
      ourselves, silently—without the utterance of a word—in endeavors
      to revive Mr. L—l. When he came to himself, we addressed
      ourselves again to an investigation of M. Valdemar’s condition.

      It remained in all respects as I have last described it, with the
      exception that the mirror no longer afforded evidence of
      respiration. An attempt to draw blood from the arm failed. I
      should mention, too, that this limb was no farther subject to my
      will. I endeavored in vain to make it follow the direction of my
      hand. The only real indication, indeed, of the mesmeric
      influence, was now found in the vibratory movement of the tongue,
      whenever I addressed M. Valdemar a question. He seemed to be
      making an effort to reply, but had no longer sufficient volition.
      To queries put to him by any other person than myself he seemed
      utterly insensible—although I endeavored to place each member of
      the company in mesmeric rapport with him. I believe that I have
      now related all that is necessary to an understanding of the
      sleep-waker’s state at this epoch. Other nurses were procured;
      and at ten o’clock I left the house in company with the two
      physicians and Mr. L—l.

      In the afternoon we all called again to see the patient. His
      condition remained precisely the same. We had now some discussion
      as to the propriety and feasibility of awakening him; but we had
      little difficulty in agreeing that no good purpose would be
      served by so doing. It was evident that, so far, death (or what
      is usually termed death) had been arrested by the mesmeric
      process. It seemed clear to us all that to awaken M. Valdemar
      would be merely to insure his instant, or at least his speedy,
      dissolution.

      From this period until the close of last week—an interval of
      nearly seven months—we continued to make daily calls at M.
      Valdemar’s house, accompanied, now and then, by medical and other
      friends. All this time the sleeper-waker remained _exactly_ as I
      have last described him. The nurses’ attentions were continual.

      It was on Friday last that we finally resolved to make the
      experiment of awakening, or attempting to awaken him; and it is
      the (perhaps) unfortunate result of this latter experiment which
      has given rise to so much discussion in private circles—to so
      much of what I cannot help thinking unwarranted popular feeling.

      For the purpose of relieving M. Valdemar from the mesmeric
      trance, I made use of the customary passes. These, for a time,
      were unsuccessful. The first indication of revival was afforded
      by a partial descent of the iris. It was observed, as especially
      remarkable, that this lowering of the pupil was accompanied by
      the profuse out-flowing of a yellowish ichor (from beneath the
      lids) of a pungent and highly offensive odor.

      It was now suggested that I should attempt to influence the
      patient’s arm, as heretofore. I made the attempt and failed. Dr.
      F—— then intimated a desire to have me put a question. I did so,
      as follows:

      “M. Valdemar, can you explain to us what are your feelings or
      wishes now?”

      There was an instant return of the hectic circles on the cheeks;
      the tongue quivered, or rather rolled violently in the mouth
      (although the jaws and lips remained rigid as before), and at
      length the same hideous voice which I have already described,
      broke forth:

      “For God’s sake!—quick!—quick!—put me to sleep—or, quick!—waken
      me!—quick!—I say to you that I am dead!”

      I was thoroughly unnerved, and for an instant remained undecided
      what to do. At first I made an endeavor to recompose the patient;
      but, failing in this through total abeyance of the will, I
      retraced my steps and as earnestly struggled to awaken him. In
      this attempt I soon saw that I should be successful—or at least I
      soon fancied that my success would be complete—and I am sure that
      all in the room were prepared to see the patient awaken.

      For what really occurred, however, it is quite impossible that
      any human being could have been prepared.

      As I rapidly made the mesmeric passes, amid ejaculations of
      “dead! dead!” absolutely bursting from the tongue and not from
      the lips of the sufferer, his whole frame at once—within the
      space of a single minute, or even less,
      shrunk—crumbled—absolutely rotted away beneath my hands. Upon the
      bed, before that whole company, there lay a nearly liquid mass of
      loathsome—of detestable putrescence.




THE BLACK CAT.


      For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to
      pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be
      to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own
      evidence. Yet, mad am I not—and very surely do I not dream. But
      to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburthen my soul. My
      immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly,
      succinctly, and without comment, a series of mere household
      events. In their consequences, these events have terrified—have
      tortured—have destroyed me. Yet I will not attempt to expound
      them. To me, they have presented little but horror—to many they
      will seem less terrible than _barroques_. Hereafter, perhaps,
      some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the
      common-place—some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less
      excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the circumstances
      I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of
      very natural causes and effects.

      From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my
      disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to
      make me the jest of my companions. I was especially fond of
      animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of
      pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy
      as when feeding and caressing them. This peculiarity of character
      grew with my growth, and in my manhood, I derived from it one of
      my principal sources of pleasure. To those who have cherished an
      affection for a faithful and sagacious dog, I need hardly be at
      the trouble of explaining the nature or the intensity of the
      gratification thus derivable. There is something in the unselfish
      and self-sacrificing love of a brute, which goes directly to the
      heart of him who has had frequent occasion to test the paltry
      friendship and gossamer fidelity of mere _Man_.

      I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition
      not uncongenial with my own. Observing my partiality for domestic
      pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring those of the most
      agreeable kind. We had birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a
      small monkey, and _a cat_.

      This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely
      black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree. In speaking of his
      intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured
      with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular
      notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise. Not
      that she was ever _serious_ upon this point—and I mention the
      matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just
      now, to be remembered.

      Pluto—this was the cat’s name—was my favorite pet and playmate. I
      alone fed him, and he attended me wherever I went about the
      house. It was even with difficulty that I could prevent him from
      following me through the streets.

      Our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years, during
      which my general temperament and character—through the
      instrumentality of the Fiend Intemperance—had (I blush to confess
      it) experienced a radical alteration for the worse. I grew, day
      by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the
      feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language
      to my wife. At length, I even offered her personal violence. My
      pets, of course, were made to feel the change in my disposition.
      I not only neglected, but ill-used them. For Pluto, however, I
      still retained sufficient regard to restrain me from maltreating
      him, as I made no scruple of maltreating the rabbits, the monkey,
      or even the dog, when by accident, or through affection, they
      came in my way. But my disease grew upon me—for what disease is
      like Alcohol!—and at length even Pluto, who was now becoming old,
      and consequently somewhat peevish—even Pluto began to experience
      the effects of my ill temper.

      One night, returning home, much intoxicated, from one of my
      haunts about town, I fancied that the cat avoided my presence. I
      seized him; when, in his fright at my violence, he inflicted a
      slight wound upon my hand with his teeth. The fury of a demon
      instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul
      seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body and a more than
      fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my
      frame. I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it,
      grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of
      its eyes from the socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen
      the damnable atrocity.

      When reason returned with the morning—when I had slept off the
      fumes of the night’s debauch—I experienced a sentiment half of
      horror, half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been
      guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and
      the soul remained untouched. I again plunged into excess, and
      soon drowned in wine all memory of the deed.

      In the meantime the cat slowly recovered. The socket of the lost
      eye presented, it is true, a frightful appearance, but he no
      longer appeared to suffer any pain. He went about the house as
      usual, but, as might be expected, fled in extreme terror at my
      approach. I had so much of my old heart left, as to be at first
      grieved by this evident dislike on the part of a creature which
      had once so loved me. But this feeling soon gave place to
      irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable
      overthrow, the spirit of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit philosophy
      takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than
      I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the
      human heart—one of the indivisible primary faculties, or
      sentiments, which give direction to the character of Man. Who has
      not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly
      action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not?
      Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best
      judgment, to violate that which is _Law_, merely because we
      understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say,
      came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of
      the soul _to vex itself_—to offer violence to its own nature—to
      do wrong for the wrong’s sake only—that urged me to continue and
      finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the
      unoffending brute. One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose
      about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree;—hung it with
      the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse
      at my heart;—hung it _because_ I knew that it had loved me, and
      _because_ I felt it had given me no reason of offence;—hung it
      _because_ I knew that in so doing I was committing a sin—a deadly
      sin that would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it—if
      such a thing wore possible—even beyond the reach of the infinite
      mercy of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God.

      On the night of the day on which this cruel deed was done, I was
      aroused from sleep by the cry of fire. The curtains of my bed
      were in flames. The whole house was blazing. It was with great
      difficulty that my wife, a servant, and myself, made our escape
      from the conflagration. The destruction was complete. My entire
      worldly wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned myself
      thenceforward to despair.

      I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of
      cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity. But I am
      detailing a chain of facts—and wish not to leave even a possible
      link imperfect. On the day succeeding the fire, I visited the
      ruins. The walls, with one exception, had fallen in. This
      exception was found in a compartment wall, not very thick, which
      stood about the middle of the house, and against which had rested
      the head of my bed. The plastering had here, in great measure,
      resisted the action of the fire—a fact which I attributed to its
      having been recently spread. About this wall a dense crowd were
      collected, and many persons seemed to be examining a particular
      portion of it with very minute and eager attention. The words
      “strange!” “singular!” and other similar expressions, excited my
      curiosity. I approached and saw, as if graven in _bas relief_
      upon the white surface, the figure of a gigantic _cat_. The
      impression was given with an accuracy truly marvellous. There was
      a rope about the animal’s neck.

      When I first beheld this apparition—for I could scarcely regard
      it as less—my wonder and my terror were extreme. But at length
      reflection came to my aid. The cat, I remembered, had been hung
      in a garden adjacent to the house. Upon the alarm of fire, this
      garden had been immediately filled by the crowd—by some one of
      whom the animal must have been cut from the tree and thrown,
      through an open window, into my chamber. This had probably been
      done with the view of arousing me from sleep. The falling of
      other walls had compressed the victim of my cruelty into the
      substance of the freshly-spread plaster; the lime of which, with
      the flames, and the _ammonia_ from the carcass, had then
      accomplished the portraiture as I saw it.

      Although I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not altogether
      to my conscience, for the startling fact just detailed, it did
      not the less fail to make a deep impression upon my fancy. For
      months I could not rid myself of the phantasm of the cat; and,
      during this period, there came back into my spirit a
      half-sentiment that seemed, but was not, remorse. I went so far
      as to regret the loss of the animal, and to look about me, among
      the vile haunts which I now habitually frequented, for another
      pet of the same species, and of somewhat similar appearance, with
      which to supply its place.

      One night as I sat, half stupefied, in a den of more than infamy,
      my attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing
      upon the head of one of the immense hogsheads of gin, or of rum,
      which constituted the chief furniture of the apartment. I had
      been looking steadily at the top of this hogshead for some
      minutes, and what now caused me surprise was the fact that I had
      not sooner perceived the object thereupon. I approached it, and
      touched it with my hand. It was a black cat—a very large
      one—fully as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every
      respect but one. Pluto had not a white hair upon any portion of
      his body; but this cat had a large, although indefinite splotch
      of white, covering nearly the whole region of the breast. Upon my
      touching him, he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against
      my hand, and appeared delighted with my notice. This, then, was
      the very creature of which I was in search. I at once offered to
      purchase it of the landlord; but this person made no claim to
      it—knew nothing of it—had never seen it before.

      I continued my caresses, and, when I prepared to go home, the
      animal evinced a disposition to accompany me. I permitted it to
      do so; occasionally stooping and patting it as I proceeded. When
      it reached the house it domesticated itself at once, and became
      immediately a great favorite with my wife.

      For my own part, I soon found a dislike to it arising within me.
      This was just the reverse of what I had anticipated; but—I know
      not how or why it was—its evident fondness for myself rather
      disgusted and annoyed. By slow degrees, these feelings of disgust
      and annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred. I avoided the
      creature; a certain sense of shame, and the remembrance of my
      former deed of cruelty, preventing me from physically abusing it.
      I did not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise violently ill use
      it; but gradually—very gradually—I came to look upon it with
      unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious
      presence, as from the breath of a pestilence.

      What added, no doubt, to my hatred of the beast, was the
      discovery, on the morning after I brought it home, that, like
      Pluto, it also had been deprived of one of its eyes. This
      circumstance, however, only endeared it to my wife, who, as I
      have already said, possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of
      feeling which had once been my distinguishing trait, and the
      source of many of my simplest and purest pleasures.

      With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself
      seemed to increase. It followed my footsteps with a pertinacity
      which it would be difficult to make the reader comprehend.
      Whenever I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or spring upon
      my knees, covering me with its loathsome caresses. If I arose to
      walk it would get between my feet and thus nearly throw me down,
      or, fastening its long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in
      this manner, to my breast. At such times, although I longed to
      destroy it with a blow, I was yet withheld from so doing, partly
      by a memory of my former crime, but chiefly—let me confess it at
      once—by absolute dread of the beast.

      This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil—and yet I
      should be at a loss how otherwise to define it. I am almost
      ashamed to own—yes, even in this felon’s cell, I am almost
      ashamed to own—that the terror and horror with which the animal
      inspired me, had been heightened by one of the merest chimaeras
      it would be possible to conceive. My wife had called my
      attention, more than once, to the character of the mark of white
      hair, of which I have spoken, and which constituted the sole
      visible difference between the strange beast and the one I had
      destroyed. The reader will remember that this mark, although
      large, had been originally very indefinite; but, by slow
      degrees—degrees nearly imperceptible, and which for a long time
      my reason struggled to reject as fanciful—it had, at length,
      assumed a rigorous distinctness of outline. It was now the
      representation of an object that I shudder to name—and for this,
      above all, I loathed, and dreaded, and would have rid myself of
      the monster _had I dared_—it was now, I say, the image of a
      hideous—of a ghastly thing—of the GALLOWS!—oh, mournful and
      terrible engine of Horror and of Crime—of Agony and of Death!

      And now was I indeed wretched beyond the wretchedness of mere
      Humanity. And _a brute beast _—whose fellow I had contemptuously
      destroyed—_a brute beast_ to work out for _me_—for me a man,
      fashioned in the image of the High God—so much of insufferable
      woe! Alas! neither by day nor by night knew I the blessing of
      rest any more! During the former the creature left me no moment
      alone, and in the latter I started hourly from dreams of
      unutterable fear to find the hot breath of _the thing_ upon my
      face, and its vast weight—an incarnate nightmare that I had no
      power to shake off—incumbent eternally upon my _heart!_

      Beneath the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble
      remnant of the good within me succumbed. Evil thoughts became my
      sole intimates—the darkest and most evil of thoughts. The
      moodiness of my usual temper increased to hatred of all things
      and of all mankind; while, from the sudden, frequent, and
      ungovernable outbursts of a fury to which I now blindly abandoned
      myself, my uncomplaining wife, alas, was the most usual and the
      most patient of sufferers.

      One day she accompanied me, upon some household errand, into the
      cellar of the old building which our poverty compelled us to
      inhabit. The cat followed me down the steep stairs, and, nearly
      throwing me headlong, exasperated me to madness. Uplifting an
      axe, and forgetting, in my wrath, the childish dread which had
      hitherto stayed my hand, I aimed a blow at the animal which, of
      course, would have proved instantly fatal had it descended as I
      wished. But this blow was arrested by the hand of my wife.
      Goaded, by the interference, into a rage more than demoniacal, I
      withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain.
      She fell dead upon the spot, without a groan.

      This hideous murder accomplished, I set myself forthwith, and
      with entire deliberation, to the task of concealing the body. I
      knew that I could not remove it from the house, either by day or
      by night, without the risk of being observed by the neighbors.
      Many projects entered my mind. At one period I thought of cutting
      the corpse into minute fragments, and destroying them by fire. At
      another, I resolved to dig a grave for it in the floor of the
      cellar. Again, I deliberated about casting it in the well in the
      yard—about packing it in a box, as if merchandise, with the usual
      arrangements, and so getting a porter to take it from the house.
      Finally I hit upon what I considered a far better expedient than
      either of these. I determined to wall it up in the cellar—as the
      monks of the middle ages are recorded to have walled up their
      victims.

      For a purpose such as this the cellar was well adapted. Its walls
      were loosely constructed, and had lately been plastered
      throughout with a rough plaster, which the dampness of the
      atmosphere had prevented from hardening. Moreover, in one of the
      walls was a projection, caused by a false chimney, or fireplace,
      that had been filled up, and made to resemble the red of the
      cellar. I made no doubt that I could readily displace the bricks
      at this point, insert the corpse, and wall the whole up as
      before, so that no eye could detect any thing suspicious. And in
      this calculation I was not deceived. By means of a crow-bar I
      easily dislodged the bricks, and, having carefully deposited the
      body against the inner wall, I propped it in that position,
      while, with little trouble, I re-laid the whole structure as it
      originally stood. Having procured mortar, sand, and hair, with
      every possible precaution, I prepared a plaster which could not
      be distinguished from the old, and with this I very carefully
      went over the new brickwork. When I had finished, I felt
      satisfied that all was right. The wall did not present the
      slightest appearance of having been disturbed. The rubbish on the
      floor was picked up with the minutest care. I looked around
      triumphantly, and said to myself: “Here at least, then, my labor
      has not been in vain.”

      My next step was to look for the beast which had been the cause
      of so much wretchedness; for I had, at length, firmly resolved to
      put it to death. Had I been able to meet with it, at the moment,
      there could have been no doubt of its fate; but it appeared that
      the crafty animal had been alarmed at the violence of my previous
      anger, and forebore to present itself in my present mood. It is
      impossible to describe, or to imagine, the deep, the blissful
      sense of relief which the absence of the detested creature
      occasioned in my bosom. It did not make its appearance during the
      night; and thus for one night at least, since its introduction
      into the house, I soundly and tranquilly slept; aye, slept even
      with the burden of murder upon my soul!

      The second and the third day passed, and still my tormentor came
      not. Once again I breathed as a freeman. The monster, in terror,
      had fled the premises forever! I should behold it no more! My
      happiness was supreme! The guilt of my dark deed disturbed me but
      little. Some few inquiries had been made, but these had been
      readily answered. Even a search had been instituted—but of course
      nothing was to be discovered. I looked upon my future felicity as
      secured.

      Upon the fourth day of the assassination, a party of the police
      came, very unexpectedly, into the house, and proceeded again to
      make rigorous investigation of the premises. Secure, however, in
      the inscrutability of my place of concealment, I felt no
      embarrassment whatever. The officers bade me accompany them in
      their search. They left no nook or corner unexplored. At length,
      for the third or fourth time, they descended into the cellar. I
      quivered not in a muscle. My heart beat calmly as that of one who
      slumbers in innocence. I walked the cellar from end to end. I
      folded my arms upon my bosom, and roamed easily to and fro. The
      police were thoroughly satisfied and prepared to depart. The glee
      at my heart was too strong to be restrained. I burned to say if
      but one word, by way of triumph, and to render doubly sure their
      assurance of my guiltlessness.

      “Gentlemen,” I said at last, as the party ascended the steps, “I
      delight to have allayed your suspicions. I wish you all health,
      and a little more courtesy. By the bye, gentlemen, this—this is a
      very well-constructed house.” (In the rabid desire to say
      something easily, I scarcely knew what I uttered at all.)—“I may
      say an _excellently_ well-constructed house. These walls—are you
      going, gentlemen?—these walls are solidly put together;” and
      here, through the mere phrenzy of bravado, I rapped heavily, with
      a cane which I held in my hand, upon that very portion of the
      brick-work behind which stood the corpse of the wife of my bosom.

      But may God shield and deliver me from the fangs of the
      Arch-Fiend! No sooner had the reverberation of my blows sunk into
      silence, than I was answered by a voice from within the tomb!—by
      a cry, at first muffled and broken, like the sobbing of a child,
      and then quickly swelling into one long, loud, and continuous
      scream, utterly anomalous and inhuman—a howl—a wailing shriek,
      half of horror and half of triumph, such as might have arisen
      only out of hell, conjointly from the throats of the damned in
      their agony and of the demons that exult in the damnation.

      Of my own thoughts it is folly to speak. Swooning, I staggered to
      the opposite wall. For one instant the party upon the stairs
      remained motionless, through extremity of terror and of awe. In
      the next, a dozen stout arms were toiling at the wall. It fell
      bodily. The corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted with
      gore, stood erect before the eyes of the spectators. Upon its
      head, with red extended mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the
      hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder, and whose
      informing voice had consigned me to the hangman. I had walled the
      monster up within the tomb!




THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER


     Son cœur est un luth suspendu;
     Sitôt qu’on le touche il résonne..

—_De Béranger_.

      During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn
      of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the
      heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a
      singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself,
      as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the
      melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was—but, with the
      first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom
      pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the feeling was
      unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic,
      sentiment, with which the mind usually receives even the sternest
      natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the
      scene before me—upon the mere house, and the simple landscape
      features of the domain—upon the bleak walls—upon the vacant
      eye-like windows—upon a few rank sedges—and upon a few white
      trunks of decayed trees—with an utter depression of soul which I
      can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the
      after-dream of the reveller upon opium—the bitter lapse into
      everyday life—the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was an
      iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart—an unredeemed
      dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could
      torture into aught of the sublime. What was it—I paused to
      think—what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of the
      House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I
      grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I
      pondered. I was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactory
      conclusion, that while, beyond doubt, there _are_ combinations of
      very simple natural objects which have the power of thus
      affecting us, still the analysis of this power lies among
      considerations beyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected,
      that a mere different arrangement of the particulars of the
      scene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient to
      modify, or perhaps to annihilate its capacity for sorrowful
      impression; and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse to the
      precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled
      lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down—but with a shudder even
      more thrilling than before—upon the remodelled and inverted
      images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the
      vacant and eye-like windows.

      Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself a
      sojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick Usher, had been
      one of my boon companions in boyhood; but many years had elapsed
      since our last meeting. A letter, however, had lately reached me
      in a distant part of the country—a letter from him—which, in its
      wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a
      personal reply. The MS. gave evidence of nervous agitation. The
      writer spoke of acute bodily illness—of a mental disorder which
      oppressed him—and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best,
      and indeed his only personal friend, with a view of attempting,
      by the cheerfulness of my society, some alleviation of his
      malady. It was the manner in which all this, and much more, was
      said—it was the apparent _heart_ that went with his request—which
      allowed me no room for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyed
      forthwith what I still considered a very singular summons.

      Although, as boys, we had been even intimate associates, yet I
      really knew little of my friend. His reserve had been always
      excessive and habitual. I was aware, however, that his very
      ancient family had been noted, time out of mind, for a peculiar
      sensibility of temperament, displaying itself, through long ages,
      in many works of exalted art, and manifested, of late, in
      repeated deeds of munificent yet unobtrusive charity, as well as
      in a passionate devotion to the intricacies, perhaps even more
      than to the orthodox and easily recognisable beauties, of musical
      science. I had learned, too, the very remarkable fact, that the
      stem of the Usher race, all time-honored as it was, had put
      forth, at no period, any enduring branch; in other words, that
      the entire family lay in the direct line of descent, and had
      always, with very trifling and very temporary variation, so lain.
      It was this deficiency, I considered, while running over in
      thought the perfect keeping of the character of the premises with
      the accredited character of the people, and while speculating
      upon the possible influence which the one, in the long lapse of
      centuries, might have exercised upon the other—it was this
      deficiency, perhaps, of collateral issue, and the consequent
      undeviating transmission, from sire to son, of the patrimony with
      the name, which had, at length, so identified the two as to merge
      the original title of the estate in the quaint and equivocal
      appellation of the “House of Usher”—an appellation which seemed
      to include, in the minds of the peasantry who used it, both the
      family and the family mansion.

      I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish
      experiment—that of looking down within the tarn—had been to
      deepen the first singular impression. There can be no doubt that
      the consciousness of the rapid increase of my superstition—for
      why should I not so term it?—served mainly to accelerate the
      increase itself. Such, I have long known, is the paradoxical law
      of all sentiments having terror as a basis. And it might have
      been for this reason only, that, when I again uplifted my eyes to
      the house itself, from its image in the pool, there grew in my
      mind a strange fancy—a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that I but
      mention it to show the vivid force of the sensations which
      oppressed me. I had so worked upon my imagination as really to
      believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an
      atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity—an
      atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but
      which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the gray wall,
      and the silent tarn—a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish,
      faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.

      Shaking off from my spirit what _must_ have been a dream, I
      scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its
      principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity.
      The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi overspread
      the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the
      eaves. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary
      dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen; and there
      appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect
      adaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of the
      individual stones. In this there was much that reminded me of the
      specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long
      years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the
      breath of the external air. Beyond this indication of extensive
      decay, however, the fabric gave little token of instability.
      Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered
      a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of
      the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag
      direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.

      Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the house.
      A servant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the Gothic
      archway of the hall. A valet, of stealthy step, thence conducted
      me, in silence, through many dark and intricate passages in my
      progress to the _studio_ of his master. Much that I encountered
      on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague
      sentiments of which I have already spoken. While the objects
      around me—while the carvings of the ceilings, the sombre
      tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors, and
      the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I strode,
      were but matters to which, or to such as which, I had been
      accustomed from my infancy—while I hesitated not to acknowledge
      how familiar was all this—I still wondered to find how unfamiliar
      were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring up. On one
      of the staircases, I met the physician of the family. His
      countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning
      and perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation and passed on.
      The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence
      of his master.

      The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty. The
      windows were long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a distance
      from the black oaken floor as to be altogether inaccessible from
      within. Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their way through
      the trellissed panes, and served to render sufficiently distinct
      the more prominent objects around; the eye, however, struggled in
      vain to reach the remoter angles of the chamber, or the recesses
      of the vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies hung upon the
      walls. The general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique,
      and tattered. Many books and musical instruments lay scattered
      about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene. I felt that
      I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and
      irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all.

      Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had been
      lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth
      which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone
      cordiality—of the constrained effort of the _ennuyé_ man of the
      world. A glance, however, at his countenance, convinced me of his
      perfect sincerity. We sat down; and for some moments, while he
      spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of
      awe. Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so
      brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It was with difficulty
      that I could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan being
      before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet the
      character of his face had been at all times remarkable. A
      cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous
      beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a
      surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model,
      but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a
      finely moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a
      want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and
      tenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the
      regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not
      easily to be forgotten. And now in the mere exaggeration of the
      prevailing character of these features, and of the expression
      they were wont to convey, lay so much of change that I doubted to
      whom I spoke. The now ghastly pallor of the skin, and the now
      miraculous lustre of the eye, above all things startled and even
      awed me. The silken hair, too, had been suffered to grow all
      unheeded, and as, in its wild gossamer texture, it floated rather
      than fell about the face, I could not, even with effort, connect
      its Arabesque expression with any idea of simple humanity.

      In the manner of my friend I was at once struck with an
      incoherence—an inconsistency; and I soon found this to arise from
      a series of feeble and futile struggles to overcome an habitual
      trepidancy—an excessive nervous agitation. For something of this
      nature I had indeed been prepared, no less by his letter, than by
      reminiscences of certain boyish traits, and by conclusions
      deduced from his peculiar physical conformation and temperament.
      His action was alternately vivacious and sullen. His voice varied
      rapidly from a tremulous indecision (when the animal spirits
      seemed utterly in abeyance) to that species of energetic
      concision—that abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding
      enunciation—that leaden, self-balanced and perfectly modulated
      guttural utterance, which may be observed in the lost drunkard,
      or the irreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods of his
      most intense excitement.

      It was thus that he spoke of the object of my visit, of his
      earnest desire to see me, and of the solace he expected me to
      afford him. He entered, at some length, into what he conceived to
      be the nature of his malady. It was, he said, a constitutional
      and a family evil, and one for which he despaired to find a
      remedy—a mere nervous affection, he immediately added, which
      would undoubtedly soon pass off. It displayed itself in a host of
      unnatural sensations. Some of these, as he detailed them,
      interested and bewildered me; although, perhaps, the terms, and
      the general manner of the narration had their weight. He suffered
      much from a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food
      was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain
      texture; the odors of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were
      tortured by even a faint light; and there were but peculiar
      sounds, and these from stringed instruments, which did not
      inspire him with horror.

      To an anomalous species of terror I found him a bounden slave. “I
      shall perish,” said he, “I must perish in this deplorable folly.
      Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost. I dread the
      events of the future, not in themselves, but in their results. I
      shudder at the thought of any, even the most trivial, incident,
      which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of soul. I
      have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except in its absolute
      effect—in terror. In this unnerved—in this pitiable condition—I
      feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must
      abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim
      phantasm, FEAR.”

      I learned, moreover, at intervals, and through broken and
      equivocal hints, another singular feature of his mental
      condition. He was enchained by certain superstitious impressions
      in regard to the dwelling which he tenanted, and whence, for many
      years, he had never ventured forth—in regard to an influence
      whose supposititious force was conveyed in terms too shadowy here
      to be re-stated—an influence which some peculiarities in the mere
      form and substance of his family mansion, had, by dint of long
      sufferance, he said, obtained over his spirit—an effect which the
      _physique_ of the gray walls and turrets, and of the dim tarn
      into which they all looked down, had, at length, brought about
      upon the _morale_ of his existence.

      He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much of the
      peculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced to a more
      natural and far more palpable origin—to the severe and
      long-continued illness—indeed to the evidently approaching
      dissolution—of a tenderly beloved sister—his sole companion for
      long years—his last and only relative on earth. “Her decease,” he
      said, with a bitterness which I can never forget, “would leave
      him (him the hopeless and the frail) the last of the ancient race
      of the Ushers.” While he spoke, the lady Madeline (for so was she
      called) passed slowly through a remote portion of the apartment,
      and, without having noticed my presence, disappeared. I regarded
      her with an utter astonishment not unmingled with dread—and yet I
      found it impossible to account for such feelings. A sensation of
      stupor oppressed me, as my eyes followed her retreating steps.
      When a door, at length, closed upon her, my glance sought
      instinctively and eagerly the countenance of the brother—but he
      had buried his face in his hands, and I could only perceive that
      a far more than ordinary wanness had overspread the emaciated
      fingers through which trickled many passionate tears.

      The disease of the lady Madeline had long baffled the skill of
      her physicians. A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the
      person, and frequent although transient affections of a partially
      cataleptical character, were the unusual diagnosis. Hitherto she
      had steadily borne up against the pressure of her malady, and had
      not betaken herself finally to bed; but, on the closing in of the
      evening of my arrival at the house, she succumbed (as her brother
      told me at night with inexpressible agitation) to the prostrating
      power of the destroyer; and I learned that the glimpse I had
      obtained of her person would thus probably be the last I should
      obtain—that the lady, at least while living, would be seen by me
      no more.

      For several days ensuing, her name was unmentioned by either
      Usher or myself; and during this period I was busied in earnest
      endeavors to alleviate the melancholy of my friend. We painted
      and read together; or I listened, as if in a dream, to the wild
      improvisations of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a closer and
      still closer intimacy admitted me more unreservedly into the
      recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive the
      futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from which darkness,
      as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth upon all objects
      of the moral and physical universe, in one unceasing radiation of
      gloom.

      I shall ever bear about me a memory of the many solemn hours I
      thus spent alone with the master of the House of Usher. Yet I
      should fail in any attempt to convey an idea of the exact
      character of the studies, or of the occupations, in which he
      involved me, or led me the way. An excited and highly distempered
      ideality threw a sulphureous lustre over all. His long improvised
      dirges will ring forever in my ears. Among other things, I hold
      painfully in mind a certain singular perversion and amplification
      of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber. From the
      paintings over which his elaborate fancy brooded, and which grew,
      touch by touch, into vaguenesses at which I shuddered the more
      thrillingly, because I shuddered knowing not why—from these
      paintings (vivid as their images now are before me) I would in
      vain endeavor to educe more than a small portion which should lie
      within the compass of merely written words. By the utter
      simplicity, by the nakedness of his designs, he arrested and
      overawed attention. If ever mortal painted an idea, that mortal
      was Roderick Usher. For me at least—in the circumstances then
      surrounding me—there arose out of the pure abstractions which the
      hypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvass, an intensity
      of intolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever yet in the
      contemplation of the certainly glowing yet too concrete reveries
      of Fuseli.

      One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend, partaking not
      so rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be shadowed forth,
      although feebly, in words. A small picture presented the interior
      of an immensely long and rectangular vault or tunnel, with low
      walls, smooth, white, and without interruption or device. Certain
      accessory points of the design served well to convey the idea
      that this excavation lay at an exceeding depth below the surface
      of the earth. No outlet was observed in any portion of its vast
      extent, and no torch, or other artificial source of light was
      discernible; yet a flood of intense rays rolled throughout, and
      bathed the whole in a ghastly and inappropriate splendor.

      I have just spoken of that morbid condition of the auditory nerve
      which rendered all music intolerable to the sufferer, with the
      exception of certain effects of stringed instruments. It was,
      perhaps, the narrow limits to which he thus confined himself upon
      the guitar, which gave birth, in great measure, to the fantastic
      character of his performances. But the fervid _facility_ of his
      _impromptus_ could not be so accounted for. They must have been,
      and were, in the notes, as well as in the words of his wild
      fantasias (for he not unfrequently accompanied himself with
      rhymed verbal improvisations), the result of that intense mental
      collectedness and concentration to which I have previously
      alluded as observable only in particular moments of the highest
      artificial excitement. The words of one of these rhapsodies I
      have easily remembered. I was, perhaps, the more forcibly
      impressed with it, as he gave it, because, in the under or mystic
      current of its meaning, I fancied that I perceived, and for the
      first time, a full consciousness on the part of Usher of the
      tottering of his lofty reason upon her throne. The verses, which
      were entitled “The Haunted Palace,” ran very nearly, if not
      accurately, thus:

                        I.
     In the greenest of our valleys,
    By good angels tenanted,
     Once a fair and stately palace—
    Radiant palace—reared its head.
     In the monarch Thought’s dominion—
    It stood there!
     Never seraph spread a pinion
    Over fabric half so fair.

                        II.
     Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
    On its roof did float and flow;
     (This—all this—was in the olden
    Time long ago)
     And every gentle air that dallied,
    In that sweet day,
     Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
    A winged odor went away.

                        III.
     Wanderers in that happy valley
    Through two luminous windows saw
     Spirits moving musically
    To a lute’s well-tunéd law,
     Round about a throne, where sitting
    (Porphyrogene!)
     In state his glory well befitting,
    The ruler of the realm was seen.

                        IV.
     And all with pearl and ruby glowing
    Was the fair palace door,
     Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
    And sparkling evermore,
     A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty
    Was but to sing,
     In voices of surpassing beauty,
    The wit and wisdom of their king.

                        V.
     But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
    Assailed the monarch’s high estate;
     (Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
    Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)
     And, round about his home, the glory
    That blushed and bloomed
     Is but a dim-remembered story
    Of the old time entombed.

                        VI.
     And travellers now within that valley,
    Through the red-litten windows, see
     Vast forms that move fantastically
    To a discordant melody;
     While, like a rapid ghastly river,
    Through the pale door,
     A hideous throng rush out forever,
    And laugh—but smile no more.

      I well remember that suggestions arising from this ballad, led us
      into a train of thought wherein there became manifest an opinion
      of Usher’s which I mention not so much on account of its novelty,
      (for other men * have thought thus,) as on account of the
      pertinacity with which he maintained it. This opinion, in its
      general form, was that of the sentience of all vegetable things.
      But, in his disordered fancy, the idea had assumed a more daring
      character, and trespassed, under certain conditions, upon the
      kingdom of inorganization. I lack words to express the full
      extent, or the earnest _abandon_ of his persuasion. The belief,
      however, was connected (as I have previously hinted) with the
      gray stones of the home of his forefathers. The conditions of the
      sentience had been here, he imagined, fulfilled in the method of
      collocation of these stones—in the order of their arrangement, as
      well as in that of the many _fungi_ which overspread them, and of
      the decayed trees which stood around—above all, in the long
      undisturbed endurance of this arrangement, and in its
      reduplication in the still waters of the tarn. Its evidence—the
      evidence of the sentience—was to be seen, he said, (and I here
      started as he spoke,) in the gradual yet certain condensation of
      an atmosphere of their own about the waters and the walls. The
      result was discoverable, he added, in that silent, yet
      importunate and terrible influence which for centuries had
      moulded the destinies of his family, and which made _him_ what I
      now saw him—what he was. Such opinions need no comment, and I
      will make none.

      * Watson, Dr. Percival, Spallanzani, and especially the Bishop of
      Landaff.—See “Chemical Essays,” vol v.

      Our books—the books which, for years, had formed no small portion
      of the mental existence of the invalid—were, as might be
      supposed, in strict keeping with this character of phantasm. We
      pored together over such works as the Ververt et Chartreuse of
      Gresset; the Belphegor of Machiavelli; the Heaven and Hell of
      Swedenborg; the Subterranean Voyage of Nicholas Klimm by Holberg;
      the Chiromancy of Robert Flud, of Jean D’Indaginé, and of De la
      Chambre; the Journey into the Blue Distance of Tieck; and the
      City of the Sun of Campanella. One favorite volume was a small
      octavo edition of the _Directorium Inquisitorium_, by the
      Dominican Eymeric de Gironne; and there were passages in
      Pomponius Mela, about the old African Satyrs and OEgipans, over
      which Usher would sit dreaming for hours. His chief delight,
      however, was found in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and
      curious book in quarto Gothic—the manual of a forgotten
      church—the _Vigiliae Mortuorum secundum Chorum Ecclesiae
      Maguntinae_.

      I could not help thinking of the wild ritual of this work, and of
      its probable influence upon the hypochondriac, when, one evening,
      having informed me abruptly that the lady Madeline was no more,
      he stated his intention of preserving her corpse for a fortnight,
      (previously to its final interment,) in one of the numerous
      vaults within the main walls of the building. The worldly reason,
      however, assigned for this singular proceeding, was one which I
      did not feel at liberty to dispute. The brother had been led to
      his resolution (so he told me) by consideration of the unusual
      character of the malady of the deceased, of certain obtrusive and
      eager inquiries on the part of her medical men, and of the remote
      and exposed situation of the burial-ground of the family. I will
      not deny that when I called to mind the sinister countenance of
      the person whom I met upon the staircase, on the day of my
      arrival at the house, I had no desire to oppose what I regarded
      as at best but a harmless, and by no means an unnatural,
      precaution.

      At the request of Usher, I personally aided him in the
      arrangements for the temporary entombment. The body having been
      encoffined, we two alone bore it to its rest. The vault in which
      we placed it (and which had been so long unopened that our
      torches, half smothered in its oppressive atmosphere, gave us
      little opportunity for investigation) was small, damp, and
      entirely without means of admission for light; lying, at great
      depth, immediately beneath that portion of the building in which
      was my own sleeping apartment. It had been used, apparently, in
      remote feudal times, for the worst purposes of a donjon-keep,
      and, in later days, as a place of deposit for powder, or some
      other highly combustible substance, as a portion of its floor,
      and the whole interior of a long archway through which we reached
      it, were carefully sheathed with copper. The door, of massive
      iron, had been, also, similarly protected. Its immense weight
      caused an unusually sharp grating sound, as it moved upon its
      hinges.

      Having deposited our mournful burden upon tressels within this
      region of horror, we partially turned aside the yet unscrewed lid
      of the coffin, and looked upon the face of the tenant. A striking
      similitude between the brother and sister now first arrested my
      attention; and Usher, divining, perhaps, my thoughts, murmured
      out some few words from which I learned that the deceased and
      himself had been twins, and that sympathies of a scarcely
      intelligible nature had always existed between them. Our glances,
      however, rested not long upon the dead—for we could not regard
      her unawed. The disease which had thus entombed the lady in the
      maturity of youth, had left, as usual in all maladies of a
      strictly cataleptical character, the mockery of a faint blush
      upon the bosom and the face, and that suspiciously lingering
      smile upon the lip which is so terrible in death. We replaced and
      screwed down the lid, and, having secured the door of iron, made
      our way, with toil, into the scarcely less gloomy apartments of
      the upper portion of the house.

      And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observable
      change came over the features of the mental disorder of my
      friend. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary
      occupations were neglected or forgotten. He roamed from chamber
      to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor
      of his countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly
      hue—but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone out. The
      once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a
      tremulous quaver, as if of extreme terror, habitually
      characterized his utterance. There were times, indeed, when I
      thought his unceasingly agitated mind was laboring with some
      oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled for the
      necessary courage. At times, again, I was obliged to resolve all
      into the mere inexplicable vagaries of madness, for I beheld him
      gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in an attitude of the
      profoundest attention, as if listening to some imaginary sound.
      It was no wonder that his condition terrified—that it infected
      me. I felt creeping upon me, by slow yet certain degrees, the
      wild influences of his own fantastic yet impressive
      superstitions.

      It was, especially, upon retiring to bed late in the night of the
      seventh or eighth day after the placing of the lady Madeline
      within the donjon, that I experienced the full power of such
      feelings. Sleep came not near my couch—while the hours waned and
      waned away. I struggled to reason off the nervousness which had
      dominion over me. I endeavored to believe that much, if not all
      of what I felt, was due to the bewildering influence of the
      gloomy furniture of the room—of the dark and tattered draperies,
      which, tortured into motion by the breath of a rising tempest,
      swayed fitfully to and fro upon the walls, and rustled uneasily
      about the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were fruitless.
      An irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame; and, at
      length, there sat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly
      causeless alarm. Shaking this off with a gasp and a struggle, I
      uplifted myself upon the pillows, and, peering earnestly within
      the intense darkness of the chamber, harkened—I know not why,
      except that an instinctive spirit prompted me—to certain low and
      indefinite sounds which came, through the pauses of the storm, at
      long intervals, I knew not whence. Overpowered by an intense
      sentiment of horror, unaccountable yet unendurable, I threw on my
      clothes with haste (for I felt that I should sleep no more during
      the night), and endeavored to arouse myself from the pitiable
      condition into which I had fallen, by pacing rapidly to and fro
      through the apartment.

      I had taken but few turns in this manner, when a light step on an
      adjoining staircase arrested my attention. I presently recognised
      it as that of Usher. In an instant afterward he rapped, with a
      gentle touch, at my door, and entered, bearing a lamp. His
      countenance was, as usual, cadaverously wan—but, moreover, there
      was a species of mad hilarity in his eyes—an evidently restrained
      _hysteria_ in his whole demeanor. His air appalled me—but
      anything was preferable to the solitude which I had so long
      endured, and I even welcomed his presence as a relief.

      “And you have not seen it?” he said abruptly, after having stared
      about him for some moments in silence—“you have not then seen
      it?—but, stay! you shall.” Thus speaking, and having carefully
      shaded his lamp, he hurried to one of the casements, and threw it
      freely open to the storm.

      The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our
      feet. It was, indeed, a tempestuous yet sternly beautiful night,
      and one wildly singular in its terror and its beauty. A whirlwind
      had apparently collected its force in our vicinity; for there
      were frequent and violent alterations in the direction of the
      wind; and the exceeding density of the clouds (which hung so low
      as to press upon the turrets of the house) did not prevent our
      perceiving the life-like velocity with which they flew careering
      from all points against each other, without passing away into the
      distance. I say that even their exceeding density did not prevent
      our perceiving this—yet we had no glimpse of the moon or
      stars—nor was there any flashing forth of the lightning. But the
      under surfaces of the huge masses of agitated vapor, as well as
      all terrestrial objects immediately around us, were glowing in
      the unnatural light of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible
      gaseous exhalation which hung about and enshrouded the mansion.

      “You must not—you shall not behold this!” said I, shudderingly,
      to Usher, as I led him, with a gentle violence, from the window
      to a seat. “These appearances, which bewilder you, are merely
      electrical phenomena not uncommon—or it may be that they have
      their ghastly origin in the rank miasma of the tarn. Let us close
      this casement;—the air is chilling and dangerous to your frame.
      Here is one of your favorite romances. I will read, and you shall
      listen;—and so we will pass away this terrible night together.”

      The antique volume which I had taken up was the “Mad Trist” of
      Sir Launcelot Canning; but I had called it a favorite of Usher’s
      more in sad jest than in earnest; for, in truth, there is little
      in its uncouth and unimaginative prolixity which could have had
      interest for the lofty and spiritual ideality of my friend. It
      was, however, the only book immediately at hand; and I indulged a
      vague hope that the excitement which now agitated the
      hypochondriac, might find relief (for the history of mental
      disorder is full of similar anomalies) even in the extremeness of
      the folly which I should read. Could I have judged, indeed, by
      the wild overstrained air of vivacity with which he harkened, or
      apparently harkened, to the words of the tale, I might well have
      congratulated myself upon the success of my design.

      I had arrived at that well-known portion of the story where
      Ethelred, the hero of the Trist, having sought in vain for
      peaceable admission into the dwelling of the hermit, proceeds to
      make good an entrance by force. Here, it will be remembered, the
      words of the narrative run thus:

      “And Ethelred, who was by nature of a doughty heart, and who was
      now mighty withal, on account of the powerfulness of the wine
      which he had drunken, waited no longer to hold parley with the
      hermit, who, in sooth, was of an obstinate and maliceful turn,
      but, feeling the rain upon his shoulders, and fearing the rising
      of the tempest, uplifted his mace outright, and, with blows, made
      quickly room in the plankings of the door for his gauntleted
      hand; and now pulling therewith sturdily, he so cracked, and
      ripped, and tore all asunder, that the noise of the dry and
      hollow-sounding wood alarummed and reverberated throughout the
      forest.”

      At the termination of this sentence I started, and for a moment,
      paused; for it appeared to me (although I at once concluded that
      my excited fancy had deceived me)—it appeared to me that, from
      some very remote portion of the mansion, there came,
      indistinctly, to my ears, what might have been, in its exact
      similarity of character, the echo (but a stifled and dull one
      certainly) of the very cracking and ripping sound which Sir
      Launcelot had so particularly described. It was, beyond doubt,
      the coincidence alone which had arrested my attention; for, amid
      the rattling of the sashes of the casements, and the ordinary
      commingled noises of the still increasing storm, the sound, in
      itself, had nothing, surely, which should have interested or
      disturbed me. I continued the story:

      “But the good champion Ethelred, now entering within the door,
      was sore enraged and amazed to perceive no signal of the
      maliceful hermit; but, in the stead thereof, a dragon of a scaly
      and prodigious demeanor, and of a fiery tongue, which sate in
      guard before a palace of gold, with a floor of silver; and upon
      the wall there hung a shield of shining brass with this legend
      enwritten—

     Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath bin;
     Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win;

      And Ethelred uplifted his mace, and struck upon the head of the
      dragon, which fell before him, and gave up his pesty breath, with
      a shriek so horrid and harsh, and withal so piercing, that
      Ethelred had fain to close his ears with his hands against the
      dreadful noise of it, the like whereof was never before heard.”

      Here again I paused abruptly, and now with a feeling of wild
      amazement—for there could be no doubt whatever that, in this
      instance, I did actually hear (although from what direction it
      proceeded I found it impossible to say) a low and apparently
      distant, but harsh, protracted, and most unusual screaming or
      grating sound—the exact counterpart of what my fancy had already
      conjured up for the dragon’s unnatural shriek as described by the
      romancer.

      Oppressed, as I certainly was, upon the occurrence of this second
      and most extraordinary coincidence, by a thousand conflicting
      sensations, in which wonder and extreme terror were predominant,
      I still retained sufficient presence of mind to avoid exciting,
      by any observation, the sensitive nervousness of my companion. I
      was by no means certain that he had noticed the sounds in
      question; although, assuredly, a strange alteration had, during
      the last few minutes, taken place in his demeanor. From a
      position fronting my own, he had gradually brought round his
      chair, so as to sit with his face to the door of the chamber; and
      thus I could but partially perceive his features, although I saw
      that his lips trembled as if he were murmuring inaudibly. His
      head had dropped upon his breast—yet I knew that he was not
      asleep, from the wide and rigid opening of the eye as I caught a
      glance of it in profile. The motion of his body, too, was at
      variance with this idea—for he rocked from side to side with a
      gentle yet constant and uniform sway. Having rapidly taken notice
      of all this, I resumed the narrative of Sir Launcelot, which thus
      proceeded:

      “And now, the champion, having escaped from the terrible fury of
      the dragon, bethinking himself of the brazen shield, and of the
      breaking up of the enchantment which was upon it, removed the
      carcass from out of the way before him, and approached valorously
      over the silver pavement of the castle to where the shield was
      upon the wall; which in sooth tarried not for his full coming,
      but fell down at his feet upon the silver floor, with a mighty
      great and terrible ringing sound.”

      No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than—as if a shield
      of brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon a floor
      of silver—I became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic, and
      clangorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely
      unnerved, I leaped to my feet; but the measured rocking movement
      of Usher was undisturbed. I rushed to the chair in which he sat.
      His eyes were bent fixedly before him, and throughout his whole
      countenance there reigned a stony rigidity. But, as I placed my
      hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shudder over his
      whole person; a sickly smile quivered about his lips; and I saw
      that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering murmur, as if
      unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over him, I at length
      drank in the hideous import of his words.

      “Not hear it?—yes, I hear it, and _have_ heard it.
      Long—long—long—many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard
      it—yet I dared not—oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!—I
      dared not—I _dared_ not speak! _We have put her living in the
      tomb!_ Said I not that my senses were acute? I _now_ tell you
      that I heard her first feeble movements in the hollow coffin. I
      heard them—many, many days ago—yet I dared not—_I dared not
      speak!_ And now—to-night—Ethelred—ha! ha!—the breaking of the
      hermit’s door, and the death-cry of the dragon, and the clangor
      of the shield!—say, rather, the rending of her coffin, and the
      grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her struggles
      within the coppered archway of the vault! Oh whither shall I fly?
      Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurrying to upbraid me for
      my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the stair? Do I not
      distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart?
      Madman!”—here he sprang furiously to his feet, and shrieked out
      his syllables, as if in the effort he were giving up his
      soul—“_Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the door!_”

      As if in the superhuman energy of his utterance there had been
      found the potency of a spell—the huge antique pannels to which
      the speaker pointed, threw slowly back, upon the instant, their
      ponderous and ebony jaws. It was the work of the rushing gust—but
      then without those doors there _did_ stand the lofty and
      enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher. There was blood
      upon her white robes, and the evidence of some bitter struggle
      upon every portion of her emaciated frame. For a moment she
      remained trembling and reeling to and fro upon the
      threshold—then, with a low moaning cry, fell heavily inward upon
      the person of her brother, and in her violent and now final
      death-agonies, bore him to the floor a corpse, and a victim to
      the terrors he had anticipated.

      From that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast. The
      storm was still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself
      crossing the old causeway. Suddenly there shot along the path a
      wild light, and I turned to see whence a gleam so unusual could
      have issued; for the vast house and its shadows were alone behind
      me. The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-red
      moon, which now shone vividly through that once
      barely-discernible fissure, of which I have before spoken as
      extending from the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction,
      to the base. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened—there
      came a fierce breath of the whirlwind—the entire orb of the
      satellite burst at once upon my sight—my brain reeled as I saw
      the mighty walls rushing asunder—there was a long tumultuous
      shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters—and the deep
      and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the
      fragments of the “_House of Usher_.”




SILENCE—A FABLE


     “The mountain pinnacles slumber; valleys, crags and caves _are
     silent_.”

      “Listen to me,” said the Demon as he placed his hand upon my
      head. “The region of which I speak is a dreary region in Libya,
      by the borders of the river Zaire. And there is no quiet there,
      nor silence.

      “The waters of the river have a saffron and sickly hue; and they
      flow not onwards to the sea, but palpitate forever and forever
      beneath the red eye of the sun with a tumultuous and convulsive
      motion. For many miles on either side of the river’s oozy bed is
      a pale desert of gigantic water-lilies. They sigh one unto the
      other in that solitude, and stretch towards the heaven their long
      and ghastly necks, and nod to and fro their everlasting heads.
      And there is an indistinct murmur which cometh out from among
      them like the rushing of subterrene water. And they sigh one unto
      the other.

      “But there is a boundary to their realm—the boundary of the dark,
      horrible, lofty forest. There, like the waves about the Hebrides,
      the low underwood is agitated continually. But there is no wind
      throughout the heaven. And the tall primeval trees rock eternally
      hither and thither with a crashing and mighty sound. And from
      their high summits, one by one, drop everlasting dews. And at the
      roots strange poisonous flowers lie writhing in perturbed
      slumber. And overhead, with a rustling and loud noise, the gray
      clouds rush westwardly forever, until they roll, a cataract, over
      the fiery wall of the horizon. But there is no wind throughout
      the heaven. And by the shores of the river Zaire there is neither
      quiet nor silence.

      “It was night, and the rain fell; and falling, it was rain, but,
      having fallen, it was blood. And I stood in the morass among the
      tall and the rain fell upon my head—and the lilies sighed one
      unto the other in the solemnity of their desolation.

      “And, all at once, the moon arose through the thin ghastly mist,
      and was crimson in color. And mine eyes fell upon a huge gray
      rock which stood by the shore of the river, and was lighted by
      the light of the moon. And the rock was gray, and ghastly, and
      tall,—and the rock was gray. Upon its front were characters
      engraven in the stone; and I walked through the morass of
      water-lilies, until I came close unto the shore, that I might
      read the characters upon the stone. But I could not decypher
      them. And I was going back into the morass, when the moon shone
      with a fuller red, and I turned and looked again upon the rock,
      and upon the characters, and the characters were DESOLATION.

      “And I looked upwards, and there stood a man upon the summit of
      the rock; and I hid myself among the water-lilies that I might
      discover the actions of the man. And the man was tall and stately
      in form, and was wrapped up from his shoulders to his feet in the
      toga of old Rome. And the outlines of his figure were
      indistinct—but his features were the features of a deity; for the
      mantle of the night, and of the mist, and of the moon, and of the
      dew, had left uncovered the features of his face. And his brow
      was lofty with thought, and his eye wild with care; and, in the
      few furrows upon his cheek I read the fables of sorrow, and
      weariness, and disgust with mankind, and a longing after
      solitude.

      “And the man sat upon the rock, and leaned his head upon his
      hand, and looked out upon the desolation. He looked down into the
      low unquiet shrubbery, and up into the tall primeval trees, and
      up higher at the rustling heaven, and into the crimson moon. And
      I lay close within shelter of the lilies, and observed the
      actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude;—but the
      night waned, and he sat upon the rock.

      “And the man turned his attention from the heaven, and looked out
      upon the dreary river Zaire, and upon the yellow ghastly waters,
      and upon the pale legions of the water-lilies. And the man
      listened to the sighs of the water-lilies, and to the murmur that
      came up from among them. And I lay close within my covert and
      observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the
      solitude;—but the night waned and he sat upon the rock.

      “Then I went down into the recesses of the morass, and waded afar
      in among the wilderness of the lilies, and called unto the
      hippopotami which dwelt among the fens in the recesses of the
      morass. And the hippopotami heard my call, and came, with the
      behemoth, unto the foot of the rock, and roared loudly and
      fearfully beneath the moon. And I lay close within my covert and
      observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the
      solitude;—but the night waned and he sat upon the rock.

      “Then I cursed the elements with the curse of tumult; and a
      frightful tempest gathered in the heaven where, before, there had
      been no wind. And the heaven became livid with the violence of
      the tempest—and the rain beat upon the head of the man—and the
      floods of the river came down—and the river was tormented into
      foam—and the water-lilies shrieked within their beds—and the
      forest crumbled before the wind—and the thunder rolled—and the
      lightning fell—and the rock rocked to its foundation. And I lay
      close within my covert and observed the actions of the man. And
      the man trembled in the solitude;—but the night waned and he sat
      upon the rock.

      “Then I grew angry and cursed, with the curse of silence, the
      river, and the lilies, and the wind, and the forest, and the
      heaven, and the thunder, and the sighs of the water-lilies. And
      they became accursed, and were still. And the moon ceased to
      totter up its pathway to heaven—and the thunder died away—and the
      lightning did not flash—and the clouds hung motionless—and the
      waters sunk to their level and remained—and the trees ceased to
      rock—and the water-lilies sighed no more—and the murmur was heard
      no longer from among them, nor any shadow of sound throughout the
      vast illimitable desert. And I looked upon the characters of the
      rock, and they were changed; and the characters were SILENCE.

      “And mine eyes fell upon the countenance of the man, and his
      countenance was wan with terror. And, hurriedly, he raised his
      head from his hand, and stood forth upon the rock and listened.
      But there was no voice throughout the vast illimitable desert,
      and the characters upon the rock were SILENCE. And the man
      shuddered, and turned his face away, and fled afar off, in haste,
      so that I beheld him no more.”

      Now there are fine tales in the volumes of the Magi—in the
      iron-bound, melancholy volumes of the Magi. Therein, I say, are
      glorious histories of the Heaven, and of the Earth, and of the
      mighty sea—and of the Genii that over-ruled the sea, and the
      earth, and the lofty heaven. There was much lore too in the
      sayings which were said by the Sybils; and holy, holy things were
      heard of old by the dim leaves that trembled around Dodona—but,
      as Allah liveth, that fable which the Demon told me as he sat by
      my side in the shadow of the tomb, I hold to be the most
      wonderful of all! And as the Demon made an end of his story, he
      fell back within the cavity of the tomb and laughed. And I could
      not laugh with the Demon, and he cursed me because I could not
      laugh. And the lynx which dwelleth forever in the tomb, came out
      therefrom, and lay down at the feet of the Demon, and looked at
      him steadily in the face.




THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH.


      The “Red Death” had long devastated the country. No pestilence
      had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and
      its seal—the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp
      pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the
      pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and
      especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which
      shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his
      fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress and termination of
      the disease, were the incidents of half an hour.

      But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious.
      When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his
      presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the
      knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the
      deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys. This was an
      extensive and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince’s
      own eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty wall girdled
      it in. This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers, having
      entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts.
      They resolved to leave means neither of ingress or egress to the
      sudden impulses of despair or of frenzy from within. The abbey
      was amply provisioned. With such precautions the courtiers might
      bid defiance to contagion. The external world could take care of
      itself. In the meantime it was folly to grieve, or to think. The
      prince had provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were
      buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers,
      there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. All these
      and security were within. Without was the “Red Death.”

      It was toward the close of the fifth or sixth month of his
      seclusion, and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad,
      that the Prince Prospero entertained his thousand friends at a
      masked ball of the most unusual magnificence.

      It was a voluptuous scene, that masquerade. But first let me tell
      of the rooms in which it was held. There were seven—an imperial
      suite. In many palaces, however, such suites form a long and
      straight vista, while the folding doors slide back nearly to the
      walls on either hand, so that the view of the whole extent is
      scarcely impeded. Here the case was very different; as might have
      been expected from the duke’s love of the bizarre. The apartments
      were so irregularly disposed that the vision embraced but little
      more than one at a time. There was a sharp turn at every twenty
      or thirty yards, and at each turn a novel effect. To the right
      and left, in the middle of each wall, a tall and narrow Gothic
      window looked out upon a closed corridor which pursued the
      windings of the suite. These windows were of stained glass whose
      color varied in accordance with the prevailing hue of the
      decorations of the chamber into which it opened. That at the
      eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue—and vividly blue
      were its windows. The second chamber was purple in its ornaments
      and tapestries, and here the panes were purple. The third was
      green throughout, and so were the casements. The fourth was
      furnished and lighted with orange—the fifth with white—the sixth
      with violet. The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black
      velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the
      walls, falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material
      and hue. But in this chamber only, the color of the windows
      failed to correspond with the decorations. The panes here were
      scarlet—a deep blood color. Now in no one of the seven apartments
      was there any lamp or candelabrum, amid the profusion of golden
      ornaments that lay scattered to and fro or depended from the
      roof. There was no light of any kind emanating from lamp or
      candle within the suite of chambers. But in the corridors that
      followed the suite, there stood, opposite to each window, a heavy
      tripod, bearing a brazier of fire that projected its rays through
      the tinted glass and so glaringly illumined the room. And thus
      were produced a multitude of gaudy and fantastic appearances. But
      in the western or black chamber the effect of the fire-light that
      streamed upon the dark hangings through the blood-tinted panes,
      was ghastly in the extreme, and produced so wild a look upon the
      countenances of those who entered, that there were few of the
      company bold enough to set foot within its precincts at all.

      It was in this apartment, also, that there stood against the
      western wall, a gigantic clock of ebony. Its pendulum swung to
      and fro with a dull, heavy, monotonous clang; and when the
      minute-hand made the circuit of the face, and the hour was to be
      stricken, there came from the brazen lungs of the clock a sound
      which was clear and loud and deep and exceedingly musical, but of
      so peculiar a note and emphasis that, at each lapse of an hour,
      the musicians of the orchestra were constrained to pause,
      momentarily, in their performance, to hearken to the sound; and
      thus the waltzers perforce ceased their evolutions; and there was
      a brief disconcert of the whole gay company; and, while the
      chimes of the clock yet rang, it was observed that the giddiest
      grew pale, and the more aged and sedate passed their hands over
      their brows as if in confused reverie or meditation. But when the
      echoes had fully ceased, a light laughter at once pervaded the
      assembly; the musicians looked at each other and smiled as if at
      their own nervousness and folly, and made whispering vows, each
      to the other, that the next chiming of the clock should produce
      in them no similar emotion; and then, after the lapse of sixty
      minutes (which embrace three thousand and six hundred seconds of
      the Time that flies), there came yet another chiming of the
      clock, and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and
      meditation as before.

      But, in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent
      revel. The tastes of the duke were peculiar. He had a fine eye
      for colors and effects. He disregarded the decora of mere
      fashion. His plans were bold and fiery, and his conceptions
      glowed with barbaric lustre. There are some who would have
      thought him mad. His followers felt that he was not. It was
      necessary to hear and see and touch him to be sure that he was
      not.

      He had directed, in great part, the moveable embellishments of
      the seven chambers, upon occasion of this great fête; and it was
      his own guiding taste which had given character to the
      masqueraders. Be sure they were grotesque. There were much glare
      and glitter and piquancy and phantasm—much of what has been since
      seen in “Hernani.” There were arabesque figures with unsuited
      limbs and appointments. There were delirious fancies such as the
      madman fashions. There was much of the beautiful, much of the
      wanton, much of the bizarre, something of the terrible, and not a
      little of that which might have excited disgust. To and fro in
      the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a multitude of dreams.
      And these—the dreams—writhed in and about, taking hue from the
      rooms, and causing the wild music of the orchestra to seem as the
      echo of their steps. And, anon, there strikes the ebony clock
      which stands in the hall of the velvet. And then, for a moment,
      all is still, and all is silent save the voice of the clock. The
      dreams are stiff-frozen as they stand. But the echoes of the
      chime die away—they have endured but an instant—and a light,
      half-subdued laughter floats after them as they depart. And now
      again the music swells, and the dreams live, and writhe to and
      fro more merrily than ever, taking hue from the many-tinted
      windows through which stream the rays from the tripods. But to
      the chamber which lies most westwardly of the seven, there are
      now none of the maskers who venture; for the night is waning
      away; and there flows a ruddier light through the blood-colored
      panes; and the blackness of the sable drapery appals; and to him
      whose foot falls upon the sable carpet, there comes from the near
      clock of ebony a muffled peal more solemnly emphatic than any
      which reaches their ears who indulge in the more remote gaieties
      of the other apartments.

      But these other apartments were densely crowded, and in them beat
      feverishly the heart of life. And the revel went whirlingly on,
      until at length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the
      clock. And then the music ceased, as I have told; and the
      evolutions of the waltzers were quieted; and there was an uneasy
      cessation of all things as before. But now there were twelve
      strokes to be sounded by the bell of the clock; and thus it
      happened, perhaps, that more of thought crept, with more of time,
      into the meditations of the thoughtful among those who revelled.
      And thus, too, it happened, perhaps, that before the last echoes
      of the last chime had utterly sunk into silence, there were many
      individuals in the crowd who had found leisure to become aware of
      the presence of a masked figure which had arrested the attention
      of no single individual before. And the rumor of this new
      presence having spread itself whisperingly around, there arose at
      length from the whole company a buzz, or murmur, expressive of
      disapprobation and surprise—then, finally, of terror, of horror,
      and of disgust.

      In an assembly of phantasms such as I have painted, it may well
      be supposed that no ordinary appearance could have excited such
      sensation. In truth the masquerade license of the night was
      nearly unlimited; but the figure in question had out-Heroded
      Herod, and gone beyond the bounds of even the prince’s indefinite
      decorum. There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless
      which cannot be touched without emotion. Even with the utterly
      lost, to whom life and death are equally jests, there are matters
      of which no jest can be made. The whole company, indeed, seemed
      now deeply to feel that in the costume and bearing of the
      stranger neither wit nor propriety existed. The figure was tall
      and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of
      the grave. The mask which concealed the visage was made so nearly
      to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse that the
      closest scrutiny must have had difficulty in detecting the cheat.
      And yet all this might have been endured, if not approved, by the
      mad revellers around. But the mummer had gone so far as to assume
      the type of the Red Death. His vesture was dabbled in blood—and
      his broad brow, with all the features of the face, was
      besprinkled with the scarlet horror.

      When the eyes of Prince Prospero fell upon this spectral image
      (which with a slow and solemn movement, as if more fully to
      sustain its role, stalked to and fro among the waltzers) he was
      seen to be convulsed, in the first moment with a strong shudder
      either of terror or distaste; but, in the next, his brow reddened
      with rage.

      “Who dares?” he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers who stood near
      him—“who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? Seize him
      and unmask him—that we may know whom we have to hang at sunrise,
      from the battlements!”

      It was in the eastern or blue chamber in which stood the Prince
      Prospero as he uttered these words. They rang throughout the
      seven rooms loudly and clearly—for the prince was a bold and
      robust man, and the music had become hushed at the waving of his
      hand.

      It was in the blue room where stood the prince, with a group of
      pale courtiers by his side. At first, as he spoke, there was a
      slight rushing movement of this group in the direction of the
      intruder, who at the moment was also near at hand, and now, with
      deliberate and stately step, made closer approach to the speaker.
      But from a certain nameless awe with which the mad assumptions of
      the mummer had inspired the whole party, there were found none
      who put forth hand to seize him; so that, unimpeded, he passed
      within a yard of the prince’s person; and, while the vast
      assembly, as if with one impulse, shrank from the centres of the
      rooms to the walls, he made his way uninterruptedly, but with the
      same solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from
      the first, through the blue chamber to the purple—through the
      purple to the green—through the green to the orange—through this
      again to the white—and even thence to the violet, ere a decided
      movement had been made to arrest him. It was then, however, that
      the Prince Prospero, maddening with rage and the shame of his own
      momentary cowardice, rushed hurriedly through the six chambers,
      while none followed him on account of a deadly terror that had
      seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and had
      approached, in rapid impetuosity, to within three or four feet of
      the retreating figure, when the latter, having attained the
      extremity of the velvet apartment, turned suddenly and confronted
      his pursuer. There was a sharp cry—and the dagger dropped
      gleaming upon the sable carpet, upon which, instantly afterwards,
      fell prostrate in death the Prince Prospero. Then, summoning the
      wild courage of despair, a throng of the revellers at once threw
      themselves into the black apartment, and, seizing the mummer,
      whose tall figure stood erect and motionless within the shadow of
      the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror at finding the
      grave-cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled with so
      violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.

      And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had
      come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the
      revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died
      each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the
      ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the
      flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red
      Death held illimitable dominion over all.




THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO.


      The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could;
      but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge. You, who so
      well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that
      I gave utterance to a threat. _At length_ I would be avenged;
      this was a point definitively settled—but the very definitiveness
      with which it was resolved, precluded the idea of risk. I must
      not only punish, but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed
      when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally
      unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such
      to him who has done the wrong.

      It must be understood, that neither by word nor deed had I given
      Fortunato cause to doubt my good will. I continued, as was my
      wont, to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile
      _now_ was at the thought of his immolation.

      He had a weak point—this Fortunato—although in other regards he
      was a man to be respected and even feared. He prided himself on
      his connoisseurship in wine. Few Italians have the true virtuoso
      spirit. For the most part their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the
      time and opportunity—to practise imposture upon the British and
      Austrian _millionaires_. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like
      his countrymen, was a quack—but in the matter of old wines he was
      sincere. In this respect I did not differ from him materially: I
      was skilful in the Italian vintages myself, and bought largely
      whenever I could.

      It was about dusk, one evening during the supreme madness of the
      carnival season, that I encountered my friend. He accosted me
      with excessive warmth, for he had been drinking much. The man
      wore motley. He had on a tight-fitting parti-striped dress, and
      his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells. I was so
      pleased to see him, that I thought I should never have done
      wringing his hand.

      I said to him: “My dear Fortunato, you are luckily met. How
      remarkably well you are looking to-day! But I have received a
      pipe of what passes for Amontillado, and I have my doubts.”

      “How?” said he. “Amontillado? A pipe? Impossible! And in the
      middle of the carnival!”

      “I have my doubts,” I replied; “and I was silly enough to pay the
      full Amontillado price without consulting you in the matter. You
      were not to be found, and I was fearful of losing a bargain.”

      “Amontillado!”

      “I have my doubts.”

      “Amontillado!”

      “And I must satisfy them.”

      “Amontillado!”

      “As you are engaged, I am on my way to Luchesi. If any one has a
      critical turn, it is he. He will tell me—”

      “Luchesi cannot tell Amontillado from Sherry.”

      “And yet some fools will have it that his taste is a match for
      your own.”

      “Come, let us go.”

      “Whither?”

      “To your vaults.”

      “My friend, no; I will not impose upon your good nature. I
      perceive you have an engagement. Luchesi—”

      “I have no engagement;—come.”

      “My friend, no. It is not the engagement, but the severe cold
      with which I perceive you are afflicted. The vaults are
      insufferably damp. They are encrusted with nitre.”

      “Let us go, nevertheless. The cold is merely nothing.
      Amontillado! You have been imposed upon. And as for Luchesi, he
      cannot distinguish Sherry from Amontillado.”

      Thus speaking, Fortunato possessed himself of my arm. Putting on
      a mask of black silk, and drawing a _roquelaire_ closely about my
      person, I suffered him to hurry me to my palazzo.

      There were no attendants at home; they had absconded to make
      merry in honor of the time. I had told them that I should not
      return until the morning, and had given them explicit orders not
      to stir from the house. These orders were sufficient, I well
      knew, to insure their immediate disappearance, one and all, as
      soon as my back was turned.

      I took from their sconces two flambeaux, and giving one to
      Fortunato, bowed him through several suites of rooms to the
      archway that led into the vaults. I passed down a long and
      winding staircase, requesting him to be cautious as he followed.
      We came at length to the foot of the descent, and stood together
      on the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montresors.

      The gait of my friend was unsteady, and the bells upon his cap
      jingled as he strode.

      “The pipe,” said he.

      “It is farther on,” said I; “but observe the white web-work which
      gleams from these cavern walls.”

      He turned towards me, and looked into my eyes with two filmy orbs
      that distilled the rheum of intoxication.

      “Nitre?” he asked, at length.

      “Nitre,” I replied. “How long have you had that cough?”

      “Ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh! ugh! ugh!—ugh!
      ugh! ugh!”

      My poor friend found it impossible to reply for many minutes.

      “It is nothing,” he said, at last.

      “Come,” I said, with decision, “we will go back; your health is
      precious. You are rich, respected, admired, beloved; you are
      happy, as once I was. You are a man to be missed. For me it is no
      matter. We will go back; you will be ill, and I cannot be
      responsible. Besides, there is Luchesi—”

      “Enough,” he said; “the cough is a mere nothing; it will not kill
      me. I shall not die of a cough.”

      “True—true,” I replied; “and, indeed, I had no intention of
      alarming you unnecessarily—but you should use all proper caution.
      A draught of this Medoc will defend us from the damps.”

      Here I knocked off the neck of a bottle which I drew from a long
      row of its fellows that lay upon the mould.

      “Drink,” I said, presenting him the wine.

      He raised it to his lips with a leer. He paused and nodded to me
      familiarly, while his bells jingled.

      “I drink,” he said, “to the buried that repose around us.”

      “And I to your long life.”

      He again took my arm, and we proceeded.

      “These vaults,” he said, “are extensive.”

      “The Montresors,” I replied, “were a great and numerous family.”

      “I forget your arms.”

      “A huge human foot d’or, in a field azure; the foot crushes a
      serpent rampant whose fangs are imbedded in the heel.”

      “And the motto?”

      “_Nemo me impune lacessit_.”

      “Good!” he said.

      The wine sparkled in his eyes and the bells jingled. My own fancy
      grew warm with the Medoc. We had passed through walls of piled
      bones, with casks and puncheons intermingling, into the inmost
      recesses of the catacombs. I paused again, and this time I made
      bold to seize Fortunato by an arm above the elbow.

      “The nitre!” I said: “see, it increases. It hangs like moss upon
      the vaults. We are below the river’s bed. The drops of moisture
      trickle among the bones. Come, we will go back ere it is too
      late. Your cough—”

      “It is nothing,” he said; “let us go on. But first, another
      draught of the Medoc.”

      I broke and reached him a flagon of De Grâve. He emptied it at a
      breath. His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He laughed and
      threw the bottle upwards with a gesticulation I did not
      understand.

      I looked at him in surprise. He repeated the movement—a grotesque
      one.

      “You do not comprehend?” he said.

      “Not I,” I replied.

      “Then you are not of the brotherhood.”

      “How?”

      “You are not of the masons.”

      “Yes, yes,” I said, “yes, yes.”

      “You? Impossible! A mason?”

      “A mason,” I replied.

      “A sign,” he said.

      “It is this,” I answered, producing a trowel from beneath the
      folds of my _roquelaire_.

      “You jest,” he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. “But let us
      proceed to the Amontillado.”

      “Be it so,” I said, replacing the tool beneath the cloak, and
      again offering him my arm. He leaned upon it heavily. We
      continued our route in search of the Amontillado. We passed
      through a range of low arches, descended, passed on, and
      descending again, arrived at a deep crypt, in which the foulness
      of the air caused our flambeaux rather to glow than flame.

      At the most remote end of the crypt there appeared another less
      spacious. Its walls had been lined with human remains, piled to
      the vault overhead, in the fashion of the great catacombs of
      Paris. Three sides of this interior crypt were still ornamented
      in this manner. From the fourth the bones had been thrown down,
      and lay promiscuously upon the earth, forming at one point a
      mound of some size. Within the wall thus exposed by the
      displacing of the bones, we perceived a still interior recess, in
      depth about four feet, in width three, in height six or seven. It
      seemed to have been constructed for no especial use in itself,
      but formed merely the interval between two of the colossal
      supports of the roof of the catacombs, and was backed by one of
      their circumscribing walls of solid granite.

      It was in vain that Fortunato, uplifting his dull torch,
      endeavored to pry into the depths of the recess. Its termination
      the feeble light did not enable us to see.

      “Proceed,” I said; “herein is the Amontillado. As for Luchesi—”

      “He is an ignoramus,” interrupted my friend, as he stepped
      unsteadily forward, while I followed immediately at his heels. In
      an instant he had reached the extremity of the niche, and finding
      his progress arrested by the rock, stood stupidly bewildered. A
      moment more and I had fettered him to the granite. In its surface
      were two iron staples, distant from each other about two feet,
      horizontally. From one of these depended a short chain, from the
      other a padlock. Throwing the links about his waist, it was but
      the work of a few seconds to secure it. He was too much astounded
      to resist. Withdrawing the key I stepped back from the recess.

      “Pass your hand,” I said, “over the wall; you cannot help feeling
      the nitre. Indeed it is _very_ damp. Once more let me _implore_
      you to return. No? Then I must positively leave you. But I must
      first render you all the little attentions in my power.”

      “The Amontillado!” ejaculated my friend, not yet recovered from
      his astonishment.

      “True,” I replied; “the Amontillado.”

      As I said these words I busied myself among the pile of bones of
      which I have before spoken. Throwing them aside, I soon uncovered
      a quantity of building stone and mortar. With these materials and
      with the aid of my trowel, I began vigorously to wall up the
      entrance of the niche.

      I had scarcely laid the first tier of my masonry when I
      discovered that the intoxication of Fortunato had in a great
      measure worn off. The earliest indication I had of this was a low
      moaning cry from the depth of the recess. It was _not_ the cry of
      a drunken man. There was then a long and obstinate silence. I
      laid the second tier, and the third, and the fourth; and then I
      heard the furious vibrations of the chain. The noise lasted for
      several minutes, during which, that I might hearken to it with
      the more satisfaction, I ceased my labors and sat down upon the
      bones. When at last the clanking subsided, I resumed the trowel,
      and finished without interruption the fifth, the sixth, and the
      seventh tier. The wall was now nearly upon a level with my
      breast. I again paused, and holding the flambeaux over the
      mason-work, threw a few feeble rays upon the figure within.

      A succession of loud and shrill screams, bursting suddenly from
      the throat of the chained form, seemed to thrust me violently
      back. For a brief moment I hesitated—I trembled. Unsheathing my
      rapier, I began to grope with it about the recess; but the
      thought of an instant reassured me. I placed my hand upon the
      solid fabric of the catacombs, and felt satisfied. I reapproached
      the wall. I replied to the yells of him who clamored. I
      re-echoed—I aided—I surpassed them in volume and in strength. I
      did this, and the clamorer grew still.

      It was now midnight, and my task was drawing to a close. I had
      completed the eighth, the ninth, and the tenth tier. I had
      finished a portion of the last and the eleventh; there remained
      but a single stone to be fitted and plastered in. I struggled
      with its weight; I placed it partially in its destined position.
      But now there came from out the niche a low laugh that erected
      the hairs upon my head. It was succeeded by a sad voice, which I
      had difficulty in recognising as that of the noble Fortunato. The
      voice said—

      “Ha! ha! ha!—he! he!—a very good joke indeed—an excellent jest.
      We will have many a rich laugh about it at the palazzo—he! he!
      he!—over our wine—he! he! he!”

      “The Amontillado!” I said.

      “He! he! he!—he! he! he!—yes, the Amontillado. But is it not
      getting late? Will not they be awaiting us at the palazzo, the
      Lady Fortunato and the rest? Let us be gone.”

      “Yes,” I said, “let us be gone.”

      “_For the love of God, Montressor!_”

      “Yes,” I said, “for the love of God!”

      But to these words I hearkened in vain for a reply. I grew
      impatient. I called aloud—

      “Fortunato!”

      No answer. I called again—

      “Fortunato!”

      No answer still. I thrust a torch through the remaining aperture
      and let it fall within. There came forth in return only a
      jingling of the bells. My heart grew sick—on account of the
      dampness of the catacombs. I hastened to make an end of my labor.
      I forced the last stone into its position; I plastered it up.
      Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones.
      For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them. _In pace
      requiescat!_




THE IMP OF THE PERVERSE


      In the consideration of the faculties and impulses—of the prima
      mobilia of the human soul, the phrenologists have failed to make
      room for a propensity which, although obviously existing as a
      radical, primitive, irreducible sentiment, has been equally
      overlooked by all the moralists who have preceded them. In the
      pure arrogance of the reason, we have all overlooked it. We have
      suffered its existence to escape our senses, solely through want
      of belief—of faith;—whether it be faith in Revelation, or faith
      in the Kabbala. The idea of it has never occurred to us, simply
      because of its supererogation. We saw no need of the impulse—for
      the propensity. We could not perceive its necessity. We could not
      understand, that is to say, we could not have understood, had the
      notion of this primum mobile ever obtruded itself;—we could not
      have understood in what manner it might be made to further the
      objects of humanity, either temporal or eternal. It cannot be
      denied that phrenology and, in great measure, all
      metaphysicianism have been concocted a priori. The intellectual
      or logical man, rather than the understanding or observant man,
      set himself to imagine designs—to dictate purposes to God. Having
      thus fathomed, to his satisfaction, the intentions of Jehovah,
      out of these intentions he built his innumerable systems of mind.
      In the matter of phrenology, for example, we first determined,
      naturally enough, that it was the design of the Deity that man
      should eat. We then assigned to man an organ of alimentiveness,
      and this organ is the scourge with which the Deity compels man,
      will-I nill-I, into eating. Secondly, having settled it to be
      God’s will that man should continue his species, we discovered an
      organ of amativeness, forthwith. And so with combativeness, with
      ideality, with causality, with constructiveness,—so, in short,
      with every organ, whether representing a propensity, a moral
      sentiment, or a faculty of the pure intellect. And in these
      arrangements of the Principia of human action, the Spurzheimites,
      whether right or wrong, in part, or upon the whole, have but
      followed, in principle, the footsteps of their predecessors;
      deducing and establishing every thing from the preconceived
      destiny of man, and upon the ground of the objects of his
      Creator.

      It would have been wiser, it would have been safer, to classify
      (if classify we must) upon the basis of what man usually or
      occasionally did, and was always occasionally doing, rather than
      upon the basis of what we took it for granted the Deity intended
      him to do. If we cannot comprehend God in his visible works, how
      then in his inconceivable thoughts, that call the works into
      being? If we cannot understand him in his objective creatures,
      how then in his substantive moods and phases of creation?

      Induction, _a posteriori_, would have brought phrenology to
      admit, as an innate and primitive principle of human action, a
      paradoxical something, which we may call _perverseness_, for want
      of a more characteristic term. In the sense I intend, it is, in
      fact, a _mobile_ without motive, a motive not _motivirt_. Through
      its promptings we act without comprehensible object; or, if this
      shall be understood as a contradiction in terms, we may so far
      modify the proposition as to say, that through its promptings we
      act, for the reason that we should _not_. In theory, no reason
      can be more unreasonable, but, in fact, there is none more
      strong. With certain minds, under certain conditions, it becomes
      absolutely irresistible. I am not more certain that I breathe,
      than that the assurance of the wrong or error of any action is
      often the one unconquerable _force_ which impels us, and alone
      impels us to its prosecution. Nor will this overwhelming tendency
      to do wrong for the wrong’s sake, admit of analysis, or
      resolution into ulterior elements. It is a radical, a primitive
      impulse—elementary. It will be said, I am aware, that when we
      persist in acts because we feel we should not persist in them,
      our conduct is but a modification of that which ordinarily
      springs from the combativeness of phrenology. But a glance will
      show the fallacy of this idea. The phrenological combativeness
      has for its essence, the necessity of self-defence. It is our
      safeguard against injury. Its principle regards our well-being;
      and thus the desire to be well is excited simultaneously with its
      development. It follows, that the desire to be well must be
      excited simultaneously with any principle which shall be merely a
      modification of combativeness, but in the case of that something
      which I term perverseness, the desire to be well is not only not
      aroused, but a strongly antagonistical sentiment exists.

      An appeal to one’s own heart is, after all, the best reply to the
      sophistry just noticed. No one who trustingly consults and
      thoroughly questions his own soul, will be disposed to deny the
      entire radicalness of the propensity in question. It is not more
      incomprehensible than distinctive. There lives no man who at some
      period has not been tormented, for example, by an earnest desire
      to tantalize a listener by circumlocution. The speaker is aware
      that he displeases; he has every intention to please, he is
      usually curt, precise, and clear; the most laconic and luminous
      language is struggling for utterance upon his tongue; it is only
      with difficulty that he restrains himself from giving it flow; he
      dreads and deprecates the anger of him whom he addresses; yet,
      the thought strikes him, that by certain involutions and
      parentheses this anger may be engendered. That single thought is
      enough. The impulse increases to a wish, the wish to a desire,
      the desire to an uncontrollable longing, and the longing (to the
      deep regret and mortification of the speaker, and in defiance of
      all consequences) is indulged.

      We have a task before us which must be speedily performed. We
      know that it will be ruinous to make delay. The most important
      crisis of our life calls, trumpet-tongued, for immediate energy
      and action. We glow, we are consumed with eagerness to commence
      the work, with the anticipation of whose glorious result our
      whole souls are on fire. It must, it shall be undertaken to-day,
      and yet we put it off until to-morrow; and why? There is no
      answer, except that we feel perverse, using the word with no
      comprehension of the principle. To-morrow arrives, and with it a
      more impatient anxiety to do our duty, but with this very
      increase of anxiety arrives, also, a nameless, a positively
      fearful, because unfathomable, craving for delay. This craving
      gathers strength as the moments fly. The last hour for action is
      at hand. We tremble with the violence of the conflict within
      us,—of the definite with the indefinite—of the substance with the
      shadow. But, if the contest have proceeded thus far, it is the
      shadow which prevails,—we struggle in vain. The clock strikes,
      and is the knell of our welfare. At the same time, it is the
      chanticleer-note to the ghost that has so long overawed us. It
      flies—it disappears—we are free. The old energy returns. We will
      labor now. Alas, it is too late!

      We stand upon the brink of a precipice. We peer into the abyss—we
      grow sick and dizzy. Our first impulse is to shrink from the
      danger. Unaccountably we remain. By slow degrees our sickness and
      dizziness and horror become merged in a cloud of unnamable
      feeling. By gradations, still more imperceptible, this cloud
      assumes shape, as did the vapor from the bottle out of which
      arose the genius in the Arabian Nights. But out of this our cloud
      upon the precipice’s edge, there grows into palpability, a shape,
      far more terrible than any genius or any demon of a tale, and yet
      it is but a thought, although a fearful one, and one which chills
      the very marrow of our bones with the fierceness of the delight
      of its horror. It is merely the idea of what would be our
      sensations during the sweeping precipitancy of a fall from such a
      height. And this fall—this rushing annihilation—for the very
      reason that it involves that one most ghastly and loathsome of
      all the most ghastly and loathsome images of death and suffering
      which have ever presented themselves to our imagination—for this
      very cause do we now the most vividly desire it. And because our
      reason violently deters us from the brink, therefore do we the
      most impetuously approach it. There is no passion in nature so
      demoniacally impatient, as that of him who, shuddering upon the
      edge of a precipice, thus meditates a plunge. To indulge, for a
      moment, in any attempt at thought, is to be inevitably lost; for
      reflection but urges us to forbear, and therefore it is, I say,
      that we cannot. If there be no friendly arm to check us, or if we
      fail in a sudden effort to prostrate ourselves backward from the
      abyss, we plunge, and are destroyed.

      Examine these similar actions as we will, we shall find them
      resulting solely from the spirit of the Perverse. We perpetrate
      them because we feel that we should not. Beyond or behind this
      there is no intelligible principle; and we might, indeed, deem
      this perverseness a direct instigation of the Arch-Fiend, were it
      not occasionally known to operate in furtherance of good.

      I have said thus much, that in some measure I may answer your
      question—that I may explain to you why I am here—that I may
      assign to you something that shall have at least the faint aspect
      of a cause for my wearing these fetters, and for my tenanting
      this cell of the condemned. Had I not been thus prolix, you might
      either have misunderstood me altogether, or, with the rabble,
      have fancied me mad. As it is, you will easily perceive that I am
      one of the many uncounted victims of the Imp of the Perverse.

      It is impossible that any deed could have been wrought with a
      more thorough deliberation. For weeks, for months, I pondered
      upon the means of the murder. I rejected a thousand schemes,
      because their accomplishment involved a _chance_ of detection. At
      length, in reading some French memoirs, I found an account of a
      nearly fatal illness that occurred to Madame Pilau, through the
      agency of a candle accidentally poisoned. The idea struck my
      fancy at once. I knew my victim’s habit of reading in bed. I
      knew, too, that his apartment was narrow and ill-ventilated. But
      I need not vex you with impertinent details. I need not describe
      the easy artifices by which I substituted, in his bed-room
      candle-stand, a wax-light of my own making for the one which I
      there found. The next morning he was discovered dead in his bed,
      and the coroner’s verdict was—“Death by the visitation of God.”

      Having inherited his estate, all went well with me for years. The
      idea of detection never once entered my brain. Of the remains of
      the fatal taper I had myself carefully disposed. I had left no
      shadow of a clew by which it would be possible to convict, or
      even to suspect me of the crime. It is inconceivable how rich a
      sentiment of satisfaction arose in my bosom as I reflected upon
      my absolute security. For a very long period of time I was
      accustomed to revel in this sentiment. It afforded me more real
      delight than all the mere worldly advantages accruing from my
      sin. But there arrived at length an epoch, from which the
      pleasurable feeling grew, by scarcely perceptible gradations,
      into a haunting and harassing thought. It harassed because it
      haunted. I could scarcely get rid of it for an instant. It is
      quite a common thing to be thus annoyed with the ringing in our
      ears, or rather in our memories, of the burthen of some ordinary
      song, or some unimpressive snatches from an opera. Nor will we be
      the less tormented if the song in itself be good, or the opera
      air meritorious. In this manner, at last, I would perpetually
      catch myself pondering upon my security, and repeating, in a low
      undertone, the phrase, “I am safe.”

      One day, whilst sauntering along the streets, I arrested myself
      in the act of murmuring, half aloud, these customary syllables.
      In a fit of petulance, I remodelled them thus: “I am safe—I am
      safe—yes—if I be not fool enough to make open confession!”

      No sooner had I spoken these words, than I felt an icy chill
      creep to my heart. I had had some experience in these fits of
      perversity (whose nature I have been at some trouble to explain),
      and I remembered well that in no instance I had successfully
      resisted their attacks. And now my own casual self-suggestion
      that I might possibly be fool enough to confess the murder of
      which I had been guilty, confronted me, as if the very ghost of
      him whom I had murdered—and beckoned me on to death.

      At first, I made an effort to shake off this nightmare of the
      soul. I walked vigorously—faster—still faster—at length I ran. I
      felt a maddening desire to shriek aloud. Every succeeding wave of
      thought overwhelmed me with new terror, for, alas! I well, too
      well understood that to think, in my situation, was to be lost. I
      still quickened my pace. I bounded like a madman through the
      crowded thoroughfares. At length, the populace took the alarm,
      and pursued me. I felt then the consummation of my fate. Could I
      have torn out my tongue, I would have done it, but a rough voice
      resounded in my ears—a rougher grasp seized me by the shoulder. I
      turned—I gasped for breath. For a moment I experienced all the
      pangs of suffocation; I became blind, and deaf, and giddy; and
      then some invisible fiend, I thought, struck me with his broad
      palm upon the back. The long imprisoned secret burst forth from
      my soul.

      They say that I spoke with a distinct enunciation, but with
      marked emphasis and passionate hurry, as if in dread of
      interruption before concluding the brief but pregnant sentences
      that consigned me to the hangman and to hell.

      Having related all that was necessary for the fullest judicial
      conviction, I fell prostrate in a swoon.

      But why shall I say more? To-day I wear these chains, and am
      _here!_ To-morrow I shall be fetterless!—_but where?_




THE ISLAND OF THE FAY


Nullus enim locus sine genio est.—_Servius_.

      “La musique,” says Marmontel, in those “Contes Moraux” (*1) which
      in all our translations, we have insisted upon calling “Moral
      Tales,” as if in mockery of their spirit—“la musique est le seul
      des talents qui jouissent de lui-même; tous les autres veulent
      des temoins.” He here confounds the pleasure derivable from sweet
      sounds with the capacity for creating them. No more than any
      other talent, is that for music susceptible of complete
      enjoyment, where there is no second party to appreciate its
      exercise. And it is only in common with other talents that it
      produces effects which may be fully enjoyed in solitude. The idea
      which the raconteur has either failed to entertain clearly, or
      has sacrificed in its expression to his national love of point,
      is, doubtless, the very tenable one that the higher order of
      music is the most thoroughly estimated when we are exclusively
      alone. The proposition, in this form, will be admitted at once by
      those who love the lyre for its own sake, and for its spiritual
      uses. But there is one pleasure still within the reach of fallen
      mortality and perhaps only one—which owes even more than does
      music to the accessory sentiment of seclusion. I mean the
      happiness experienced in the contemplation of natural scenery. In
      truth, the man who would behold aright the glory of God upon
      earth must in solitude behold that glory. To me, at least, the
      presence—not of human life only, but of life in any other form
      than that of the green things which grow upon the soil and are
      voiceless—is a stain upon the landscape—is at war with the genius
      of the scene. I love, indeed, to regard the dark valleys, and the
      gray rocks, and the waters that silently smile, and the forests
      that sigh in uneasy slumbers, and the proud watchful mountains
      that look down upon all,—I love to regard these as themselves but
      the colossal members of one vast animate and sentient whole—a
      whole whose form (that of the sphere) is the most perfect and
      most inclusive of all; whose path is among associate planets;
      whose meek handmaiden is the moon, whose mediate sovereign is the
      sun; whose life is eternity, whose thought is that of a God;
      whose enjoyment is knowledge; whose destinies are lost in
      immensity, whose cognizance of ourselves is akin with our own
      cognizance of the animalculae which infest the brain—a being
      which we, in consequence, regard as purely inanimate and material
      much in the same manner as these animalculae must thus regard us.

      Our telescopes and our mathematical investigations assure us on
      every hand—notwithstanding the cant of the more ignorant of the
      priesthood—that space, and therefore that bulk, is an important
      consideration in the eyes of the Almighty. The cycles in which
      the stars move are those best adapted for the evolution, without
      collision, of the greatest possible number of bodies. The forms
      of those bodies are accurately such as, within a given surface,
      to include the greatest possible amount of matter;—while the
      surfaces themselves are so disposed as to accommodate a denser
      population than could be accommodated on the same surfaces
      otherwise arranged. Nor is it any argument against bulk being an
      object with God, that space itself is infinite; for there may be
      an infinity of matter to fill it. And since we see clearly that
      the endowment of matter with vitality is a principle—indeed, as
      far as our judgments extend, the leading principle in the
      operations of Deity,—it is scarcely logical to imagine it
      confined to the regions of the minute, where we daily trace it,
      and not extending to those of the august. As we find cycle within
      cycle without end,—yet all revolving around one far-distant
      centre which is the God-head, may we not analogically suppose in
      the same manner, life within life, the less within the greater,
      and all within the Spirit Divine? In short, we are madly erring,
      through self-esteem, in believing man, in either his temporal or
      future destinies, to be of more moment in the universe than that
      vast “clod of the valley” which he tills and contemns, and to
      which he denies a soul for no more profound reason than that he
      does not behold it in operation. (*2)

      These fancies, and such as these, have always given to my
      meditations among the mountains and the forests, by the rivers
      and the ocean, a tinge of what the everyday world would not fail
      to term fantastic. My wanderings amid such scenes have been many,
      and far-searching, and often solitary; and the interest with
      which I have strayed through many a dim, deep valley, or gazed
      into the reflected Heaven of many a bright lake, has been an
      interest greatly deepened by the thought that I have strayed and
      gazed alone. What flippant Frenchman was it who said in allusion
      to the well-known work of Zimmerman, that, “la solitude est une
      belle chose; mais il faut quelqu’un pour vous dire que la
      solitude est une belle chose?” The epigram cannot be gainsayed;
      but the necessity is a thing that does not exist.

      It was during one of my lonely journeyings, amid a far distant
      region of mountain locked within mountain, and sad rivers and
      melancholy tarn writhing or sleeping within all—that I chanced
      upon a certain rivulet and island. I came upon them suddenly in
      the leafy June, and threw myself upon the turf, beneath the
      branches of an unknown odorous shrub, that I might doze as I
      contemplated the scene. I felt that thus only should I look upon
      it—such was the character of phantasm which it wore.

      On all sides—save to the west, where the sun was about
      sinking—arose the verdant walls of the forest. The little river
      which turned sharply in its course, and was thus immediately lost
      to sight, seemed to have no exit from its prison, but to be
      absorbed by the deep green foliage of the trees to the east—while
      in the opposite quarter (so it appeared to me as I lay at length
      and glanced upward) there poured down noiselessly and
      continuously into the valley, a rich golden and crimson waterfall
      from the sunset fountains of the sky.

      About midway in the short vista which my dreamy vision took in,
      one small circular island, profusely verdured, reposed upon the
      bosom of the stream.

      So blended bank and shadow there
      That each seemed pendulous in air—

      so mirror-like was the glassy water, that it was scarcely
      possible to say at what point upon the slope of the emerald turf
      its crystal dominion began.

      My position enabled me to include in a single view both the
      eastern and western extremities of the islet; and I observed a
      singularly-marked difference in their aspects. The latter was all
      one radiant harem of garden beauties. It glowed and blushed
      beneath the eyes of the slant sunlight, and fairly laughed with
      flowers. The grass was short, springy, sweet-scented, and
      asphodel-interspersed. The trees were lithe, mirthful,
      erect—bright, slender, and graceful,—of Eastern figure and
      foliage, with bark smooth, glossy, and parti-colored. There
      seemed a deep sense of life and joy about all; and although no
      airs blew from out the heavens, yet every thing had motion
      through the gentle sweepings to and fro of innumerable
      butterflies, that might have been mistaken for tulips with wings.
      (*4)

      The other or eastern end of the isle was whelmed in the blackest
      shade. A sombre, yet beautiful and peaceful gloom here pervaded
      all things. The trees were dark in color, and mournful in form
      and attitude, wreathing themselves into sad, solemn, and spectral
      shapes that conveyed ideas of mortal sorrow and untimely death.
      The grass wore the deep tint of the cypress, and the heads of its
      blades hung droopingly, and hither and thither among it were many
      small unsightly hillocks, low and narrow, and not very long, that
      had the aspect of graves, but were not; although over and all
      about them the rue and the rosemary clambered. The shade of the
      trees fell heavily upon the water, and seemed to bury itself
      therein, impregnating the depths of the element with darkness. I
      fancied that each shadow, as the sun descended lower and lower,
      separated itself sullenly from the trunk that gave it birth, and
      thus became absorbed by the stream; while other shadows issued
      momently from the trees, taking the place of their predecessors
      thus entombed.

      This idea, having once seized upon my fancy, greatly excited it,
      and I lost myself forthwith in revery. “If ever island were
      enchanted,” said I to myself, “this is it. This is the haunt of
      the few gentle Fays who remain from the wreck of the race. Are
      these green tombs theirs?—or do they yield up their sweet lives
      as mankind yield up their own? In dying, do they not rather waste
      away mournfully, rendering unto God, little by little, their
      existence, as these trees render up shadow after shadow,
      exhausting their substance unto dissolution? What the wasting
      tree is to the water that imbibes its shade, growing thus blacker
      by what it preys upon, may not the life of the Fay be to the
      death which engulfs it?”

      As I thus mused, with half-shut eyes, while the sun sank rapidly
      to rest, and eddying currents careered round and round the
      island, bearing upon their bosom large, dazzling, white flakes of
      the bark of the sycamore—flakes which, in their multiform
      positions upon the water, a quick imagination might have
      converted into anything it pleased—while I thus mused, it
      appeared to me that the form of one of those very Fays about whom
      I had been pondering made its way slowly into the darkness from
      out the light at the western end of the island. She stood erect
      in a singularly fragile canoe, and urged it with the mere phantom
      of an oar. While within the influence of the lingering sunbeams,
      her attitude seemed indicative of joy—but sorrow deformed it as
      she passed within the shade. Slowly she glided along, and at
      length rounded the islet and re-entered the region of light. “The
      revolution which has just been made by the Fay,” continued I,
      musingly, “is the cycle of the brief year of her life. She has
      floated through her winter and through her summer. She is a year
      nearer unto Death; for I did not fail to see that, as she came
      into the shade, her shadow fell from her, and was swallowed up in
      the dark water, making its blackness more black.”

      And again the boat appeared and the Fay; but about the attitude
      of the latter there was more of care and uncertainty and less of
      elastic joy. She floated again from out the light and into the
      gloom (which deepened momently) and again her shadow fell from
      her into the ebony water, and became absorbed into its blackness.
      And again and again she made the circuit of the island, (while
      the sun rushed down to his slumbers), and at each issuing into
      the light there was more sorrow about her person, while it grew
      feebler and far fainter and more indistinct, and at each passage
      into the gloom there fell from her a darker shade, which became
      whelmed in a shadow more black. But at length when the sun had
      utterly departed, the Fay, now the mere ghost of her former self,
      went disconsolately with her boat into the region of the ebony
      flood—and that she issued thence at all I cannot say, for
      darkness fell over all things and I beheld her magical figure no
      more.




THE ASSIGNATION


     Stay for me there! I will not fail.
     To meet thee in that hollow vale.

(_Exequy on the death of his wife, by Henry King, Bishop of
Chichester_.)

      Ill-fated and mysterious man!—bewildered in the brilliancy of
      thine own imagination, and fallen in the flames of thine own
      youth! Again in fancy I behold thee! Once more thy form hath
      risen before me!—not—oh! not as thou art—in the cold valley and
      shadow—but as thou _shouldst be_—squandering away a life of
      magnificent meditation in that city of dim visions, thine own
      Venice—which is a star-beloved Elysium of the sea, and the wide
      windows of whose Palladian palaces look down with a deep and
      bitter meaning upon the secrets of her silent waters. Yes! I
      repeat it—as thou _shouldst be_. There are surely other worlds
      than this—other thoughts than the thoughts of the multitude—other
      speculations than the speculations of the sophist. Who then shall
      call thy conduct into question? who blame thee for thy visionary
      hours, or denounce those occupations as a wasting away of life,
      which were but the overflowings of thine everlasting energies?

      It was at Venice, beneath the covered archway there called the
      _Ponte di Sospiri_, that I met for the third or fourth time the
      person of whom I speak. It is with a confused recollection that I
      bring to mind the circumstances of that meeting. Yet I
      remember—ah! how should I forget?—the deep midnight, the Bridge
      of Sighs, the beauty of woman, and the Genius of Romance that
      stalked up and down the narrow canal.

      It was a night of unusual gloom. The great clock of the Piazza
      had sounded the fifth hour of the Italian evening. The square of
      the Campanile lay silent and deserted, and the lights in the old
      Ducal Palace were dying fast away. I was returning home from the
      Piazetta, by way of the Grand Canal. But as my gondola arrived
      opposite the mouth of the canal San Marco, a female voice from
      its recesses broke suddenly upon the night, in one wild,
      hysterical, and long continued shriek. Startled at the sound, I
      sprang upon my feet: while the gondolier, letting slip his single
      oar, lost it in the pitchy darkness beyond a chance of recovery,
      and we were consequently left to the guidance of the current
      which here sets from the greater into the smaller channel. Like
      some huge and sable-feathered condor, we were slowly drifting
      down towards the Bridge of Sighs, when a thousand flambeaux
      flashing from the windows, and down the staircases of the Ducal
      Palace, turned all at once that deep gloom into a livid and
      preternatural day.

      A child, slipping from the arms of its own mother, had fallen
      from an upper window of the lofty structure into the deep and dim
      canal. The quiet waters had closed placidly over their victim;
      and, although my own gondola was the only one in sight, many a
      stout swimmer, already in the stream, was seeking in vain upon
      the surface, the treasure which was to be found, alas! only
      within the abyss. Upon the broad black marble flagstones at the
      entrance of the palace, and a few steps above the water, stood a
      figure which none who then saw can have ever since forgotten. It
      was the Marchesa Aphrodite—the adoration of all Venice—the gayest
      of the gay—the most lovely where all were beautiful—but still the
      young wife of the old and intriguing Mentoni, and the mother of
      that fair child, her first and only one, who now, deep beneath
      the murky water, was thinking in bitterness of heart upon her
      sweet caresses, and exhausting its little life in struggles to
      call upon her name.

      She stood alone. Her small, bare, and silvery feet gleamed in the
      black mirror of marble beneath her. Her hair, not as yet more
      than half loosened for the night from its ball-room array,
      clustered, amid a shower of diamonds, round and round her
      classical head, in curls like those of the young hyacinth. A
      snowy-white and gauze-like drapery seemed to be nearly the sole
      covering to her delicate form; but the mid-summer and midnight
      air was hot, sullen, and still, and no motion in the statue-like
      form itself, stirred even the folds of that raiment of very vapor
      which hung around it as the heavy marble hangs around the Niobe.
      Yet—strange to say!—her large lustrous eyes were not turned
      downwards upon that grave wherein her brightest hope lay
      buried—but riveted in a widely different direction! The prison of
      the Old Republic is, I think, the stateliest building in all
      Venice—but how could that lady gaze so fixedly upon it, when
      beneath her lay stifling her only child? Yon dark, gloomy niche,
      too, yawns right opposite her chamber window—what, then, _could_
      there be in its shadows—in its architecture—in its ivy-wreathed
      and solemn cornices—that the Marchesa di Mentoni had not wondered
      at a thousand times before? Nonsense!—Who does not remember that,
      at such a time as this, the eye, like a shattered mirror,
      multiplies the images of its sorrow, and sees in innumerable
      far-off places, the woe which is close at hand?

      Many steps above the Marchesa, and within the arch of the
      water-gate, stood, in full dress, the Satyr-like figure of
      Mentoni himself. He was occasionally occupied in thrumming a
      guitar, and seemed _ennuye_ to the very death, as at intervals he
      gave directions for the recovery of his child. Stupefied and
      aghast, I had myself no power to move from the upright position I
      had assumed upon first hearing the shriek, and must have
      presented to the eyes of the agitated group a spectral and
      ominous appearance, as with pale countenance and rigid limbs, I
      floated down among them in that funereal gondola.

      All efforts proved in vain. Many of the most energetic in the
      search were relaxing their exertions, and yielding to a gloomy
      sorrow. There seemed but little hope for the child; (how much
      less than for the mother!) but now, from the interior of that
      dark niche which has been already mentioned as forming a part of
      the Old Republican prison, and as fronting the lattice of the
      Marchesa, a figure muffled in a cloak, stepped out within reach
      of the light, and, pausing a moment upon the verge of the giddy
      descent, plunged headlong into the canal. As, in an instant
      afterwards, he stood with the still living and breathing child
      within his grasp, upon the marble flagstones by the side of the
      Marchesa, his cloak, heavy with the drenching water, became
      unfastened, and, falling in folds about his feet, discovered to
      the wonder-stricken spectators the graceful person of a very
      young man, with the sound of whose name the greater part of
      Europe was then ringing.

      No word spoke the deliverer. But the Marchesa! She will now
      receive her child—she will press it to her heart—she will cling
      to its little form, and smother it with her caresses. Alas!
      _another’s_ arms have taken it from the stranger—_another’s_ arms
      have taken it away, and borne it afar off, unnoticed, into the
      palace! And the Marchesa! Her lip—her beautiful lip trembles;
      tears are gathering in her eyes—those eyes which, like Pliny’s
      acanthus, are “soft and almost liquid.” Yes! tears are gathering
      in those eyes—and see! the entire woman thrills throughout the
      soul, and the statue has started into life! The pallor of the
      marble countenance, the swelling of the marble bosom, the very
      purity of the marble feet, we behold suddenly flushed over with a
      tide of ungovernable crimson; and a slight shudder quivers about
      her delicate frame, as a gentle air at Napoli about the rich
      silver lilies in the grass.

      Why _should_ that lady blush! To this demand there is no
      answer—except that, having left, in the eager haste and terror of
      a mother’s heart, the privacy of her own _boudoir_, she has
      neglected to enthral her tiny feet in their slippers, and utterly
      forgotten to throw over her Venetian shoulders that drapery which
      is their due. What other possible reason could there have been
      for her so blushing?—for the glance of those wild appealing
      eyes?—for the unusual tumult of that throbbing bosom?—for the
      convulsive pressure of that trembling hand?—that hand which fell,
      as Mentoni turned into the palace, accidentally, upon the hand of
      the stranger. What reason could there have been for the low—the
      singularly low tone of those unmeaning words which the lady
      uttered hurriedly in bidding him adieu? “Thou hast conquered,”
      she said, or the murmurs of the water deceived me; “thou hast
      conquered—one hour after sunrise—we shall meet—so let it be!”

      The tumult had subsided, the lights had died away within the
      palace, and the stranger, whom I now recognized, stood alone upon
      the flags. He shook with inconceivable agitation, and his eye
      glanced around in search of a gondola. I could not do less than
      offer him the service of my own; and he accepted the civility.
      Having obtained an oar at the water-gate, we proceeded together
      to his residence, while he rapidly recovered his self-possession,
      and spoke of our former slight acquaintance in terms of great
      apparent cordiality.

      There are some subjects upon which I take pleasure in being
      minute. The person of the stranger—let me call him by this title,
      who to all the world was still a stranger—the person of the
      stranger is one of these subjects. In height he might have been
      below rather than above the medium size: although there were
      moments of intense passion when his frame actually _expanded_ and
      belied the assertion. The light, almost slender symmetry of his
      figure, promised more of that ready activity which he evinced at
      the Bridge of Sighs, than of that Herculean strength which he has
      been known to wield without an effort, upon occasions of more
      dangerous emergency. With the mouth and chin of a deity—singular,
      wild, full, liquid eyes, whose shadows varied from pure hazel to
      intense and brilliant jet—and a profusion of curling, black hair,
      from which a forehead of unusual breadth gleamed forth at
      intervals all light and ivory—his were features than which I have
      seen none more classically regular, except, perhaps, the marble
      ones of the Emperor Commodus. Yet his countenance was,
      nevertheless, one of those which all men have seen at some period
      of their lives, and have never afterwards seen again. It had no
      peculiar, it had no settled predominant expression to be fastened
      upon the memory; a countenance seen and instantly forgotten, but
      forgotten with a vague and never-ceasing desire of recalling it
      to mind. Not that the spirit of each rapid passion failed, at any
      time, to throw its own distinct image upon the mirror of that
      face—but that the mirror, mirror-like, retained no vestige of the
      passion, when the passion had departed.

      Upon leaving him on the night of our adventure, he solicited me,
      in what I thought an urgent manner, to call upon him _very_ early
      the next morning. Shortly after sunrise, I found myself
      accordingly at his Palazzo, one of those huge structures of
      gloomy, yet fantastic pomp, which tower above the waters of the
      Grand Canal in the vicinity of the Rialto. I was shown up a broad
      winding staircase of mosaics, into an apartment whose
      unparalleled splendor burst through the opening door with an
      actual glare, making me blind and dizzy with luxuriousness.

      I knew my acquaintance to be wealthy. Report had spoken of his
      possessions in terms which I had even ventured to call terms of
      ridiculous exaggeration. But as I gazed about me, I could not
      bring myself to believe that the wealth of any subject in Europe
      could have supplied the princely magnificence which burned and
      blazed around.

      Although, as I say, the sun had arisen, yet the room was still
      brilliantly lighted up. I judge from this circumstance, as well
      as from an air of exhaustion in the countenance of my friend,
      that he had not retired to bed during the whole of the preceding
      night. In the architecture and embellishments of the chamber, the
      evident design had been to dazzle and astound. Little attention
      had been paid to the _decora_ of what is technically called
      _keeping_, or to the proprieties of nationality. The eye wandered
      from object to object, and rested upon none—neither the
      _grotesques_ of the Greek painters, nor the sculptures of the
      best Italian days, nor the huge carvings of untutored Egypt. Rich
      draperies in every part of the room trembled to the vibration of
      low, melancholy music, whose origin was not to be discovered. The
      senses were oppressed by mingled and conflicting perfumes,
      reeking up from strange convolute censers, together with
      multitudinous flaring and flickering tongues of emerald and
      violet fire. The rays of the newly risen sun poured in upon the
      whole, through windows, formed each of a single pane of
      crimson-tinted glass. Glancing to and fro, in a thousand
      reflections, from curtains which rolled from their cornices like
      cataracts of molten silver, the beams of natural glory mingled at
      length fitfully with the artificial light, and lay weltering in
      subdued masses upon a carpet of rich, liquid-looking cloth of
      Chili gold.

      “Ha! ha! ha!—ha! ha! ha!”—laughed the proprietor, motioning me to
      a seat as I entered the room, and throwing himself back at
      full-length upon an ottoman. “I see,” said he, perceiving that I
      could not immediately reconcile myself to the _bienseance_ of so
      singular a welcome—“I see you are astonished at my apartment—at
      my statues—my pictures—my originality of conception in
      architecture and upholstery! absolutely drunk, eh, with my
      magnificence? But pardon me, my dear sir, (here his tone of voice
      dropped to the very spirit of cordiality,) pardon me for my
      uncharitable laughter. You appeared so _utterly_ astonished.
      Besides, some things are so completely ludicrous, that a man
      _must_ laugh or die. To die laughing, must be the most glorious
      of all glorious deaths! Sir Thomas More—a very fine man was Sir
      Thomas More—Sir Thomas More died laughing, you remember. Also in
      the _Absurdities_ of Ravisius Textor, there is a long list of
      characters who came to the same magnificent end. Do you know,
      however,” continued he musingly, “that at Sparta (which is now
      Palæochori,) at Sparta, I say, to the west of the citadel, among
      a chaos of scarcely visible ruins, is a kind of _socle_, upon
      which are still legible the letters ΛΑΞΜ. They are undoubtedly
      part of ΓΕΛΑΞΜΑ. Now, at Sparta were a thousand temples and
      shrines to a thousand different divinities. How exceedingly
      strange that the altar of Laughter should have survived all the
      others! But in the present instance,” he resumed, with a singular
      alteration of voice and manner, “I have no right to be merry at
      your expense. You might well have been amazed. Europe cannot
      produce anything so fine as this, my little regal cabinet. My
      other apartments are by no means of the same order—mere _ultras_
      of fashionable insipidity. This is better than fashion—is it not?
      Yet this has but to be seen to become the rage—that is, with
      those who could afford it at the cost of their entire patrimony.
      I have guarded, however, against any such profanation. With one
      exception, you are the only human being besides myself and my
      _valet_, who has been admitted within the mysteries of these
      imperial precincts, since they have been bedizened as you see!”

      I bowed in acknowledgment—for the overpowering sense of splendor
      and perfume, and music, together with the unexpected eccentricity
      of his address and manner, prevented me from expressing, in
      words, my appreciation of what I might have construed into a
      compliment.

      “Here,” he resumed, arising and leaning on my arm as he sauntered
      around the apartment, “here are paintings from the Greeks to
      Cimabue, and from Cimabue to the present hour. Many are chosen,
      as you see, with little deference to the opinions of Virtu. They
      are all, however, fitting tapestry for a chamber such as this.
      Here, too, are some _chefs d’oeuvre_ of the unknown great; and
      here, unfinished designs by men, celebrated in their day, whose
      very names the perspicacity of the academies has left to silence
      and to me. What think you,” said he, turning abruptly as he
      spoke—“what think you of this Madonna della Pieta?”

      “It is Guido’s own!” I said, with all the enthusiasm of my
      nature, for I had been poring intently over its surpassing
      loveliness. “It is Guido’s own!—how _could_ you have obtained
      it?—she is undoubtedly in painting what the Venus is in
      sculpture.”

      “Ha!” said he thoughtfully, “the Venus—the beautiful Venus?—the
      Venus of the Medici?—she of the diminutive head and the gilded
      hair? Part of the left arm (here his voice dropped so as to be
      heard with difficulty,) and all the right, are restorations; and
      in the coquetry of that right arm lies, I think, the quintessence
      of all affectation. Give _me_ the Canova! The Apollo, too, is a
      copy—there can be no doubt of it—blind fool that I am, who cannot
      behold the boasted inspiration of the Apollo! I cannot help—pity
      me!—I cannot help preferring the Antinous. Was it not Socrates
      who said that the statuary found his statue in the block of
      marble? Then Michael Angelo was by no means original in his
      couplet—

     ‘Non ha l’ottimo artista alcun concetto
     Che un marmo solo in se non circunscriva.’”

      It has been, or should be remarked, that, in the manner of the
      true gentleman, we are always aware of a difference from the
      bearing of the vulgar, without being at once precisely able to
      determine in what such difference consists. Allowing the remark
      to have applied in its full force to the outward demeanor of my
      acquaintance, I felt it, on that eventful morning, still more
      fully applicable to his moral temperament and character. Nor can
      I better define that peculiarity of spirit which seemed to place
      him so essentially apart from all other human beings, than by
      calling it a _habit_ of intense and continual thought, pervading
      even his most trivial actions—intruding upon his moments of
      dalliance—and interweaving itself with his very flashes of
      merriment—like adders which writhe from out the eyes of the
      grinning masks in the cornices around the temples of Persepolis.

      I could not help, however, repeatedly observing, through the
      mingled tone of levity and solemnity with which he rapidly
      descanted upon matters of little importance, a certain air of
      trepidation—a degree of nervous _unction_ in action and in
      speech—an unquiet excitability of manner which appeared to me at
      all times unaccountable, and upon some occasions even filled me
      with alarm. Frequently, too, pausing in the middle of a sentence
      whose commencement he had apparently forgotten, he seemed to be
      listening in the deepest attention, as if either in momentary
      expectation of a visitor, or to sounds which must have had
      existence in his imagination alone.

      It was during one of these reveries or pauses of apparent
      abstraction, that, in turning over a page of the poet and scholar
      Politian’s beautiful tragedy “The Orfeo,” (the first native
      Italian tragedy,) which lay near me upon an ottoman, I discovered
      a passage underlined in pencil. It was a passage towards the end
      of the third act—a passage of the most heart-stirring
      excitement—a passage which, although tainted with impurity, no
      man shall read without a thrill of novel emotion—no woman without
      a sigh. The whole page was blotted with fresh tears; and, upon
      the opposite interleaf, were the following English lines, written
      in a hand so very different from the peculiar characters of my
      acquaintance, that I had some difficulty in recognising it as his
      own:—

Thou wast that all to me, love,
    For which my soul did pine—
A green isle in the sea, love,
    A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers;
    And all the flowers were mine.

Ah, dream too bright to last!
    Ah, starry Hope, that didst arise
But to be overcast!
    A voice from out the Future cries,
“Onward!”—but o’er the Past
    (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies,
Mute—motionless—aghast!

For alas!  alas!  with me
    The light of life is o’er.
“No more—no more—no more,”
    (Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore,)
    Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,
Or the stricken eagle soar!

Now all my hours are trances;
    And all my nightly dreams
Are where the dark eye glances,
    And where thy footstep gleams,
In what ethereal dances,
    By what Italian streams.

Alas!  for that accursed time
    They bore thee o’er the billow,
From Love to titled age and crime,
    And an unholy pillow!—
From me, and from our misty clime,
    Where weeps the silver willow!

      That these lines were written in English—a language with which I
      had not believed their author acquainted—afforded me little
      matter for surprise. I was too well aware of the extent of his
      acquirements, and of the singular pleasure he took in concealing
      them from observation, to be astonished at any similar discovery;
      but the place of date, I must confess, occasioned me no little
      amazement. It had been originally written _London_, and
      afterwards carefully overscored—not, however, so effectually as
      to conceal the word from a scrutinizing eye. I say, this
      occasioned me no little amazement; for I well remember that, in a
      former conversation with a friend, I particularly inquired if he
      had at any time met in London the Marchesa di Mentoni, (who for
      some years previous to her marriage had resided in that city,)
      when his answer, if I mistake not, gave me to understand that he
      had never visited the metropolis of Great Britain. I might as
      well here mention, that I have more than once heard, (without, of
      course, giving credit to a report involving so many
      improbabilities,) that the person of whom I speak, was not only
      by birth, but in education, an _Englishman_.

“There is one painting,” said he, without being aware of my notice of
the tragedy—“there is still one painting which you have not seen.” And
throwing aside a drapery, he discovered a full-length portrait of the
Marchesa Aphrodite.

Human art could have done no more in the delineation of her superhuman
beauty. The same ethereal figure which stood before me the preceding
night upon the steps of the Ducal Palace, stood before me once again.
But in the expression of the countenance, which was beaming all over
with smiles, there still lurked (incomprehensible anomaly!) that fitful
stain of melancholy which will ever be found inseparable from the
perfection of the beautiful. Her right arm lay folded over her bosom.
With her left she pointed downward to a curiously fashioned vase. One
small, fairy foot, alone visible, barely touched the earth; and,
scarcely discernible in the brilliant atmosphere which seemed to
encircle and enshrine her loveliness, floated a pair of the most
delicately imagined wings. My glance fell from the painting to the
figure of my friend, and the vigorous words of Chapman’s _Bussy
D’Ambois_, quivered instinctively upon my lips:

    “He is up
There like a Roman statue!  He will stand
Till Death hath made him marble!”

      “Come,” he said at length, turning towards a table of richly
      enamelled and massive silver, upon which were a few goblets
      fantastically stained, together with two large Etruscan vases,
      fashioned in the same extraordinary model as that in the
      foreground of the portrait, and filled with what I supposed to be
      Johannisberger. “Come,” he said, abruptly, “let us drink! It is
      early—but let us drink. It is _indeed_ early,” he continued,
      musingly, as a cherub with a heavy golden hammer made the
      apartment ring with the first hour after sunrise: “It is _indeed_
      early—but what matters it? let us drink! Let us pour out an
      offering to yon solemn sun which these gaudy lamps and censers
      are so eager to subdue!” And, having made me pledge him in a
      bumper, he swallowed in rapid succession several goblets of the
      wine.

      “To dream,” he continued, resuming the tone of his desultory
      conversation, as he held up to the rich light of a censer one of
      the magnificent vases—“to dream has been the business of my life.
      I have therefore framed for myself, as you see, a bower of
      dreams. In the heart of Venice could I have erected a better? You
      behold around you, it is true, a medley of architectural
      embellishments. The chastity of Ionia is offended by antediluvian
      devices, and the sphynxes of Egypt are outstretched upon carpets
      of gold. Yet the effect is incongruous to the timid alone.
      Proprieties of place, and especially of time, are the bugbears
      which terrify mankind from the contemplation of the magnificent.
      Once I was myself a decorist; but that sublimation of folly has
      palled upon my soul. All this is now the fitter for my purpose.
      Like these arabesque censers, my spirit is writhing in fire, and
      the delirium of this scene is fashioning me for the wilder
      visions of that land of real dreams whither I am now rapidly
      departing.” He here paused abruptly, bent his head to his bosom,
      and seemed to listen to a sound which I could not hear. At
      length, erecting his frame, he looked upwards, and ejaculated the
      lines of the Bishop of Chichester:

     _“Stay for me there!  I will not fail_
     _To meet thee in that hollow vale.”_

      In the next instant, confessing the power of the wine, he threw
      himself at full-length upon an ottoman.

      A quick step was now heard upon the staircase, and a loud knock
      at the door rapidly succeeded. I was hastening to anticipate a
      second disturbance, when a page of Mentoni’s household burst into
      the room, and faltered out, in a voice choking with emotion, the
      incoherent words, “My mistress!—my mistress!—Poisoned!—poisoned!
      Oh, beautiful—oh, beautiful Aphrodite!”

      Bewildered, I flew to the ottoman, and endeavored to arouse the
      sleeper to a sense of the startling intelligence. But his limbs
      were rigid—his lips were livid—his lately beaming eyes were
      riveted in _death_. I staggered back towards the table—my hand
      fell upon a cracked and blackened goblet—and a consciousness of
      the entire and terrible truth flashed suddenly over my soul.




THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM


     Impia tortorum longos hic turba furores
     Sanguinis innocui, non satiata, aluit.
     Sospite nunc patria, fracto nunc funeris antro,
     Mors ubi dira fuit vita salusque patent.

[_Quatrain composed for the gates of a market to be erected upon the
site of the Jacobin Club House at Paris_.]

      I was sick—sick unto death with that long agony; and when they at
      length unbound me, and I was permitted to sit, I felt that my
      senses were leaving me. The sentence—the dread sentence of
      death—was the last of distinct accentuation which reached my
      ears. After that, the sound of the inquisitorial voices seemed
      merged in one dreamy indeterminate hum. It conveyed to my soul
      the idea of _revolution_—perhaps from its association in fancy
      with the burr of a mill wheel. This only for a brief period, for
      presently I heard no more. Yet, for a while, I saw—but with how
      terrible an exaggeration! I saw the lips of the black-robed
      judges. They appeared to me white—whiter than the sheet upon
      which I trace these words—and thin even to grotesqueness; thin
      with the intensity of their expression of firmness—of immoveable
      resolution—of stern contempt of human torture. I saw that the
      decrees of what to me was Fate, were still issuing from those
      lips. I saw them writhe with a deadly locution. I saw them
      fashion the syllables of my name; and I shuddered because no
      sound succeeded. I saw, too, for a few moments of delirious
      horror, the soft and nearly imperceptible waving of the sable
      draperies which enwrapped the walls of the apartment. And then my
      vision fell upon the seven tall candles upon the table. At first
      they wore the aspect of charity, and seemed white and slender
      angels who would save me; but then, all at once, there came a
      most deadly nausea over my spirit, and I felt every fibre in my
      frame thrill as if I had touched the wire of a galvanic battery,
      while the angel forms became meaningless spectres, with heads of
      flame, and I saw that from them there would be no help. And then
      there stole into my fancy, like a rich musical note, the thought
      of what sweet rest there must be in the grave. The thought came
      gently and stealthily, and it seemed long before it attained full
      appreciation; but just as my spirit came at length properly to
      feel and entertain it, the figures of the judges vanished, as if
      magically, from before me; the tall candles sank into
      nothingness; their flames went out utterly; the blackness of
      darkness supervened; all sensations appeared swallowed up in a
      mad rushing descent as of the soul into Hades. Then silence, and
      stillness, night were the universe.

      I had swooned; but still will not say that all of consciousness
      was lost. What of it there remained I will not attempt to define,
      or even to describe; yet all was not lost. In the deepest
      slumber—no! In delirium—no! In a swoon—no! In death—no! even in
      the grave all is not lost. Else there is no immortality for man.
      Arousing from the most profound of slumbers, we break the
      gossamer web of some dream. Yet in a second afterward, (so frail
      may that web have been) we remember not that we have dreamed. In
      the return to life from the swoon there are two stages; first,
      that of the sense of mental or spiritual; secondly, that of the
      sense of physical, existence. It seems probable that if, upon
      reaching the second stage, we could recall the impressions of the
      first, we should find these impressions eloquent in memories of
      the gulf beyond. And that gulf is—what? How at least shall we
      distinguish its shadows from those of the tomb? But if the
      impressions of what I have termed the first stage are not, at
      will, recalled, yet, after long interval, do they not come
      unbidden, while we marvel whence they come? He who has never
      swooned, is not he who finds strange palaces and wildly familiar
      faces in coals that glow; is not he who beholds floating in
      mid-air the sad visions that the many may not view; is not he who
      ponders over the perfume of some novel flower; is not he whose
      brain grows bewildered with the meaning of some musical cadence
      which has never before arrested his attention.

      Amid frequent and thoughtful endeavors to remember; amid earnest
      struggles to regather some token of the state of seeming
      nothingness into which my soul had lapsed, there have been
      moments when I have dreamed of success; there have been brief,
      very brief periods when I have conjured up remembrances which the
      lucid reason of a later epoch assures me could have had reference
      only to that condition of seeming unconsciousness. These shadows
      of memory tell, indistinctly, of tall figures that lifted and
      bore me in silence down—down—still down—till a hideous dizziness
      oppressed me at the mere idea of the interminableness of the
      descent. They tell also of a vague horror at my heart, on account
      of that heart’s unnatural stillness. Then comes a sense of sudden
      motionlessness throughout all things; as if those who bore me (a
      ghastly train!) had outrun, in their descent, the limits of the
      limitless, and paused from the wearisomeness of their toil. After
      this I call to mind flatness and dampness; and then all is
      madness—the madness of a memory which busies itself among
      forbidden things.

      Very suddenly there came back to my soul motion and sound—the
      tumultuous motion of the heart, and, in my ears, the sound of its
      beating. Then a pause in which all is blank. Then again sound,
      and motion, and touch—a tingling sensation pervading my frame.
      Then the mere consciousness of existence, without thought—a
      condition which lasted long. Then, very suddenly, thought, and
      shuddering terror, and earnest endeavor to comprehend my true
      state. Then a strong desire to lapse into insensibility. Then a
      rushing revival of soul and a successful effort to move. And now
      a full memory of the trial, of the judges, of the sable
      draperies, of the sentence, of the sickness, of the swoon. Then
      entire forgetfulness of all that followed; of all that a later
      day and much earnestness of endeavor have enabled me vaguely to
      recall.

      So far, I had not opened my eyes. I felt that I lay upon my back,
      unbound. I reached out my hand, and it fell heavily upon
      something damp and hard. There I suffered it to remain for many
      minutes, while I strove to imagine where and what I could be. I
      longed, yet dared not to employ my vision. I dreaded the first
      glance at objects around me. It was not that I feared to look
      upon things horrible, but that I grew aghast lest there should be
      nothing to see. At length, with a wild desperation at heart, I
      quickly unclosed my eyes. My worst thoughts, then, were
      confirmed. The blackness of eternal night encompassed me. I
      struggled for breath. The intensity of the darkness seemed to
      oppress and stifle me. The atmosphere was intolerably close. I
      still lay quietly, and made effort to exercise my reason. I
      brought to mind the inquisitorial proceedings, and attempted from
      that point to deduce my real condition. The sentence had passed;
      and it appeared to me that a very long interval of time had since
      elapsed. Yet not for a moment did I suppose myself actually dead.
      Such a supposition, notwithstanding what we read in fiction, is
      altogether inconsistent with real existence;—but where and in
      what state was I? The condemned to death, I knew, perished
      usually at the autos-da-fe, and one of these had been held on the
      very night of the day of my trial. Had I been remanded to my
      dungeon, to await the next sacrifice, which would not take place
      for many months? This I at once saw could not be. Victims had
      been in immediate demand. Moreover, my dungeon, as well as all
      the condemned cells at Toledo, had stone floors, and light was
      not altogether excluded.

      A fearful idea now suddenly drove the blood in torrents upon my
      heart, and for a brief period, I once more relapsed into
      insensibility. Upon recovering, I at once started to my feet,
      trembling convulsively in every fibre. I thrust my arms wildly
      above and around me in all directions. I felt nothing; yet
      dreaded to move a step, lest I should be impeded by the walls of
      a tomb. Perspiration burst from every pore, and stood in cold big
      beads upon my forehead. The agony of suspense grew at length
      intolerable, and I cautiously moved forward, with my arms
      extended, and my eyes straining from their sockets, in the hope
      of catching some faint ray of light. I proceeded for many paces;
      but still all was blackness and vacancy. I breathed more freely.
      It seemed evident that mine was not, at least, the most hideous
      of fates.

      And now, as I still continued to step cautiously onward, there
      came thronging upon my recollection a thousand vague rumors of
      the horrors of Toledo. Of the dungeons there had been strange
      things narrated—fables I had always deemed them—but yet strange,
      and too ghastly to repeat, save in a whisper. Was I left to
      perish of starvation in this subterranean world of darkness; or
      what fate, perhaps even more fearful, awaited me? That the result
      would be death, and a death of more than customary bitterness, I
      knew too well the character of my judges to doubt. The mode and
      the hour were all that occupied or distracted me.

      My outstretched hands at length encountered some solid
      obstruction. It was a wall, seemingly of stone masonry—very
      smooth, slimy, and cold. I followed it up; stepping with all the
      careful distrust with which certain antique narratives had
      inspired me. This process, however, afforded me no means of
      ascertaining the dimensions of my dungeon; as I might make its
      circuit, and return to the point whence I set out, without being
      aware of the fact; so perfectly uniform seemed the wall. I
      therefore sought the knife which had been in my pocket, when led
      into the inquisitorial chamber; but it was gone; my clothes had
      been exchanged for a wrapper of coarse serge. I had thought of
      forcing the blade in some minute crevice of the masonry, so as to
      identify my point of departure. The difficulty, nevertheless, was
      but trivial; although, in the disorder of my fancy, it seemed at
      first insuperable. I tore a part of the hem from the robe and
      placed the fragment at full length, and at right angles to the
      wall. In groping my way around the prison, I could not fail to
      encounter this rag upon completing the circuit. So, at least I
      thought: but I had not counted upon the extent of the dungeon, or
      upon my own weakness. The ground was moist and slippery. I
      staggered onward for some time, when I stumbled and fell. My
      excessive fatigue induced me to remain prostrate; and sleep soon
      overtook me as I lay.

      Upon awaking, and stretching forth an arm, I found beside me a
      loaf and a pitcher with water. I was too much exhausted to
      reflect upon this circumstance, but ate and drank with avidity.
      Shortly afterward, I resumed my tour around the prison, and with
      much toil came at last upon the fragment of the serge. Up to the
      period when I fell I had counted fifty-two paces, and upon
      resuming my walk, I had counted forty-eight more—when I arrived
      at the rag. There were in all, then, a hundred paces; and,
      admitting two paces to the yard, I presumed the dungeon to be
      fifty yards in circuit. I had met, however, with many angles in
      the wall, and thus I could form no guess at the shape of the
      vault, for vault I could not help supposing it to be.

      I had little object—certainly no hope—in these researches; but a
      vague curiosity prompted me to continue them. Quitting the wall,
      I resolved to cross the area of the enclosure. At first I
      proceeded with extreme caution, for the floor, although seemingly
      of solid material, was treacherous with slime. At length,
      however, I took courage, and did not hesitate to step firmly;
      endeavoring to cross in as direct a line as possible. I had
      advanced some ten or twelve paces in this manner, when the
      remnant of the torn hem of my robe became entangled between my
      legs. I stepped on it, and fell violently on my face.

      In the confusion attending my fall, I did not immediately
      apprehend a somewhat startling circumstance, which yet, in a few
      seconds afterward, and while I still lay prostrate, arrested my
      attention. It was this: my chin rested upon the floor of the
      prison, but my lips and the upper portion of my head, although
      seemingly at a less elevation than the chin, touched nothing. At
      the same time my forehead seemed bathed in a clammy vapor, and
      the peculiar smell of decayed fungus arose to my nostrils. I put
      forward my arm, and shuddered to find that I had fallen at the
      very brink of a circular pit, whose extent, of course, I had no
      means of ascertaining at the moment. Groping about the masonry
      just below the margin, I succeeded in dislodging a small
      fragment, and let it fall into the abyss. For many seconds I
      hearkened to its reverberations as it dashed against the sides of
      the chasm in its descent; at length there was a sullen plunge
      into water, succeeded by loud echoes. At the same moment there
      came a sound resembling the quick opening, and as rapid closing
      of a door overhead, while a faint gleam of light flashed suddenly
      through the gloom, and as suddenly faded away.

      I saw clearly the doom which had been prepared for me, and
      congratulated myself upon the timely accident by which I had
      escaped. Another step before my fall, and the world had seen me
      no more. And the death just avoided, was of that very character
      which I had regarded as fabulous and frivolous in the tales
      respecting the Inquisition. To the victims of its tyranny, there
      was the choice of death with its direst physical agonies, or
      death with its most hideous moral horrors. I had been reserved
      for the latter. By long suffering my nerves had been unstrung,
      until I trembled at the sound of my own voice, and had become in
      every respect a fitting subject for the species of torture which
      awaited me.

      Shaking in every limb, I groped my way back to the wall—resolving
      there to perish rather than risk the terrors of the wells, of
      which my imagination now pictured many in various positions about
      the dungeon. In other conditions of mind I might have had courage
      to end my misery at once by a plunge into one of these abysses;
      but now I was the veriest of cowards. Neither could I forget what
      I had read of these pits—that the sudden extinction of life
      formed no part of their most horrible plan.

      Agitation of spirit kept me awake for many long hours, but at
      length I again slumbered. Upon arousing, I found by my side, as
      before, a loaf and a pitcher of water. A burning thirst consumed
      me, and I emptied the vessel at a draught. It must have been
      drugged—for scarcely had I drunk, before I became irresistibly
      drowsy. A deep sleep fell upon me—a sleep like that of death. How
      long it lasted of course, I know not; but when, once again, I
      unclosed my eyes, the objects around me were visible. By a wild
      sulphurous lustre, the origin of which I could not at first
      determine, I was enabled to see the extent and aspect of the
      prison.

      In its size I had been greatly mistaken. The whole circuit of its
      walls did not exceed twenty-five yards. For some minutes this
      fact occasioned me a world of vain trouble; vain indeed! for what
      could be of less importance, under the terrible circumstances
      which environed me, then the mere dimensions of my dungeon? But
      my soul took a wild interest in trifles, and I busied myself in
      endeavors to account for the error I had committed in my
      measurement. The truth at length flashed upon me. In my first
      attempt at exploration I had counted fifty-two paces, up to the
      period when I fell; I must then have been within a pace or two of
      the fragment of serge; in fact, I had nearly performed the
      circuit of the vault. I then slept—and, upon awaking, I must have
      returned upon my steps—thus supposing the circuit nearly double
      what it actually was. My confusion of mind prevented me from
      observing that I began my tour with the wall to the left, and
      ended it with the wall to the right.

      I had been deceived, too, in respect to the shape of the
      enclosure. In feeling my way I had found many angles, and thus
      deduced an idea of great irregularity; so potent is the effect of
      total darkness upon one arousing from lethargy or sleep! The
      angles were simply those of a few slight depressions, or niches,
      at odd intervals. The general shape of the prison was square.
      What I had taken for masonry seemed now to be iron, or some other
      metal, in huge plates, whose sutures or joints occasioned the
      depression. The entire surface of this metallic enclosure was
      rudely daubed in all the hideous and repulsive devices to which
      the charnel superstition of the monks has given rise. The figures
      of fiends in aspects of menace, with skeleton forms, and other
      more really fearful images, overspread and disfigured the walls.
      I observed that the outlines of these monstrosities were
      sufficiently distinct, but that the colors seemed faded and
      blurred, as if from the effects of a damp atmosphere. I now
      noticed the floor, too, which was of stone. In the centre yawned
      the circular pit from whose jaws I had escaped; but it was the
      only one in the dungeon.

      All this I saw indistinctly and by much effort—for my personal
      condition had been greatly changed during slumber. I now lay upon
      my back, and at full length, on a species of low framework of
      wood. To this I was securely bound by a long strap resembling a
      surcingle. It passed in many convolutions about my limbs and
      body, leaving at liberty only my head, and my left arm to such
      extent that I could, by dint of much exertion, supply myself with
      food from an earthen dish which lay by my side on the floor. I
      saw, to my horror, that the pitcher had been removed. I say to my
      horror—for I was consumed with intolerable thirst. This thirst it
      appeared to be the design of my persecutors to stimulate—for the
      food in the dish was meat pungently seasoned.

      Looking upward, I surveyed the ceiling of my prison. It was some
      thirty or forty feet overhead, and constructed much as the side
      walls. In one of its panels a very singular figure riveted my
      whole attention. It was the painted figure of Time as he is
      commonly represented, save that, in lieu of a scythe, he held
      what, at a casual glance, I supposed to be the pictured image of
      a huge pendulum such as we see on antique clocks. There was
      something, however, in the appearance of this machine which
      caused me to regard it more attentively. While I gazed directly
      upward at it (for its position was immediately over my own) I
      fancied that I saw it in motion. In an instant afterward the
      fancy was confirmed. Its sweep was brief, and of course slow. I
      watched it for some minutes, somewhat in fear, but more in
      wonder. Wearied at length with observing its dull movement, I
      turned my eyes upon the other objects in the cell.

      A slight noise attracted my notice, and, looking to the floor, I
      saw several enormous rats traversing it. They had issued from the
      well, which lay just within view to my right. Even then, while I
      gazed, they came up in troops, hurriedly, with ravenous eyes,
      allured by the scent of the meat. From this it required much
      effort and attention to scare them away.

      It might have been half an hour, perhaps even an hour, (for I
      could take but imperfect note of time) before I again cast my
      eyes upward. What I then saw confounded and amazed me. The sweep
      of the pendulum had increased in extent by nearly a yard. As a
      natural consequence, its velocity was also much greater. But what
      mainly disturbed me was the idea that had perceptibly descended.
      I now observed—with what horror it is needless to say—that its
      nether extremity was formed of a crescent of glittering steel,
      about a foot in length from horn to horn; the horns upward, and
      the under edge evidently as keen as that of a razor. Like a razor
      also, it seemed massy and heavy, tapering from the edge into a
      solid and broad structure above. It was appended to a weighty rod
      of brass, and the whole hissed as it swung through the air.

      I could no longer doubt the doom prepared for me by monkish
      ingenuity in torture. My cognizance of the pit had become known
      to the inquisitorial agents—_the pit_, whose horrors had been
      destined for so bold a recusant as myself—the pit, typical of
      hell, and regarded by rumor as the Ultima Thule of all their
      punishments. The plunge into this pit I had avoided by the merest
      of accidents, I knew that surprise, or entrapment into torment,
      formed an important portion of all the grotesquerie of these
      dungeon deaths. Having failed to fall, it was no part of the
      demon plan to hurl me into the abyss; and thus (there being no
      alternative) a different and a milder destruction awaited me.
      Milder! I half smiled in my agony as I thought of such
      application of such a term.

      What boots it to tell of the long, long hours of horror more than
      mortal, during which I counted the rushing vibrations of the
      steel! Inch by inch—line by line—with a descent only appreciable
      at intervals that seemed ages—down and still down it came! Days
      passed—it might have been that many days passed—ere it swept so
      closely over me as to fan me with its acrid breath. The odor of
      the sharp steel forced itself into my nostrils. I prayed—I
      wearied heaven with my prayer for its more speedy descent. I grew
      frantically mad, and struggled to force myself upward against the
      sweep of the fearful scimitar. And then I fell suddenly calm, and
      lay smiling at the glittering death, as a child at some rare
      bauble.

      There was another interval of utter insensibility; it was brief;
      for, upon again lapsing into life there had been no perceptible
      descent in the pendulum. But it might have been long; for I knew
      there were demons who took note of my swoon, and who could have
      arrested the vibration at pleasure. Upon my recovery, too, I felt
      very—oh! inexpressibly—sick and weak, as if through long
      inanition. Even amid the agonies of that period, the human nature
      craved food. With painful effort I outstretched my left arm as
      far as my bonds permitted, and took possession of the small
      remnant which had been spared me by the rats. As I put a portion
      of it within my lips, there rushed to my mind a half formed
      thought of joy—of hope. Yet what business had _I_ with hope? It
      was, as I say, a half formed thought—man has many such, which are
      never completed. I felt that it was of joy—of hope; but felt also
      that it had perished in its formation. In vain I struggled to
      perfect—to regain it. Long suffering had nearly annihilated all
      my ordinary powers of mind. I was an imbecile—an idiot.

      The vibration of the pendulum was at right angles to my length. I
      saw that the crescent was designed to cross the region of the
      heart. It would fray the serge of my robe—it would return and
      repeat its operations—again—and again. Notwithstanding its
      terrifically wide sweep (some thirty feet or more) and the
      hissing vigor of its descent, sufficient to sunder these very
      walls of iron, still the fraying of my robe would be all that,
      for several minutes, it would accomplish. And at this thought I
      paused. I dared not go farther than this reflection. I dwelt upon
      it with a pertinacity of attention—as if, in so dwelling, I could
      arrest here the descent of the steel. I forced myself to ponder
      upon the sound of the crescent as it should pass across the
      garment—upon the peculiar thrilling sensation which the friction
      of cloth produces on the nerves. I pondered upon all this
      frivolity until my teeth were on edge.

      Down—steadily down it crept. I took a frenzied pleasure in
      contrasting its downward with its lateral velocity. To the
      right—to the left—far and wide—with the shriek of a damned
      spirit! to my heart with the stealthy pace of the tiger! I
      alternately laughed and howled as the one or the other idea grew
      predominant.

      Down—certainly, relentlessly down! It vibrated within three
      inches of my bosom! I struggled violently, furiously, to free my
      left arm. This was free only from the elbow to the hand. I could
      reach the latter, from the platter beside me, to my mouth, with
      great effort, but no farther. Could I have broken the fastenings
      above the elbow, I would have seized and attempted to arrest the
      pendulum. I might as well have attempted to arrest an avalanche!

      Down—still unceasingly—still inevitably down! I gasped and
      struggled at each vibration. I shrunk convulsively at its every
      sweep. My eyes followed its outward or upward whirls with the
      eagerness of the most unmeaning despair; they closed themselves
      spasmodically at the descent, although death would have been a
      relief, oh, how unspeakable! Still I quivered in every nerve to
      think how slight a sinking of the machinery would precipitate
      that keen, glistening axe upon my bosom. It was hope that
      prompted the nerve to quiver—the frame to shrink. It was hope—the
      hope that triumphs on the rack—that whispers to the
      death-condemned even in the dungeons of the Inquisition.

      I saw that some ten or twelve vibrations would bring the steel in
      actual contact with my robe, and with this observation there
      suddenly came over my spirit all the keen, collected calmness of
      despair. For the first time during many hours—or perhaps days—I
      thought. It now occurred to me that the bandage, or surcingle,
      which enveloped me, was unique. I was tied by no separate cord.
      The first stroke of the razorlike crescent athwart any portion of
      the band, would so detach it that it might be unwound from my
      person by means of my left hand. But how fearful, in that case,
      the proximity of the steel! The result of the slightest struggle
      how deadly! Was it likely, moreover, that the minions of the
      torturer had not foreseen and provided for this possibility? Was
      it probable that the bandage crossed my bosom in the track of the
      pendulum? Dreading to find my faint, and, as it seemed, my last
      hope frustrated, I so far elevated my head as to obtain a
      distinct view of my breast. The surcingle enveloped my limbs and
      body close in all directions—save in the path of the destroying
      crescent.

      Scarcely had I dropped my head back into its original position,
      when there flashed upon my mind what I cannot better describe
      than as the unformed half of that idea of deliverance to which I
      have previously alluded, and of which a moiety only floated
      indeterminately through my brain when I raised food to my burning
      lips. The whole thought was now present—feeble, scarcely sane,
      scarcely definite,—but still entire. I proceeded at once, with
      the nervous energy of despair, to attempt its execution.

      For many hours the immediate vicinity of the low framework upon
      which I lay had been literally swarming with rats. They were
      wild, bold, ravenous—their red eyes glaring upon me as if they
      waited but for motionlessness on my part to make me their prey.
      “To what food,” I thought, “have they been accustomed in the
      well?”

      They had devoured, in spite of all my efforts to prevent them,
      all but a small remnant of the contents of the dish. I had fallen
      into an habitual see-saw, or wave of the hand about the platter;
      and, at length, the unconscious uniformity of the movement
      deprived it of effect. In their voracity the vermin frequently
      fastened their sharp fangs in my fingers. With the particles of
      the oily and spicy viand which now remained, I thoroughly rubbed
      the bandage wherever I could reach it; then, raising my hand from
      the floor, I lay breathlessly still.

      At first the ravenous animals were startled and terrified at the
      change—at the cessation of movement. They shrank alarmedly back;
      many sought the well. But this was only for a moment. I had not
      counted in vain upon their voracity. Observing that I remained
      without motion, one or two of the boldest leaped upon the
      frame-work, and smelt at the surcingle. This seemed the signal
      for a general rush. Forth from the well they hurried in fresh
      troops. They clung to the wood—they overran it, and leaped in
      hundreds upon my person. The measured movement of the pendulum
      disturbed them not at all. Avoiding its strokes they busied
      themselves with the anointed bandage. They pressed—they swarmed
      upon me in ever accumulating heaps. They writhed upon my throat;
      their cold lips sought my own; I was half stifled by their
      thronging pressure; disgust, for which the world has no name,
      swelled my bosom, and chilled, with a heavy clamminess, my heart.
      Yet one minute, and I felt that the struggle would be over.
      Plainly I perceived the loosening of the bandage. I knew that in
      more than one place it must be already severed. With a more than
      human resolution I lay still.

      Nor had I erred in my calculations—nor had I endured in vain. I
      at length felt that I was free. The surcingle hung in ribands
      from my body. But the stroke of the pendulum already pressed upon
      my bosom. It had divided the serge of the robe. It had cut
      through the linen beneath. Twice again it swung, and a sharp
      sense of pain shot through every nerve. But the moment of escape
      had arrived. At a wave of my hand my deliverers hurried
      tumultuously away. With a steady movement—cautious, sidelong,
      shrinking, and slow—I slid from the embrace of the bandage and
      beyond the reach of the scimitar. For the moment, at least, I was
      free.

      Free!—and in the grasp of the Inquisition! I had scarcely stepped
      from my wooden bed of horror upon the stone floor of the prison,
      when the motion of the hellish machine ceased and I beheld it
      drawn up, by some invisible force, through the ceiling. This was
      a lesson which I took desperately to heart. My every motion was
      undoubtedly watched. Free!—I had but escaped death in one form of
      agony, to be delivered unto worse than death in some other. With
      that thought I rolled my eves nervously around on the barriers of
      iron that hemmed me in. Something unusual—some change which, at
      first, I could not appreciate distinctly—it was obvious, had
      taken place in the apartment. For many minutes of a dreamy and
      trembling abstraction, I busied myself in vain, unconnected
      conjecture. During this period, I became aware, for the first
      time, of the origin of the sulphurous light which illumined the
      cell. It proceeded from a fissure, about half an inch in width,
      extending entirely around the prison at the base of the walls,
      which thus appeared, and were, completely separated from the
      floor. I endeavored, but of course in vain, to look through the
      aperture.

      As I arose from the attempt, the mystery of the alteration in the
      chamber broke at once upon my understanding. I have observed
      that, although the outlines of the figures upon the walls were
      sufficiently distinct, yet the colors seemed blurred and
      indefinite. These colors had now assumed, and were momentarily
      assuming, a startling and most intense brilliancy, that gave to
      the spectral and fiendish portraitures an aspect that might have
      thrilled even firmer nerves than my own. Demon eyes, of a wild
      and ghastly vivacity, glared upon me in a thousand directions,
      where none had been visible before, and gleamed with the lurid
      lustre of a fire that I could not force my imagination to regard
      as unreal.

      _Unreal!_—Even while I breathed there came to my nostrils the
      breath of the vapour of heated iron! A suffocating odour pervaded
      the prison! A deeper glow settled each moment in the eyes that
      glared at my agonies! A richer tint of crimson diffused itself
      over the pictured horrors of blood. I panted! I gasped for
      breath! There could be no doubt of the design of my
      tormentors—oh! most unrelenting! oh! most demoniac of men! I
      shrank from the glowing metal to the centre of the cell. Amid the
      thought of the fiery destruction that impended, the idea of the
      coolness of the well came over my soul like balm. I rushed to its
      deadly brink. I threw my straining vision below. The glare from
      the enkindled roof illumined its inmost recesses. Yet, for a wild
      moment, did my spirit refuse to comprehend the meaning of what I
      saw. At length it forced—it wrestled its way into my soul—it
      burned itself in upon my shuddering reason. Oh! for a voice to
      speak!—oh! horror!—oh! any horror but this! With a shriek, I
      rushed from the margin, and buried my face in my hands—weeping
      bitterly.

      The heat rapidly increased, and once again I looked up,
      shuddering as with a fit of the ague. There had been a second
      change in the cell—and now the change was obviously in the form.
      As before, it was in vain that I, at first, endeavoured to
      appreciate or understand what was taking place. But not long was
      I left in doubt. The Inquisitorial vengeance had been hurried by
      my two-fold escape, and there was to be no more dallying with the
      King of Terrors. The room had been square. I saw that two of its
      iron angles were now acute—two, consequently, obtuse. The fearful
      difference quickly increased with a low rumbling or moaning
      sound. In an instant the apartment had shifted its form into that
      of a lozenge. But the alteration stopped not here—I neither hoped
      nor desired it to stop. I could have clasped the red walls to my
      bosom as a garment of eternal peace. “Death,” I said, “any death
      but that of the pit!” Fool! might I have not known that into the
      pit it was the object of the burning iron to urge me? Could I
      resist its glow? or, if even that, could I withstand its
      pressure? And now, flatter and flatter grew the lozenge, with a
      rapidity that left me no time for contemplation. Its centre, and
      of course, its greatest width, came just over the yawning gulf. I
      shrank back—but the closing walls pressed me resistlessly onward.
      At length for my seared and writhing body there was no longer an
      inch of foothold on the firm floor of the prison. I struggled no
      more, but the agony of my soul found vent in one loud, long, and
      final scream of despair. I felt that I tottered upon the brink—I
      averted my eyes—

      There was a discordant hum of human voices! There was a loud
      blast as of many trumpets! There was a harsh grating as of a
      thousand thunders! The fiery walls rushed back! An outstretched
      arm caught my own as I fell, fainting, into the abyss. It was
      that of General Lasalle. The French army had entered Toledo. The
      Inquisition was in the hands of its enemies.




THE PREMATURE BURIAL


      There are certain themes of which the interest is all-absorbing,
      but which are too entirely horrible for the purposes of
      legitimate fiction. These the mere romanticist must eschew, if he
      do not wish to offend or to disgust. They are with propriety
      handled only when the severity and majesty of Truth sanctify and
      sustain them. We thrill, for example, with the most intense of
      “pleasurable pain” over the accounts of the Passage of the
      Beresina, of the Earthquake at Lisbon, of the Plague at London,
      of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, or of the stifling of the
      hundred and twenty-three prisoners in the Black Hole at Calcutta.
      But in these accounts it is the fact——it is the reality——it is
      the history which excites. As inventions, we should regard them
      with simple abhorrence.

      I have mentioned some few of the more prominent and august
      calamities on record; but in these it is the extent, not less
      than the character of the calamity, which so vividly impresses
      the fancy. I need not remind the reader that, from the long and
      weird catalogue of human miseries, I might have selected many
      individual instances more replete with essential suffering than
      any of these vast generalities of disaster. The true
      wretchedness, indeed—the ultimate woe——is particular, not
      diffuse. That the ghastly extremes of agony are endured by man
      the unit, and never by man the mass——for this let us thank a
      merciful God!

      To be buried while alive is, beyond question, the most terrific
      of these extremes which has ever fallen to the lot of mere
      mortality. That it has frequently, very frequently, so fallen
      will scarcely be denied by those who think. The boundaries which
      divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall
      say where the one ends, and where the other begins? We know that
      there are diseases in which occur total cessations of all the
      apparent functions of vitality, and yet in which these cessations
      are merely suspensions, properly so called. They are only
      temporary pauses in the incomprehensible mechanism. A certain
      period elapses, and some unseen mysterious principle again sets
      in motion the magic pinions and the wizard wheels. The silver
      cord was not for ever loosed, nor the golden bowl irreparably
      broken. But where, meantime, was the soul?

      Apart, however, from the inevitable conclusion, _a priori_ that
      such causes must produce such effects——that the well-known
      occurrence of such cases of suspended animation must naturally
      give rise, now and then, to premature interments—apart from this
      consideration, we have the direct testimony of medical and
      ordinary experience to prove that a vast number of such
      interments have actually taken place. I might refer at once, if
      necessary, to a hundred well-authenticated instances. One of very
      remarkable character, and of which the circumstances may be fresh
      in the memory of some of my readers, occurred, not very long ago,
      in the neighboring city of Baltimore, where it occasioned a
      painful, intense, and widely-extended excitement. The wife of one
      of the most respectable citizens—a lawyer of eminence and a
      member of Congress—was seized with a sudden and unaccountable
      illness, which completely baffled the skill of her physicians.
      After much suffering she died, or was supposed to die. No one
      suspected, indeed, or had reason to suspect, that she was not
      actually dead. She presented all the ordinary appearances of
      death. The face assumed the usual pinched and sunken outline. The
      lips were of the usual marble pallor. The eyes were lustreless.
      There was no warmth. Pulsation had ceased. For three days the
      body was preserved unburied, during which it had acquired a stony
      rigidity. The funeral, in short, was hastened, on account of the
      rapid advance of what was supposed to be decomposition.

      The lady was deposited in her family vault, which, for three
      subsequent years, was undisturbed. At the expiration of this term
      it was opened for the reception of a sarcophagus; but, alas! how
      fearful a shock awaited the husband, who, personally, threw open
      the door! As its portals swung outwardly back, some
      white-apparelled object fell rattling within his arms. It was the
      skeleton of his wife in her yet unmoulded shroud.

      A careful investigation rendered it evident that she had revived
      within two days after her entombment; that her struggles within
      the coffin had caused it to fall from a ledge, or shelf to the
      floor, where it was so broken as to permit her escape. A lamp
      which had been accidentally left, full of oil, within the tomb,
      was found empty; it might have been exhausted, however, by
      evaporation. On the uttermost of the steps which led down into
      the dread chamber was a large fragment of the coffin, with which,
      it seemed, that she had endeavored to arrest attention by
      striking the iron door. While thus occupied, she probably
      swooned, or possibly died, through sheer terror; and, in failing,
      her shroud became entangled in some iron-work which projected
      interiorly. Thus she remained, and thus she rotted, erect.

      In the year 1810, a case of living inhumation happened in France,
      attended with circumstances which go far to warrant the assertion
      that truth is, indeed, stranger than fiction. The heroine of the
      story was a Mademoiselle Victorine Lafourcade, a young girl of
      illustrious family, of wealth, and of great personal beauty.
      Among her numerous suitors was Julien Bossuet, a poor
      _litterateur_, or journalist of Paris. His talents and general
      amiability had recommended him to the notice of the heiress, by
      whom he seems to have been truly beloved; but her pride of birth
      decided her, finally, to reject him, and to wed a Monsieur
      Renelle, a banker and a diplomatist of some eminence. After
      marriage, however, this gentleman neglected, and, perhaps, even
      more positively ill-treated her. Having passed with him some
      wretched years, she died—at least her condition so closely
      resembled death as to deceive every one who saw her. She was
      buried——not in a vault, but in an ordinary grave in the village
      of her nativity. Filled with despair, and still inflamed by the
      memory of a profound attachment, the lover journeys from the
      capital to the remote province in which the village lies, with
      the romantic purpose of disinterring the corpse, and possessing
      himself of its luxuriant tresses. He reaches the grave. At
      midnight he unearths the coffin, opens it, and is in the act of
      detaching the hair, when he is arrested by the unclosing of the
      beloved eyes. In fact, the lady had been buried alive. Vitality
      had not altogether departed, and she was aroused by the caresses
      of her lover from the lethargy which had been mistaken for death.
      He bore her frantically to his lodgings in the village. He
      employed certain powerful restoratives suggested by no little
      medical learning. In fine, she revived. She recognized her
      preserver. She remained with him until, by slow degrees, she
      fully recovered her original health. Her woman’s heart was not
      adamant, and this last lesson of love sufficed to soften it. She
      bestowed it upon Bossuet. She returned no more to her husband,
      but, concealing from him her resurrection, fled with her lover to
      America. Twenty years afterward, the two returned to France, in
      the persuasion that time had so greatly altered the lady’s
      appearance that her friends would be unable to recognize her.
      They were mistaken, however, for, at the first meeting, Monsieur
      Renelle did actually recognize and make claim to his wife. This
      claim she resisted, and a judicial tribunal sustained her in her
      resistance, deciding that the peculiar circumstances, with the
      long lapse of years, had extinguished, not only equitably, but
      legally, the authority of the husband.

      The “Chirurgical Journal” of Leipsic, a periodical of high
      authority and merit, which some American bookseller would do well
      to translate and republish, records in a late number a very
      distressing event of the character in question.

      An officer of artillery, a man of gigantic stature and of robust
      health, being thrown from an unmanageable horse, received a very
      severe contusion upon the head, which rendered him insensible at
      once; the skull was slightly fractured, but no immediate danger
      was apprehended. Trepanning was accomplished successfully. He was
      bled, and many other of the ordinary means of relief were
      adopted. Gradually, however, he fell into a more and more
      hopeless state of stupor, and, finally, it was thought that he
      died.

      The weather was warm, and he was buried with indecent haste in
      one of the public cemeteries. His funeral took place on Thursday.
      On the Sunday following, the grounds of the cemetery were, as
      usual, much thronged with visitors, and about noon an intense
      excitement was created by the declaration of a peasant that,
      while sitting upon the grave of the officer, he had distinctly
      felt a commotion of the earth, as if occasioned by some one
      struggling beneath. At first little attention was paid to the
      man’s asseveration; but his evident terror, and the dogged
      obstinacy with which he persisted in his story, had at length
      their natural effect upon the crowd. Spades were hurriedly
      procured, and the grave, which was shamefully shallow, was in a
      few minutes so far thrown open that the head of its occupant
      appeared. He was then seemingly dead; but he sat nearly erect
      within his coffin, the lid of which, in his furious struggles, he
      had partially uplifted.

      He was forthwith conveyed to the nearest hospital, and there
      pronounced to be still living, although in an asphytic condition.
      After some hours he revived, recognized individuals of his
      acquaintance, and, in broken sentences spoke of his agonies in
      the grave.

      From what he related, it was clear that he must have been
      conscious of life for more than an hour, while inhumed, before
      lapsing into insensibility. The grave was carelessly and loosely
      filled with an exceedingly porous soil; and thus some air was
      necessarily admitted. He heard the footsteps of the crowd
      overhead, and endeavored to make himself heard in turn. It was
      the tumult within the grounds of the cemetery, he said, which
      appeared to awaken him from a deep sleep, but no sooner was he
      awake than he became fully aware of the awful horrors of his
      position.

      This patient, it is recorded, was doing well and seemed to be in
      a fair way of ultimate recovery, but fell a victim to the
      quackeries of medical experiment. The galvanic battery was
      applied, and he suddenly expired in one of those ecstatic
      paroxysms which, occasionally, it superinduces.

      The mention of the galvanic battery, nevertheless, recalls to my
      memory a well known and very extraordinary case in point, where
      its action proved the means of restoring to animation a young
      attorney of London, who had been interred for two days. This
      occurred in 1831, and created, at the time, a very profound
      sensation wherever it was made the subject of converse.

      The patient, Mr. Edward Stapleton, had died, apparently of typhus
      fever, accompanied with some anomalous symptoms which had excited
      the curiosity of his medical attendants. Upon his seeming
      decease, his friends were requested to sanction a post-mortem
      examination, but declined to permit it. As often happens, when
      such refusals are made, the practitioners resolved to disinter
      the body and dissect it at leisure, in private. Arrangements were
      easily effected with some of the numerous corps of
      body-snatchers, with which London abounds; and, upon the third
      night after the funeral, the supposed corpse was unearthed from a
      grave eight feet deep, and deposited in the opening chamber of
      one of the private hospitals.

      An incision of some extent had been actually made in the abdomen,
      when the fresh and undecayed appearance of the subject suggested
      an application of the battery. One experiment succeeded another,
      and the customary effects supervened, with nothing to
      characterize them in any respect, except, upon one or two
      occasions, a more than ordinary degree of life-likeness in the
      convulsive action.

      It grew late. The day was about to dawn; and it was thought
      expedient, at length, to proceed at once to the dissection. A
      student, however, was especially desirous of testing a theory of
      his own, and insisted upon applying the battery to one of the
      pectoral muscles. A rough gash was made, and a wire hastily
      brought in contact, when the patient, with a hurried but quite
      unconvulsive movement, arose from the table, stepped into the
      middle of the floor, gazed about him uneasily for a few seconds,
      and then—spoke. What he said was unintelligible, but words were
      uttered; the syllabification was distinct. Having spoken, he fell
      heavily to the floor.

      For some moments all were paralyzed with awe—but the urgency of
      the case soon restored them their presence of mind. It was seen
      that Mr. Stapleton was alive, although in a swoon. Upon
      exhibition of ether he revived and was rapidly restored to
      health, and to the society of his friends—from whom, however, all
      knowledge of his resuscitation was withheld, until a relapse was
      no longer to be apprehended. Their wonder—their rapturous
      astonishment—may be conceived.

      The most thrilling peculiarity of this incident, nevertheless, is
      involved in what Mr. S. himself asserts. He declares that at no
      period was he altogether insensible—that, dully and confusedly,
      he was aware of everything which happened to him, from the moment
      in which he was pronounced dead by his physicians, to that in
      which he fell swooning to the floor of the hospital. “I am
      alive,” were the uncomprehended words which, upon recognizing the
      locality of the dissecting-room, he had endeavored, in his
      extremity, to utter.

      It were an easy matter to multiply such histories as these—but I
      forbear—for, indeed, we have no need of such to establish the
      fact that premature interments occur. When we reflect how very
      rarely, from the nature of the case, we have it in our power to
      detect them, we must admit that they may frequently occur without
      our cognizance. Scarcely, in truth, is a graveyard ever
      encroached upon, for any purpose, to any great extent, that
      skeletons are not found in postures which suggest the most
      fearful of suspicions.

      Fearful indeed the suspicion—but more fearful the doom! It may be
      asserted, without hesitation, that no event is so terribly well
      adapted to inspire the supremeness of bodily and of mental
      distress, as is burial before death. The unendurable oppression
      of the lungs—the stifling fumes from the damp earth—the clinging
      to the death garments—the rigid embrace of the narrow house—the
      blackness of the absolute Night—the silence like a sea that
      overwhelms—the unseen but palpable presence of the Conqueror
      Worm—these things, with the thoughts of the air and grass above,
      with memory of dear friends who would fly to save us if but
      informed of our fate, and with consciousness that of this fate
      they can never be informed—that our hopeless portion is that of
      the really dead—these considerations, I say, carry into the
      heart, which still palpitates, a degree of appalling and
      intolerable horror from which the most daring imagination must
      recoil. We know of nothing so agonizing upon Earth—we can dream
      of nothing half so hideous in the realms of the nethermost Hell.
      And thus all narratives upon this topic have an interest
      profound; an interest, nevertheless, which, through the sacred
      awe of the topic itself, very properly and very peculiarly
      depends upon our conviction of the truth of the matter narrated.
      What I have now to tell is of my own actual knowledge—of my own
      positive and personal experience.

      For several years I had been subject to attacks of the singular
      disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy, in
      default of a more definitive title. Although both the immediate
      and the predisposing causes, and even the actual diagnosis, of
      this disease are still mysterious, its obvious and apparent
      character is sufficiently well understood. Its variations seem to
      be chiefly of degree. Sometimes the patient lies, for a day only,
      or even for a shorter period, in a species of exaggerated
      lethargy. He is senseless and externally motionless; but the
      pulsation of the heart is still faintly perceptible; some traces
      of warmth remain; a slight color lingers within the centre of the
      cheek; and, upon application of a mirror to the lips, we can
      detect a torpid, unequal, and vacillating action of the lungs.
      Then again the duration of the trance is for weeks—even for
      months; while the closest scrutiny, and the most rigorous medical
      tests, fail to establish any material distinction between the
      state of the sufferer and what we conceive of absolute death.
      Very usually he is saved from premature interment solely by the
      knowledge of his friends that he has been previously subject to
      catalepsy, by the consequent suspicion excited, and, above all,
      by the non-appearance of decay. The advances of the malady are,
      luckily, gradual. The first manifestations, although marked, are
      unequivocal. The fits grow successively more and more
      distinctive, and endure each for a longer term than the
      preceding. In this lies the principal security from inhumation.
      The unfortunate whose first attack should be of the extreme
      character which is occasionally seen, would almost inevitably be
      consigned alive to the tomb.

      My own case differed in no important particular from those
      mentioned in medical books. Sometimes, without any apparent
      cause, I sank, little by little, into a condition of
      semi-syncope, or half swoon; and, in this condition, without
      pain, without ability to stir, or, strictly speaking, to think,
      but with a dull lethargic consciousness of life and of the
      presence of those who surrounded my bed, I remained, until the
      crisis of the disease restored me, suddenly, to perfect
      sensation. At other times I was quickly and impetuously smitten.
      I grew sick, and numb, and chilly, and dizzy, and so fell
      prostrate at once. Then, for weeks, all was void, and black, and
      silent, and Nothing became the universe. Total annihilation could
      be no more. From these latter attacks I awoke, however, with a
      gradation slow in proportion to the suddenness of the seizure.
      Just as the day dawns to the friendless and houseless beggar who
      roams the streets throughout the long desolate winter night—just
      so tardily—just so wearily—just so cheerily came back the light
      of the Soul to me.

      Apart from the tendency to trance, however, my general health
      appeared to be good; nor could I perceive that it was at all
      affected by the one prevalent malady—unless, indeed, an
      idiosyncrasy in my ordinary sleep may be looked upon as
      superinduced. Upon awaking from slumber, I could never gain, at
      once, thorough possession of my senses, and always remained, for
      many minutes, in much bewilderment and perplexity—the mental
      faculties in general, but the memory in especial, being in a
      condition of absolute abeyance.

      In all that I endured there was no physical suffering but of
      moral distress an infinitude. My fancy grew charnel, I talked “of
      worms, of tombs, and epitaphs.” I was lost in reveries of death,
      and the idea of premature burial held continual possession of my
      brain. The ghastly Danger to which I was subjected haunted me day
      and night. In the former, the torture of meditation was
      excessive—in the latter, supreme. When the grim Darkness
      overspread the Earth, then, with every horror of thought, I
      shook—shook as the quivering plumes upon the hearse. When Nature
      could endure wakefulness no longer, it was with a struggle that I
      consented to sleep—for I shuddered to reflect that, upon awaking,
      I might find myself the tenant of a grave. And when, finally, I
      sank into slumber, it was only to rush at once into a world of
      phantasms, above which, with vast, sable, overshadowing wing,
      hovered, predominant, the one sepulchral Idea.

      From the innumerable images of gloom which thus oppressed me in
      dreams, I select for record but a solitary vision. Methought I
      was immersed in a cataleptic trance of more than usual duration
      and profundity. Suddenly there came an icy hand upon my forehead,
      and an impatient, gibbering voice whispered the word “Arise!”
      within my ear.

      I sat erect. The darkness was total. I could not see the figure
      of him who had aroused me. I could call to mind neither the
      period at which I had fallen into the trance, nor the locality in
      which I then lay. While I remained motionless, and busied in
      endeavors to collect my thought, the cold hand grasped me
      fiercely by the wrist, shaking it petulantly, while the gibbering
      voice said again:

      “Arise! did I not bid thee arise?”

      “And who,” I demanded, “art thou?”

      “I have no name in the regions which I inhabit,” replied the
      voice, mournfully; “I was mortal, but am fiend. I was merciless,
      but am pitiful. Thou dost feel that I shudder. My teeth chatter
      as I speak, yet it is not with the chilliness of the night—of the
      night without end. But this hideousness is insufferable. How
      canst thou tranquilly sleep? I cannot rest for the cry of these
      great agonies. These sights are more than I can bear. Get thee
      up! Come with me into the outer Night, and let me unfold to thee
      the graves. Is not this a spectacle of woe?—Behold!”

      I looked; and the unseen figure, which still grasped me by the
      wrist, had caused to be thrown open the graves of all mankind;
      and from each issued the faint phosphoric radiance of decay; so
      that I could see into the innermost recesses, and there view the
      shrouded bodies in their sad and solemn slumbers with the worm.
      But alas! the real sleepers were fewer, by many millions, than
      those who slumbered not at all; and there was a feeble
      struggling; and there was a general sad unrest; and from out the
      depths of the countless pits there came a melancholy rustling
      from the garments of the buried. And of those who seemed
      tranquilly to repose, I saw that a vast number had changed, in a
      greater or less degree, the rigid and uneasy position in which
      they had originally been entombed. And the voice again said to me
      as I gazed:

      “Is it not—oh! is it _not_ a pitiful sight?” But, before I could
      find words to reply, the figure had ceased to grasp my wrist, the
      phosphoric lights expired, and the graves were closed with a
      sudden violence, while from out them arose a tumult of despairing
      cries, saying again: “Is it not—O, God, is it _not_ a very
      pitiful sight?”

      Phantasies such as these, presenting themselves at night,
      extended their terrific influence far into my waking hours. My
      nerves became thoroughly unstrung, and I fell a prey to perpetual
      horror. I hesitated to ride, or to walk, or to indulge in any
      exercise that would carry me from home. In fact, I no longer
      dared trust myself out of the immediate presence of those who
      were aware of my proneness to catalepsy, lest, falling into one
      of my usual fits, I should be buried before my real condition
      could be ascertained. I doubted the care, the fidelity of my
      dearest friends. I dreaded that, in some trance of more than
      customary duration, they might be prevailed upon to regard me as
      irrecoverable. I even went so far as to fear that, as I
      occasioned much trouble, they might be glad to consider any very
      protracted attack as sufficient excuse for getting rid of me
      altogether. It was in vain they endeavored to reassure me by the
      most solemn promises. I exacted the most sacred oaths, that under
      no circumstances they would bury me until decomposition had so
      materially advanced as to render farther preservation impossible.
      And, even then, my mortal terrors would listen to no reason—would
      accept no consolation. I entered into a series of elaborate
      precautions. Among other things, I had the family vault so
      remodelled as to admit of being readily opened from within. The
      slightest pressure upon a long lever that extended far into the
      tomb would cause the iron portal to fly back. There were
      arrangements also for the free admission of air and light, and
      convenient receptacles for food and water, within immediate reach
      of the coffin intended for my reception. This coffin was warmly
      and softly padded, and was provided with a lid, fashioned upon
      the principle of the vault-door, with the addition of springs so
      contrived that the feeblest movement of the body would be
      sufficient to set it at liberty. Besides all this, there was
      suspended from the roof of the tomb, a large bell, the rope of
      which, it was designed, should extend through a hole in the
      coffin, and so be fastened to one of the hands of the corpse.
      But, alas? what avails the vigilance against the Destiny of man?
      Not even these well-contrived securities sufficed to save from
      the uttermost agonies of living inhumation, a wretch to these
      agonies foredoomed!

      There arrived an epoch—as often before there had arrived—in which
      I found myself emerging from total unconsciousness into the first
      feeble and indefinite sense of existence. Slowly—with a tortoise
      gradation—approached the faint gray dawn of the psychal day. A
      torpid uneasiness. An apathetic endurance of dull pain. No
      care—no hope—no effort. Then, after a long interval, a ringing in
      the ears; then, after a lapse still longer, a prickling or
      tingling sensation in the extremities; then a seemingly eternal
      period of pleasurable quiescence, during which the awakening
      feelings are struggling into thought; then a brief re-sinking
      into non-entity; then a sudden recovery. At length the slight
      quivering of an eyelid, and immediately thereupon, an electric
      shock of a terror, deadly and indefinite, which sends the blood
      in torrents from the temples to the heart. And now the first
      positive effort to think. And now the first endeavor to remember.
      And now a partial and evanescent success. And now the memory has
      so far regained its dominion, that, in some measure, I am
      cognizant of my state. I feel that I am not awaking from ordinary
      sleep. I recollect that I have been subject to catalepsy. And
      now, at last, as if by the rush of an ocean, my shuddering spirit
      is overwhelmed by the one grim Danger—by the one spectral and
      ever-prevalent idea.

      For some minutes after this fancy possessed me, I remained
      without motion. And why? I could not summon courage to move. I
      dared not make the effort which was to satisfy me of my fate—and
      yet there was something at my heart which whispered me it was
      sure. Despair—such as no other species of wretchedness ever calls
      into being—despair alone urged me, after long irresolution, to
      uplift the heavy lids of my eyes. I uplifted them. It was
      dark—all dark. I knew that the fit was over. I knew that the
      crisis of my disorder had long passed. I knew that I had now
      fully recovered the use of my visual faculties—and yet it was
      dark—all dark—the intense and utter raylessness of the Night that
      endureth for evermore.

      I endeavored to shriek; and my lips and my parched tongue moved
      convulsively together in the attempt—but no voice issued from the
      cavernous lungs, which oppressed as if by the weight of some
      incumbent mountain, gasped and palpitated, with the heart, at
      every elaborate and struggling inspiration.

      The movement of the jaws, in this effort to cry aloud, showed me
      that they were bound up, as is usual with the dead. I felt, too,
      that I lay upon some hard substance; and by something similar my
      sides were, also, closely compressed. So far, I had not ventured
      to stir any of my limbs—but now I violently threw up my arms,
      which had been lying at length, with the wrists crossed. They
      struck a solid wooden substance, which extended above my person
      at an elevation of not more than six inches from my face. I could
      no longer doubt that I reposed within a coffin at last.

      And now, amid all my infinite miseries, came sweetly the cherub
      Hope—for I thought of my precautions. I writhed, and made
      spasmodic exertions to force open the lid: it would not move. I
      felt my wrists for the bell-rope: it was not to be found. And now
      the Comforter fled for ever, and a still sterner Despair reigned
      triumphant; for I could not help perceiving the absence of the
      paddings which I had so carefully prepared—and then, too, there
      came suddenly to my nostrils the strong peculiar odor of moist
      earth. The conclusion was irresistible. I was not within the
      vault. I had fallen into a trance while absent from home—while
      among strangers—when, or how, I could not remember—and it was
      they who had buried me as a dog—nailed up in some common
      coffin—and thrust deep, deep, and for ever, into some ordinary
      and nameless grave.

      As this awful conviction forced itself, thus, into the innermost
      chambers of my soul, I once again struggled to cry aloud. And in
      this second endeavor I succeeded. A long, wild, and continuous
      shriek, or yell of agony, resounded through the realms of the
      subterranean Night.

      “Hillo! hillo, there!” said a gruff voice, in reply.

      “What the devil’s the matter now!” said a second.

      “Get out o’ that!” said a third.

      “What do you mean by yowling in that ere kind of style, like a
      cattymount?” said a fourth; and hereupon I was seized and shaken
      without ceremony, for several minutes, by a junto of very
      rough-looking individuals. They did not arouse me from my
      slumber—for I was wide awake when I screamed—but they restored me
      to the full possession of my memory.

      This adventure occurred near Richmond, in Virginia. Accompanied
      by a friend, I had proceeded, upon a gunning expedition, some
      miles down the banks of the James River. Night approached, and we
      were overtaken by a storm. The cabin of a small sloop lying at
      anchor in the stream, and laden with garden mould, afforded us
      the only available shelter. We made the best of it, and passed
      the night on board. I slept in one of the only two berths in the
      vessel—and the berths of a sloop of sixty or twenty tons need
      scarcely be described. That which I occupied had no bedding of
      any kind. Its extreme width was eighteen inches. The distance of
      its bottom from the deck overhead was precisely the same. I found
      it a matter of exceeding difficulty to squeeze myself in.
      Nevertheless, I slept soundly, and the whole of my vision—for it
      was no dream, and no nightmare—arose naturally from the
      circumstances of my position—from my ordinary bias of thought—and
      from the difficulty, to which I have alluded, of collecting my
      senses, and especially of regaining my memory, for a long time
      after awaking from slumber. The men who shook me were the crew of
      the sloop, and some laborers engaged to unload it. From the load
      itself came the earthly smell. The bandage about the jaws was a
      silk handkerchief in which I had bound up my head, in default of
      my customary nightcap.

      The tortures endured, however, were indubitably quite equal for
      the time, to those of actual sepulture. They were fearfully—they
      were inconceivably hideous; but out of Evil proceeded Good; for
      their very excess wrought in my spirit an inevitable revulsion.
      My soul acquired tone—acquired temper. I went abroad. I took
      vigorous exercise. I breathed the free air of Heaven. I thought
      upon other subjects than Death. I discarded my medical books.
      “Buchan” I burned. I read no “Night Thoughts”—no fustian about
      churchyards—no bugaboo tales—such as this. In short, I became a
      new man, and lived a man’s life. From that memorable night, I
      dismissed forever my charnel apprehensions, and with them
      vanished the cataleptic disorder, of which, perhaps, they had
      been less the consequence than the cause.

      There are moments when, even to the sober eye of Reason, the
      world of our sad Humanity may assume the semblance of a Hell—but
      the imagination of man is no Carathis, to explore with impunity
      its every cavern. Alas! the grim legion of sepulchral terrors
      cannot be regarded as altogether fanciful—but, like the Demons in
      whose company Afrasiab made his voyage down the Oxus, they must
      sleep, or they will devour us—they must be suffered to slumber,
      or we perish.




THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM


The garden like a lady fair was cut,
    That lay as if she slumbered in delight,
And to the open skies her eyes did shut.
    The azure fields of Heaven were ’sembled right
    In a large round, set with the flowers of light.
The flowers de luce, and the round sparks of dew
That hung upon their azure leaves did shew
Like twinkling stars that sparkle in the evening blue.
                    —_Giles Fletcher_.

      From his cradle to his grave a gale of prosperity bore my friend
      Ellison along. Nor do I use the word prosperity in its mere
      worldly sense. I mean it as synonymous with happiness. The person
      of whom I speak seemed born for the purpose of foreshadowing the
      doctrines of Turgot, Price, Priestley, and Condorcet—of
      exemplifying by individual instance what has been deemed the
      chimera of the perfectionists. In the brief existence of Ellison
      I fancy that I have seen refuted the dogma, that in man’s very
      nature lies some hidden principle, the antagonist of bliss. An
      anxious examination of his career has given me to understand that
      in general, from the violation of a few simple laws of humanity
      arises the wretchedness of mankind—that as a species we have in
      our possession the as yet unwrought elements of content—and that,
      even now, in the present darkness and madness of all thought on
      the great question of the social condition, it is not impossible
      that man, the individual, under certain unusual and highly
      fortuitous conditions, may be happy.

      With opinions such as these my young friend, too, was fully
      imbued, and thus it is worthy of observation that the
      uninterrupted enjoyment which distinguished his life was, in
      great measure, the result of preconcert. It is indeed evident
      that with less of the instinctive philosophy which, now and then,
      stands so well in the stead of experience, Mr. Ellison would have
      found himself precipitated, by the very extraordinary success of
      his life, into the common vortex of unhappiness which yawns for
      those of pre-eminent endowments. But it is by no means my object
      to pen an essay on happiness. The ideas of my friend may be
      summed up in a few words. He admitted but four elementary
      principles, or more strictly, conditions of bliss. That which he
      considered chief was (strange to say!) the simple and purely
      physical one of free exercise in the open air. “The health,” he
      said, “attainable by other means is scarcely worth the name.” He
      instanced the ecstasies of the fox-hunter, and pointed to the
      tillers of the earth, the only people who, as a class, can be
      fairly considered happier than others. His second condition was
      the love of woman. His third, and most difficult of realization,
      was the contempt of ambition. His fourth was an object of
      unceasing pursuit; and he held that, other things being equal,
      the extent of attainable happiness was in proportion to the
      spirituality of this object.

      Ellison was remarkable in the continuous profusion of good gifts
      lavished upon him by fortune. In personal grace and beauty he
      exceeded all men. His intellect was of that order to which the
      acquisition of knowledge is less a labor than an intuition and a
      necessity. His family was one of the most illustrious of the
      empire. His bride was the loveliest and most devoted of women.
      His possessions had been always ample; but on the attainment of
      his majority, it was discovered that one of those extraordinary
      freaks of fate had been played in his behalf which startle the
      whole social world amid which they occur, and seldom fail
      radically to alter the moral constitution of those who are their
      objects.

      It appears that about a hundred years before Mr. Ellison’s coming
      of age, there had died, in a remote province, one Mr. Seabright
      Ellison. This gentleman had amassed a princely fortune, and,
      having no immediate connections, conceived the whim of suffering
      his wealth to accumulate for a century after his decease.
      Minutely and sagaciously directing the various modes of
      investment, he bequeathed the aggregate amount to the nearest of
      blood, bearing the name of Ellison, who should be alive at the
      end of the hundred years. Many attempts had been made to set
      aside this singular bequest; their ex post facto character
      rendered them abortive; but the attention of a jealous government
      was aroused, and a legislative act finally obtained, forbidding
      all similar accumulations. This act, however, did not prevent
      young Ellison from entering into possession, on his twenty-first
      birthday, as the heir of his ancestor Seabright, of a fortune of
      four hundred and fifty millions of dollars. (*1)

      When it had become known that such was the enormous wealth
      inherited, there were, of course, many speculations as to the
      mode of its disposal. The magnitude and the immediate
      availability of the sum bewildered all who thought on the topic.
      The possessor of any appreciable amount of money might have been
      imagined to perform any one of a thousand things. With riches
      merely surpassing those of any citizen, it would have been easy
      to suppose him engaging to supreme excess in the fashionable
      extravagances of his time—or busying himself with political
      intrigue—or aiming at ministerial power—or purchasing increase of
      nobility—or collecting large museums of virtu—or playing the
      munificent patron of letters, of science, of art—or endowing, and
      bestowing his name upon extensive institutions of charity. But
      for the inconceivable wealth in the actual possession of the
      heir, these objects and all ordinary objects were felt to afford
      too limited a field. Recourse was had to figures, and these but
      sufficed to confound. It was seen that, even at three per cent.,
      the annual income of the inheritance amounted to no less than
      thirteen millions and five hundred thousand dollars; which was
      one million and one hundred and twenty-five thousand per month;
      or thirty-six thousand nine hundred and eighty-six per day; or
      one thousand five hundred and forty-one per hour; or six and
      twenty dollars for every minute that flew. Thus the usual track
      of supposition was thoroughly broken up. Men knew not what to
      imagine. There were some who even conceived that Mr. Ellison
      would divest himself of at least one-half of his fortune, as of
      utterly superfluous opulence—enriching whole troops of his
      relatives by division of his superabundance. To the nearest of
      these he did, in fact, abandon the very unusual wealth which was
      his own before the inheritance.

      I was not surprised, however, to perceive that he had long made
      up his mind on a point which had occasioned so much discussion to
      his friends. Nor was I greatly astonished at the nature of his
      decision. In regard to individual charities he had satisfied his
      conscience. In the possibility of any improvement, properly so
      called, being effected by man himself in the general condition of
      man, he had (I am sorry to confess it) little faith. Upon the
      whole, whether happily or unhappily, he was thrown back, in very
      great measure, upon self.

      In the widest and noblest sense he was a poet. He comprehended,
      moreover, the true character, the august aims, the supreme
      majesty and dignity of the poetic sentiment. The fullest, if not
      the sole proper satisfaction of this sentiment he instinctively
      felt to lie in the creation of novel forms of beauty. Some
      peculiarities, either in his early education, or in the nature of
      his intellect, had tinged with what is termed materialism all his
      ethical speculations; and it was this bias, perhaps, which led
      him to believe that the most advantageous at least, if not the
      sole legitimate field for the poetic exercise, lies in the
      creation of novel moods of purely physical loveliness. Thus it
      happened he became neither musician nor poet—if we use this
      latter term in its every-day acceptation. Or it might have been
      that he neglected to become either, merely in pursuance of his
      idea that in contempt of ambition is to be found one of the
      essential principles of happiness on earth. Is it not indeed,
      possible that, while a high order of genius is necessarily
      ambitious, the highest is above that which is termed ambition?
      And may it not thus happen that many far greater than Milton have
      contentedly remained “mute and inglorious?” I believe that the
      world has never seen—and that, unless through some series of
      accidents goading the noblest order of mind into distasteful
      exertion, the world will never see—that full extent of triumphant
      execution, in the richer domains of art, of which the human
      nature is absolutely capable.

      Ellison became neither musician nor poet; although no man lived
      more profoundly enamored of music and poetry. Under other
      circumstances than those which invested him, it is not impossible
      that he would have become a painter. Sculpture, although in its
      nature rigorously poetical was too limited in its extent and
      consequences, to have occupied, at any time, much of his
      attention. And I have now mentioned all the provinces in which
      the common understanding of the poetic sentiment has declared it
      capable of expatiating. But Ellison maintained that the richest,
      the truest, and most natural, if not altogether the most
      extensive province, had been unaccountably neglected. No
      definition had spoken of the landscape-gardener as of the poet;
      yet it seemed to my friend that the creation of the
      landscape-garden offered to the proper Muse the most magnificent
      of opportunities. Here, indeed, was the fairest field for the
      display of imagination in the endless combining of forms of novel
      beauty; the elements to enter into combination being, by a vast
      superiority, the most glorious which the earth could afford. In
      the multiform and multicolor of the flowers and the trees, he
      recognised the most direct and energetic efforts of Nature at
      physical loveliness. And in the direction or concentration of
      this effort—or, more properly, in its adaptation to the eyes
      which were to behold it on earth—he perceived that he should be
      employing the best means—laboring to the greatest advantage—in
      the fulfilment, not only of his own destiny as poet, but of the
      august purposes for which the Deity had implanted the poetic
      sentiment in man.

      “Its adaptation to the eyes which were to behold it on earth.” In
      his explanation of this phraseology, Mr. Ellison did much toward
      solving what has always seemed to me an enigma:—I mean the fact
      (which none but the ignorant dispute) that no such combination of
      scenery exists in nature as the painter of genius may produce. No
      such paradises are to be found in reality as have glowed on the
      canvas of Claude. In the most enchanting of natural landscapes,
      there will always be found a defect or an excess—many excesses
      and defects. While the component parts may defy, individually,
      the highest skill of the artist, the arrangement of these parts
      will always be susceptible of improvement. In short, no position
      can be attained on the wide surface of the natural earth, from
      which an artistical eye, looking steadily, will not find matter
      of offence in what is termed the “composition” of the landscape.
      And yet how unintelligible is this! In all other matters we are
      justly instructed to regard nature as supreme. With her details
      we shrink from competition. Who shall presume to imitate the
      colors of the tulip, or to improve the proportions of the lily of
      the valley? The criticism which says, of sculpture or
      portraiture, that here nature is to be exalted or idealized
      rather than imitated, is in error. No pictorial or sculptural
      combinations of points of human liveliness do more than approach
      the living and breathing beauty. In landscape alone is the
      principle of the critic true; and, having felt its truth here, it
      is but the headlong spirit of generalization which has led him to
      pronounce it true throughout all the domains of art. Having, I
      say, felt its truth here; for the feeling is no affectation or
      chimera. The mathematics afford no more absolute demonstrations
      than the sentiments of his art yields the artist. He not only
      believes, but positively knows, that such and such apparently
      arbitrary arrangements of matter constitute and alone constitute
      the true beauty. His reasons, however, have not yet been matured
      into expression. It remains for a more profound analysis than the
      world has yet seen, fully to investigate and express them.
      Nevertheless he is confirmed in his instinctive opinions by the
      voice of all his brethren. Let a “composition” be defective; let
      an emendation be wrought in its mere arrangement of form; let
      this emendation be submitted to every artist in the world; by
      each will its necessity be admitted. And even far more than this;
      in remedy of the defective composition, each insulated member of
      the fraternity would have suggested the identical emendation.

      I repeat that in landscape arrangements alone is the physical
      nature susceptible of exaltation, and that, therefore, her
      susceptibility of improvement at this one point, was a mystery I
      had been unable to solve. My own thoughts on the subject had
      rested in the idea that the primitive intention of nature would
      have so arranged the earth’s surface as to have fulfilled at all
      points man’s sense of perfection in the beautiful, the sublime,
      or the picturesque; but that this primitive intention had been
      frustrated by the known geological disturbances—disturbances of
      form and color—grouping, in the correction or allaying of which
      lies the soul of art. The force of this idea was much weakened,
      however, by the necessity which it involved of considering the
      disturbances abnormal and unadapted to any purpose. It was
      Ellison who suggested that they were prognostic of death. He thus
      explained:—Admit the earthly immortality of man to have been the
      first intention. We have then the primitive arrangement of the
      earth’s surface adapted to his blissful estate, as not existent
      but designed. The disturbances were the preparations for his
      subsequently conceived deathful condition.

      “Now,” said my friend, “what we regard as exaltation of the
      landscape may be really such, as respects only the moral or human
      point of view. Each alteration of the natural scenery may
      possibly effect a blemish in the picture, if we can suppose this
      picture viewed at large—in mass—from some point distant from the
      earth’s surface, although not beyond the limits of its
      atmosphere. It is easily understood that what might improve a
      closely scrutinized detail, may at the same time injure a general
      or more distantly observed effect. There may be a class of
      beings, human once, but now invisible to humanity, to whom, from
      afar, our disorder may seem order—our unpicturesqueness
      picturesque; in a word, the earth-angels, for whose scrutiny more
      especially than our own, and for whose death-refined appreciation
      of the beautiful, may have been set in array by God the wide
      landscape-gardens of the hemispheres.”

      In the course of discussion, my friend quoted some passages from
      a writer on landscape-gardening who has been supposed to have
      well treated his theme:

      “There are properly but two styles of landscape-gardening, the
      natural and the artificial. One seeks to recall the original
      beauty of the country, by adapting its means to the surrounding
      scenery, cultivating trees in harmony with the hills or plain of
      the neighboring land; detecting and bringing into practice those
      nice relations of size, proportion, and color which, hid from the
      common observer, are revealed everywhere to the experienced
      student of nature. The result of the natural style of gardening,
      is seen rather in the absence of all defects and incongruities—in
      the prevalence of a healthy harmony and order—than in the
      creation of any special wonders or miracles. The artificial style
      has as many varieties as there are different tastes to gratify.
      It has a certain general relation to the various styles of
      building. There are the stately avenues and retirements of
      Versailles; Italian terraces; and a various mixed old English
      style, which bears some relation to the domestic Gothic or
      English Elizabethan architecture. Whatever may be said against
      the abuses of the artificial landscape-gardening, a mixture of
      pure art in a garden scene adds to it a great beauty. This is
      partly pleasing to the eye, by the show of order and design, and
      partly moral. A terrace, with an old moss-covered balustrade,
      calls up at once to the eye the fair forms that have passed there
      in other days. The slightest exhibition of art is an evidence of
      care and human interest.”

      “From what I have already observed,” said Ellison, “you will
      understand that I reject the idea, here expressed, of recalling
      the original beauty of the country. The original beauty is never
      so great as that which may be introduced. Of course, every thing
      depends on the selection of a spot with capabilities. What is
      said about detecting and bringing into practice nice relations of
      size, proportion, and color, is one of those mere vaguenesses of
      speech which serve to veil inaccuracy of thought. The phrase
      quoted may mean any thing, or nothing, and guides in no degree.
      That the true result of the natural style of gardening is seen
      rather in the absence of all defects and incongruities than in
      the creation of any special wonders or miracles, is a proposition
      better suited to the grovelling apprehension of the herd than to
      the fervid dreams of the man of genius. The negative merit
      suggested appertains to that hobbling criticism which, in
      letters, would elevate Addison into apotheosis. In truth, while
      that virtue which consists in the mere avoidance of vice appeals
      directly to the understanding, and can thus be circumscribed in
      rule, the loftier virtue, which flames in creation, can be
      apprehended in its results alone. Rule applies but to the merits
      of denial—to the excellencies which refrain. Beyond these, the
      critical art can but suggest. We may be instructed to build a
      “Cato,” but we are in vain told how to conceive a Parthenon or an
      “Inferno.” The thing done, however; the wonder accomplished; and
      the capacity for apprehension becomes universal. The sophists of
      the negative school who, through inability to create, have
      scoffed at creation, are now found the loudest in applause. What,
      in its chrysalis condition of principle, affronted their demure
      reason, never fails, in its maturity of accomplishment, to extort
      admiration from their instinct of beauty.

      “The author’s observations on the artificial style,” continued
      Ellison, “are less objectionable. A mixture of pure art in a
      garden scene adds to it a great beauty. This is just; as also is
      the reference to the sense of human interest. The principle
      expressed is incontrovertible—but there may be something beyond
      it. There may be an object in keeping with the principle—an
      object unattainable by the means ordinarily possessed by
      individuals, yet which, if attained, would lend a charm to the
      landscape-garden far surpassing that which a sense of merely
      human interest could bestow. A poet, having very unusual
      pecuniary resources, might, while retaining the necessary idea of
      art or culture, or, as our author expresses it, of interest, so
      imbue his designs at once with extent and novelty of beauty, as
      to convey the sentiment of spiritual interference. It will be
      seen that, in bringing about such result, he secures all the
      advantages of interest or design, while relieving his work of the
      harshness or technicality of the worldly art. In the most rugged
      of wildernesses—in the most savage of the scenes of pure
      nature—there is apparent the art of a creator; yet this art is
      apparent to reflection only; in no respect has it the obvious
      force of a feeling. Now let us suppose this sense of the Almighty
      design to be one step depressed—to be brought into something like
      harmony or consistency with the sense of human art—to form an
      intermedium between the two:—let us imagine, for example, a
      landscape whose combined vastness and definitiveness—whose united
      beauty, magnificence, and strangeness, shall convey the idea of
      care, or culture, or superintendence, on the part of beings
      superior, yet akin to humanity—then the sentiment of interest is
      preserved, while the art intervolved is made to assume the air of
      an intermediate or secondary nature—a nature which is not God,
      nor an emanation from God, but which still is nature in the sense
      of the handiwork of the angels that hover between man and God.”

      It was in devoting his enormous wealth to the embodiment of a
      vision such as this—in the free exercise in the open air ensured
      by the personal superintendence of his plans—in the unceasing
      object which these plans afforded—in the high spirituality of the
      object—in the contempt of ambition which it enabled him truly to
      feel—in the perennial springs with which it gratified, without
      possibility of satiating, that one master passion of his soul,
      the thirst for beauty, above all, it was in the sympathy of a
      woman, not unwomanly, whose loveliness and love enveloped his
      existence in the purple atmosphere of Paradise, that Ellison
      thought to find, and found, exemption from the ordinary cares of
      humanity, with a far greater amount of positive happiness than
      ever glowed in the rapt day-dreams of De Staël.

      I despair of conveying to the reader any distinct conception of
      the marvels which my friend did actually accomplish. I wish to
      describe, but am disheartened by the difficulty of description,
      and hesitate between detail and generality. Perhaps the better
      course will be to unite the two in their extremes.

      Mr. Ellison’s first step regarded, of course, the choice of a
      locality, and scarcely had he commenced thinking on this point,
      when the luxuriant nature of the Pacific Islands arrested his
      attention. In fact, he had made up his mind for a voyage to the
      South Seas, when a night’s reflection induced him to abandon the
      idea. “Were I misanthropic,” he said, “such a locale would suit
      me. The thoroughness of its insulation and seclusion, and the
      difficulty of ingress and egress, would in such case be the charm
      of charms; but as yet I am not Timon. I wish the composure but
      not the depression of solitude. There must remain with me a
      certain control over the extent and duration of my repose. There
      will be frequent hours in which I shall need, too, the sympathy
      of the poetic in what I have done. Let me seek, then, a spot not
      far from a populous city—whose vicinity, also, will best enable
      me to execute my plans.”

      In search of a suitable place so situated, Ellison travelled for
      several years, and I was permitted to accompany him. A thousand
      spots with which I was enraptured he rejected without hesitation,
      for reasons which satisfied me, in the end, that he was right. We
      came at length to an elevated table-land of wonderful fertility
      and beauty, affording a panoramic prospect very little less in
      extent than that of Aetna, and, in Ellison’s opinion as well as
      my own, surpassing the far-famed view from that mountain in all
      the true elements of the picturesque.

      “I am aware,” said the traveller, as he drew a sigh of deep
      delight after gazing on this scene, entranced, for nearly an
      hour, “I know that here, in my circumstances, nine-tenths of the
      most fastidious of men would rest content. This panorama is
      indeed glorious, and I should rejoice in it but for the excess of
      its glory. The taste of all the architects I have ever known
      leads them, for the sake of ‘prospect,’ to put up buildings on
      hill-tops. The error is obvious. Grandeur in any of its moods,
      but especially in that of extent, startles, excites—and then
      fatigues, depresses. For the occasional scene nothing can be
      better—for the constant view nothing worse. And, in the constant
      view, the most objectionable phase of grandeur is that of extent;
      the worst phase of extent, that of distance. It is at war with
      the sentiment and with the sense of seclusion—the sentiment and
      sense which we seek to humor in ‘retiring to the country.’ In
      looking from the summit of a mountain we cannot help feeling
      abroad in the world. The heart-sick avoid distant prospects as a
      pestilence.”

      It was not until toward the close of the fourth year of our
      search that we found a locality with which Ellison professed
      himself satisfied. It is, of course, needless to say where was
      the locality. The late death of my friend, in causing his domain
      to be thrown open to certain classes of visitors, has given to
      Arnheim a species of secret and subdued if not solemn celebrity,
      similar in kind, although infinitely superior in degree, to that
      which so long distinguished Fonthill.

      The usual approach to Arnheim was by the river. The visitor left
      the city in the early morning. During the forenoon he passed
      between shores of a tranquil and domestic beauty, on which grazed
      innumerable sheep, their white fleeces spotting the vivid green
      of rolling meadows. By degrees the idea of cultivation subsided
      into that of merely pastoral care. This slowly became merged in a
      sense of retirement—this again in a consciousness of solitude. As
      the evening approached, the channel grew more narrow; the banks
      more and more precipitous; and these latter were clothed in rich,
      more profuse, and more sombre foliage. The water increased in
      transparency. The stream took a thousand turns, so that at no
      moment could its gleaming surface be seen for a greater distance
      than a furlong. At every instant the vessel seemed imprisoned
      within an enchanted circle, having insuperable and impenetrable
      walls of foliage, a roof of ultramarine satin, and no floor—the
      keel balancing itself with admirable nicety on that of a phantom
      bark which, by some accident having been turned upside down,
      floated in constant company with the substantial one, for the
      purpose of sustaining it. The channel now became a gorge—although
      the term is somewhat inapplicable, and I employ it merely because
      the language has no word which better represents the most
      striking—not the most distinctive—feature of the scene. The
      character of gorge was maintained only in the height and
      parallelism of the shores; it was lost altogether in their other
      traits. The walls of the ravine (through which the clear water
      still tranquilly flowed) arose to an elevation of a hundred and
      occasionally of a hundred and fifty feet, and inclined so much
      toward each other as, in a great measure, to shut out the light
      of day; while the long plume-like moss which depended densely
      from the intertwining shrubberies overhead, gave the whole chasm
      an air of funereal gloom. The windings became more frequent and
      intricate, and seemed often as if returning in upon themselves,
      so that the voyager had long lost all idea of direction. He was,
      moreover, enwrapt in an exquisite sense of the strange. The
      thought of nature still remained, but her character seemed to
      have undergone modification, there was a weird symmetry, a
      thrilling uniformity, a wizard propriety in these her works. Not
      a dead branch—not a withered leaf—not a stray pebble—not a patch
      of the brown earth was anywhere visible. The crystal water welled
      up against the clean granite, or the unblemished moss, with a
      sharpness of outline that delighted while it bewildered the eye.

      Having threaded the mazes of this channel for some hours, the
      gloom deepening every moment, a sharp and unexpected turn of the
      vessel brought it suddenly, as if dropped from heaven, into a
      circular basin of very considerable extent when compared with the
      width of the gorge. It was about two hundred yards in diameter,
      and girt in at all points but one—that immediately fronting the
      vessel as it entered—by hills equal in general height to the
      walls of the chasm, although of a thoroughly different character.
      Their sides sloped from the water’s edge at an angle of some
      forty-five degrees, and they were clothed from base to summit—not
      a perceptible point escaping—in a drapery of the most gorgeous
      flower-blossoms; scarcely a green leaf being visible among the
      sea of odorous and fluctuating color. This basin was of great
      depth, but so transparent was the water that the bottom, which
      seemed to consist of a thick mass of small round alabaster
      pebbles, was distinctly visible by glimpses—that is to say,
      whenever the eye could permit itself not to see, far down in the
      inverted heaven, the duplicate blooming of the hills. On these
      latter there were no trees, nor even shrubs of any size. The
      impressions wrought on the observer were those of richness,
      warmth, color, quietude, uniformity, softness, delicacy,
      daintiness, voluptuousness, and a miraculous extremeness of
      culture that suggested dreams of a new race of fairies,
      laborious, tasteful, magnificent, and fastidious; but as the eye
      traced upward the myriad-tinted slope, from its sharp junction
      with the water to its vague termination amid the folds of
      overhanging cloud, it became, indeed, difficult not to fancy a
      panoramic cataract of rubies, sapphires, opals, and golden
      onyxes, rolling silently out of the sky.

      The visitor, shooting suddenly into this bay from out the gloom
      of the ravine, is delighted but astounded by the full orb of the
      declining sun, which he had supposed to be already far below the
      horizon, but which now confronts him, and forms the sole
      termination of an otherwise limitless vista seen through another
      chasm-like rift in the hills.

      But here the voyager quits the vessel which has borne him so far,
      and descends into a light canoe of ivory, stained with arabesque
      devices in vivid scarlet, both within and without. The poop and
      beak of this boat arise high above the water, with sharp points,
      so that the general form is that of an irregular crescent. It
      lies on the surface of the bay with the proud grace of a swan. On
      its ermined floor reposes a single feathery paddle of satin-wood;
      but no oarsmen or attendant is to be seen. The guest is bidden to
      be of good cheer—that the fates will take care of him. The larger
      vessel disappears, and he is left alone in the canoe, which lies
      apparently motionless in the middle of the lake. While he
      considers what course to pursue, however, he becomes aware of a
      gentle movement in the fairy bark. It slowly swings itself around
      until its prow points toward the sun. It advances with a gentle
      but gradually accelerated velocity, while the slight ripples it
      creates seem to break about the ivory side in divinest
      melody—seem to offer the only possible explanation of the
      soothing yet melancholy music for whose unseen origin the
      bewildered voyager looks around him in vain.

      The canoe steadily proceeds, and the rocky gate of the vista is
      approached, so that its depths can be more distinctly seen. To
      the right arise a chain of lofty hills rudely and luxuriantly
      wooded. It is observed, however, that the trait of exquisite
      cleanness where the bank dips into the water, still prevails.
      There is not one token of the usual river _débris_. To the left
      the character of the scene is softer and more obviously
      artificial. Here the bank slopes upward from the stream in a very
      gentle ascent, forming a broad sward of grass of a texture
      resembling nothing so much as velvet, and of a brilliancy of
      green which would bear comparison with the tint of the purest
      emerald. This plateau varies in width from ten to three hundred
      yards; reaching from the river-bank to a wall, fifty feet high,
      which extends, in an infinity of curves, but following the
      general direction of the river, until lost in the distance to the
      westward. This wall is of one continuous rock, and has been
      formed by cutting perpendicularly the once rugged precipice of
      the stream’s southern bank, but no trace of the labor has been
      suffered to remain. The chiselled stone has the hue of ages, and
      is profusely overhung and overspread with the ivy, the coral
      honeysuckle, the eglantine, and the clematis. The uniformity of
      the top and bottom lines of the wall is fully relieved by
      occasional trees of gigantic height, growing singly or in small
      groups, both along the plateau and in the domain behind the wall,
      but in close proximity to it; so that frequent limbs (of the
      black walnut especially) reach over and dip their pendent
      extremities into the water. Farther back within the domain, the
      vision is impeded by an impenetrable screen of foliage.

      These things are observed during the canoe’s gradual approach to
      what I have called the gate of the vista. On drawing nearer to
      this, however, its chasm-like appearance vanishes; a new outlet
      from the bay is discovered to the left—in which direction the
      wall is also seen to sweep, still following the general course of
      the stream. Down this new opening the eye cannot penetrate very
      far; for the stream, accompanied by the wall, still bends to the
      left, until both are swallowed up by the leaves.

      The boat, nevertheless, glides magically into the winding
      channel; and here the shore opposite the wall is found to
      resemble that opposite the wall in the straight vista. Lofty
      hills, rising occasionally into mountains, and covered with
      vegetation in wild luxuriance, still shut in the scene.

      Floating gently onward, but with a velocity slightly augmented,
      the voyager, after many short turns, finds his progress
      apparently barred by a gigantic gate or rather door of burnished
      gold, elaborately carved and fretted, and reflecting the direct
      rays of the now fast-sinking sun with an effulgence that seems to
      wreath the whole surrounding forest in flames. This gate is
      inserted in the lofty wall; which here appears to cross the river
      at right angles. In a few moments, however, it is seen that the
      main body of the water still sweeps in a gentle and extensive
      curve to the left, the wall following it as before, while a
      stream of considerable volume, diverging from the principal one,
      makes its way, with a slight ripple, under the door, and is thus
      hidden from sight. The canoe falls into the lesser channel and
      approaches the gate. Its ponderous wings are slowly and musically
      expanded. The boat glides between them, and commences a rapid
      descent into a vast amphitheatre entirely begirt with purple
      mountains, whose bases are laved by a gleaming river throughout
      the full extent of their circuit. Meantime the whole Paradise of
      Arnheim bursts upon the view. There is a gush of entrancing
      melody; there is an oppressive sense of strange sweet odor;—there
      is a dream-like intermingling to the eye of tall slender Eastern
      trees—bosky shrubberies—flocks of golden and crimson
      birds—lily-fringed lakes—meadows of violets, tulips, poppies,
      hyacinths, and tuberoses—long intertangled lines of silver
      streamlets—and, upspringing confusedly from amid all, a mass of
      semi-Gothic, semi-Saracenic architecture sustaining itself by
      miracle in mid-air, glittering in the red sunlight with a hundred
      oriels, minarets, and pinnacles; and seeming the phantom
      handiwork, conjointly, of the Sylphs, of the Fairies, of the
      Genii and of the Gnomes.




LANDOR’S COTTAGE


A Pendant to “The Domain of Arnheim”

      During A pedestrian trip last summer, through one or two of the
      river counties of New York, I found myself, as the day declined,
      somewhat embarrassed about the road I was pursuing. The land
      undulated very remarkably; and my path, for the last hour, had
      wound about and about so confusedly, in its effort to keep in the
      valleys, that I no longer knew in what direction lay the sweet
      village of B——, where I had determined to stop for the night. The
      sun had scarcely shone—strictly speaking—during the day, which
      nevertheless, had been unpleasantly warm. A smoky mist,
      resembling that of the Indian summer, enveloped all things, and
      of course, added to my uncertainty. Not that I cared much about
      the matter. If I did not hit upon the village before sunset, or
      even before dark, it was more than possible that a little Dutch
      farmhouse, or something of that kind, would soon make its
      appearance—although, in fact, the neighborhood (perhaps on
      account of being more picturesque than fertile) was very sparsely
      inhabited. At all events, with my knapsack for a pillow, and my
      hound as a sentry, a bivouac in the open air was just the thing
      which would have amused me. I sauntered on, therefore, quite at
      ease—Ponto taking charge of my gun—until at length, just as I had
      begun to consider whether the numerous little glades that led
      hither and thither, were intended to be paths at all, I was
      conducted by one of them into an unquestionable carriage track.
      There could be no mistaking it. The traces of light wheels were
      evident; and although the tall shrubberies and overgrown
      undergrowth met overhead, there was no obstruction whatever
      below, even to the passage of a Virginian mountain wagon—the most
      aspiring vehicle, I take it, of its kind. The road, however,
      except in being open through the wood—if wood be not too weighty
      a name for such an assemblage of light trees—and except in the
      particulars of evident wheel-tracks—bore no resemblance to any
      road I had before seen. The tracks of which I speak were but
      faintly perceptible—having been impressed upon the firm, yet
      pleasantly moist surface of—what looked more like green Genoese
      velvet than any thing else. It was grass, clearly—but grass such
      as we seldom see out of England—so short, so thick, so even, and
      so vivid in color. Not a single impediment lay in the
      wheel-route—not even a chip or dead twig. The stones that once
      obstructed the way had been carefully _placed_—not thrown—along
      the sides of the lane, so as to define its boundaries at bottom
      with a kind of half-precise, half-negligent, and wholly
      picturesque definition. Clumps of wild flowers grew everywhere,
      luxuriantly, in the interspaces.

      What to make of all this, of course I knew not. Here was art
      undoubtedly—that did not surprise me—all roads, in the ordinary
      sense, are works of art; nor can I say that there was much to
      wonder at in the mere excess of art manifested; all that seemed
      to have been done, might have been done here—with such natural
      “capabilities” (as they have it in the books on Landscape
      Gardening)—with very little labor and expense. No; it was not the
      amount but the character of the art which caused me to take a
      seat on one of the blossomy stones and gaze up and down this
      fairy-like avenue for half an hour or more in bewildered
      admiration. One thing became more and more evident the longer I
      gazed: an artist, and one with a most scrupulous eye for form,
      had superintended all these arrangements. The greatest care had
      been taken to preserve a due medium between the neat and graceful
      on the one hand, and the pittoresque, in the true sense of the
      Italian term, on the other. There were few straight, and no long
      uninterrupted lines. The same effect of curvature or of color
      appeared twice, usually, but not oftener, at any one point of
      view. Everywhere was variety in uniformity. It was a piece of
      “composition,” in which the most fastidiously critical taste
      could scarcely have suggested an emendation.

      I had turned to the right as I entered this road, and now,
      arising, I continued in the same direction. The path was so
      serpentine, that at no moment could I trace its course for more
      than two or three paces in advance. Its character did not undergo
      any material change.

      Presently the murmur of water fell gently upon my ear—and in a
      few moments afterward, as I turned with the road somewhat more
      abruptly than hitherto, I became aware that a building of some
      kind lay at the foot of a gentle declivity just before me. I
      could see nothing distinctly on account of the mist which
      occupied all the little valley below. A gentle breeze, however,
      now arose, as the sun was about descending; and while I remained
      standing on the brow of the slope, the fog gradually became
      dissipated into wreaths, and so floated over the scene.

      As it came fully into view—thus gradually as I describe it—piece
      by piece, here a tree, there a glimpse of water, and here again
      the summit of a chimney, I could scarcely help fancying that the
      whole was one of the ingenious illusions sometimes exhibited
      under the name of “vanishing pictures.”

      By the time, however, that the fog had thoroughly disappeared,
      the sun had made its way down behind the gentle hills, and
      thence, as if with a slight chassez to the south, had come again
      fully into sight, glaring with a purplish lustre through a chasm
      that entered the valley from the west. Suddenly, therefore—and as
      if by the hand of magic—this whole valley and every thing in it
      became brilliantly visible.

      The first _coup d’œil_, as the sun slid into the position
      described, impressed me very much as I have been impressed, when
      a boy, by the concluding scene of some well-arranged theatrical
      spectacle or melodrama. Not even the monstrosity of color was
      wanting; for the sunlight came out through the chasm, tinted all
      orange and purple; while the vivid green of the grass in the
      valley was reflected more or less upon all objects from the
      curtain of vapor that still hung overhead, as if loth to take its
      total departure from a scene so enchantingly beautiful.

      The little vale into which I thus peered down from under the fog
      canopy could not have been more than four hundred yards long;
      while in breadth it varied from fifty to one hundred and fifty or
      perhaps two hundred. It was most narrow at its northern
      extremity, opening out as it tended southwardly, but with no very
      precise regularity. The widest portion was within eighty yards of
      the southern extreme. The slopes which encompassed the vale could
      not fairly be called hills, unless at their northern face. Here a
      precipitous ledge of granite arose to a height of some ninety
      feet; and, as I have mentioned, the valley at this point was not
      more than fifty feet wide; but as the visitor proceeded
      southwardly from the cliff, he found on his right hand and on his
      left, declivities at once less high, less precipitous, and less
      rocky. All, in a word, sloped and softened to the south; and yet
      the whole vale was engirdled by eminences, more or less high,
      except at two points. One of these I have already spoken of. It
      lay considerably to the north of west, and was where the setting
      sun made its way, as I have before described, into the
      amphitheatre, through a cleanly cut natural cleft in the granite
      embankment; this fissure might have been ten yards wide at its
      widest point, so far as the eye could trace it. It seemed to lead
      up, up like a natural causeway, into the recesses of unexplored
      mountains and forests. The other opening was directly at the
      southern end of the vale. Here, generally, the slopes were
      nothing more than gentle inclinations, extending from east to
      west about one hundred and fifty yards. In the middle of this
      extent was a depression, level with the ordinary floor of the
      valley. As regards vegetation, as well as in respect to every
      thing else, the scene softened and sloped to the south. To the
      north—on the craggy precipice—a few paces from the verge—up
      sprang the magnificent trunks of numerous hickories, black
      walnuts, and chestnuts, interspersed with occasional oak; and the
      strong lateral branches thrown out by the walnuts especially,
      spread far over the edge of the cliff. Proceeding southwardly,
      the explorer saw, at first, the same class of trees, but less and
      less lofty and Salvatorish in character; then he saw the gentler
      elm, succeeded by the sassafras and locust—these again by the
      softer linden, red-bud, catalpa, and maple—these yet again by
      still more graceful and more modest varieties. The whole face of
      the southern declivity was covered with wild shrubbery alone—an
      occasional silver willow or white poplar excepted. In the bottom
      of the valley itself—(for it must be borne in mind that the
      vegetation hitherto mentioned grew only on the cliffs or
      hillsides)—were to be seen three insulated trees. One was an elm
      of fine size and exquisite form: it stood guard over the southern
      gate of the vale. Another was a hickory, much larger than the
      elm, and altogether a much finer tree, although both were
      exceedingly beautiful: it seemed to have taken charge of the
      northwestern entrance, springing from a group of rocks in the
      very jaws of the ravine, and throwing its graceful body, at an
      angle of nearly forty-five degrees, far out into the sunshine of
      the amphitheatre. About thirty yards east of this tree stood,
      however, the pride of the valley, and beyond all question the
      most magnificent tree I have ever seen, unless, perhaps, among
      the cypresses of the Itchiatuckanee. It was a triple-stemmed
      tulip-tree—the Liriodendron Tulipiferum—one of the natural order
      of magnolias. Its three trunks separated from the parent at about
      three feet from the soil, and diverging very slightly and
      gradually, were not more than four feet apart at the point where
      the largest stem shot out into foliage: this was at an elevation
      of about eighty feet. The whole height of the principal division
      was one hundred and twenty feet. Nothing can surpass in beauty
      the form, or the glossy, vivid green of the leaves of the
      tulip-tree. In the present instance they were fully eight inches
      wide; but their glory was altogether eclipsed by the gorgeous
      splendor of the profuse blossoms. Conceive, closely congregated,
      a million of the largest and most resplendent tulips! Only thus
      can the reader get any idea of the picture I would convey. And
      then the stately grace of the clean, delicately-granulated
      columnar stems, the largest four feet in diameter, at twenty from
      the ground. The innumerable blossoms, mingling with those of
      other trees scarcely less beautiful, although infinitely less
      majestic, filled the valley with more than Arabian perfumes.

      The general floor of the amphitheatre was grass of the same
      character as that I had found in the road; if anything, more
      deliciously soft, thick, velvety, and miraculously green. It was
      hard to conceive how all this beauty had been attained.

      I have spoken of two openings into the vale. From the one to the
      northwest issued a rivulet, which came, gently murmuring and
      slightly foaming, down the ravine, until it dashed against the
      group of rocks out of which sprang the insulated hickory. Here,
      after encircling the tree, it passed on a little to the north of
      east, leaving the tulip tree some twenty feet to the south, and
      making no decided alteration in its course until it came near the
      midway between the eastern and western boundaries of the valley.
      At this point, after a series of sweeps, it turned off at right
      angles and pursued a generally southern direction meandering as
      it went—until it became lost in a small lake of irregular figure
      (although roughly oval), that lay gleaming near the lower
      extremity of the vale. This lakelet was, perhaps, a hundred yards
      in diameter at its widest part. No crystal could be clearer than
      its waters. Its bottom, which could be distinctly seen, consisted
      altogether, of pebbles brilliantly white. Its banks, of the
      emerald grass already described, rounded, rather than sloped, off
      into the clear heaven below; and so clear was this heaven, so
      perfectly, at times, did it reflect all objects above it, that
      where the true bank ended and where the mimic one commenced, it
      was a point of no little difficulty to determine. The trout, and
      some other varieties of fish, with which this pond seemed to be
      almost inconveniently crowded, had all the appearance of
      veritable flying-fish. It was almost impossible to believe that
      they were not absolutely suspended in the air. A light birch
      canoe that lay placidly on the water, was reflected in its
      minutest fibres with a fidelity unsurpassed by the most
      exquisitely polished mirror. A small island, fairly laughing with
      flowers in full bloom, and affording little more space than just
      enough for a picturesque little building, seemingly a
      fowl-house—arose from the lake not far from its northern shore—to
      which it was connected by means of an inconceivably light-looking
      and yet very primitive bridge. It was formed of a single, broad
      and thick plank of the tulip wood. This was forty feet long, and
      spanned the interval between shore and shore with a slight but
      very perceptible arch, preventing all oscillation. From the
      southern extreme of the lake issued a continuation of the
      rivulet, which, after meandering for, perhaps, thirty yards,
      finally passed through the “depression” (already described) in
      the middle of the southern declivity, and tumbling down a sheer
      precipice of a hundred feet, made its devious and unnoticed way
      to the Hudson.

      The lake was deep—at some points thirty feet—but the rivulet
      seldom exceeded three, while its greatest width was about eight.
      Its bottom and banks were as those of the pond—if a defect could
      have been attributed, in point of picturesqueness, it was that of
      excessive neatness.

      The expanse of the green turf was relieved, here and there, by an
      occasional showy shrub, such as the hydrangea, or the common
      snowball, or the aromatic seringa; or, more frequently, by a
      clump of geraniums blossoming gorgeously in great varieties.
      These latter grew in pots which were carefully buried in the
      soil, so as to give the plants the appearance of being
      indigenous. Besides all this, the lawn’s velvet was exquisitely
      spotted with sheep—a considerable flock of which roamed about the
      vale, in company with three tamed deer, and a vast number of
      brilliantly-plumed ducks. A very large mastiff seemed to be in
      vigilant attendance upon these animals, each and all.

      Along the eastern and western cliffs—where, toward the upper
      portion of the amphitheatre, the boundaries were more or less
      precipitous—grew ivy in great profusion—so that only here and
      there could even a glimpse of the naked rock be obtained. The
      northern precipice, in like manner, was almost entirely clothed
      by grape-vines of rare luxuriance; some springing from the soil
      at the base of the cliff, and others from ledges on its face.

      The slight elevation which formed the lower boundary of this
      little domain, was crowned by a neat stone wall, of sufficient
      height to prevent the escape of the deer. Nothing of the fence
      kind was observable elsewhere; for nowhere else was an artificial
      enclosure needed:—any stray sheep, for example, which should
      attempt to make its way out of the vale by means of the ravine,
      would find its progress arrested, after a few yards’ advance, by
      the precipitous ledge of rock over which tumbled the cascade that
      had arrested my attention as I first drew near the domain. In
      short, the only ingress or egress was through a gate occupying a
      rocky pass in the road, a few paces below the point at which I
      stopped to reconnoitre the scene.

      I have described the brook as meandering very irregularly through
      the whole of its course. Its two general directions, as I have
      said, were first from west to east, and then from north to south.
      At the turn, the stream, sweeping backward, made an almost
      circular loop, so as to form a peninsula which was very nearly an
      island, and which included about the sixteenth of an acre. On
      this peninsula stood a dwelling-house—and when I say that this
      house, like the infernal terrace seen by Vathek, “etait d’une
      architecture inconnue dans les annales de la terre,” I mean,
      merely, that its tout ensemble struck me with the keenest sense
      of combined novelty and propriety—in a word, of poetry—(for, than
      in the words just employed, I could scarcely give, of poetry in
      the abstract, a more rigorous definition)—and I do not mean that
      merely outre was perceptible in any respect.

      In fact nothing could well be more simple—more utterly
      unpretending than this cottage. Its marvellous effect lay
      altogether in its artistic arrangement as a picture. I could have
      fancied, while I looked at it, that some eminent
      landscape-painter had built it with his brush.

      The point of view from which I first saw the valley, was not
      altogether, although it was nearly, the best point from which to
      survey the house. I will therefore describe it as I afterwards
      saw it—from a position on the stone wall at the southern extreme
      of the amphitheatre.

      The main building was about twenty-four feet long and sixteen
      broad—certainly not more. Its total height, from the ground to
      the apex of the roof, could not have exceeded eighteen feet. To
      the west end of this structure was attached one about a third
      smaller in all its proportions:—the line of its front standing
      back about two yards from that of the larger house, and the line
      of its roof, of course, being considerably depressed below that
      of the roof adjoining. At right angles to these buildings, and
      from the rear of the main one—not exactly in the middle—extended
      a third compartment, very small—being, in general, one-third less
      than the western wing. The roofs of the two larger were very
      steep—sweeping down from the ridge-beam with a long concave
      curve, and extending at least four feet beyond the walls in
      front, so as to form the roofs of two piazzas. These latter
      roofs, of course, needed no support; but as they had the air of
      needing it, slight and perfectly plain pillars were inserted at
      the corners alone. The roof of the northern wing was merely an
      extension of a portion of the main roof. Between the chief
      building and western wing arose a very tall and rather slender
      square chimney of hard Dutch bricks, alternately black and red:—a
      slight cornice of projecting bricks at the top. Over the gables
      the roofs also projected very much:—in the main building about
      four feet to the east and two to the west. The principal door was
      not exactly in the main division, being a little to the
      east—while the two windows were to the west. These latter did not
      extend to the floor, but were much longer and narrower than
      usual—they had single shutters like doors—the panes were of
      lozenge form, but quite large. The door itself had its upper half
      of glass, also in lozenge panes—a movable shutter secured it at
      night. The door to the west wing was in its gable, and quite
      simple—a single window looked out to the south. There was no
      external door to the north wing, and it also had only one window
      to the east.

      The blank wall of the eastern gable was relieved by stairs (with
      a balustrade) running diagonally across it—the ascent being from
      the south. Under cover of the widely projecting eave these steps
      gave access to a door leading to the garret, or rather loft—for
      it was lighted only by a single window to the north, and seemed
      to have been intended as a store-room.

      The piazzas of the main building and western wing had no floors,
      as is usual; but at the doors and at each window, large, flat
      irregular slabs of granite lay imbedded in the delicious turf,
      affording comfortable footing in all weather. Excellent paths of
      the same material—not nicely adapted, but with the velvety sod
      filling frequent intervals between the stones, led hither and
      thither from the house, to a crystal spring about five paces off,
      to the road, or to one or two out-houses that lay to the north,
      beyond the brook, and were thoroughly concealed by a few locusts
      and catalpas.

      Not more than six steps from the main door of the cottage stood
      the dead trunk of a fantastic pear-tree, so clothed from head to
      foot in the gorgeous bignonia blossoms that one required no
      little scrutiny to determine what manner of sweet thing it could
      be. From various arms of this tree hung cages of different kinds.
      In one, a large wicker cylinder with a ring at top, revelled a
      mocking bird; in another an oriole; in a third the impudent
      bobolink—while three or four more delicate prisons were loudly
      vocal with canaries.

      The pillars of the piazza were enwreathed in jasmine and sweet
      honeysuckle; while from the angle formed by the main structure
      and its west wing, in front, sprang a grape-vine of unexampled
      luxuriance. Scorning all restraint, it had clambered first to the
      lower roof—then to the higher; and along the ridge of this latter
      it continued to writhe on, throwing out tendrils to the right and
      left, until at length it fairly attained the east gable, and fell
      trailing over the stairs.

      The whole house, with its wings, was constructed of the
      old-fashioned Dutch shingles—broad, and with unrounded corners.
      It is a peculiarity of this material to give houses built of it
      the appearance of being wider at bottom than at top—after the
      manner of Egyptian architecture; and in the present instance,
      this exceedingly picturesque effect was aided by numerous pots of
      gorgeous flowers that almost encompassed the base of the
      buildings.

      The shingles were painted a dull gray; and the happiness with
      which this neutral tint melted into the vivid green of the tulip
      tree leaves that partially overshadowed the cottage, can readily
      be conceived by an artist.

      From the position near the stone wall, as described, the
      buildings were seen at great advantage—for the southeastern angle
      was thrown forward—so that the eye took in at once the whole of
      the two fronts, with the picturesque eastern gable, and at the
      same time obtained just a sufficient glimpse of the northern
      wing, with parts of a pretty roof to the spring-house, and nearly
      half of a light bridge that spanned the brook in the near
      vicinity of the main buildings.

      I did not remain very long on the brow of the hill, although long
      enough to make a thorough survey of the scene at my feet. It was
      clear that I had wandered from the road to the village, and I had
      thus good traveller’s excuse to open the gate before me, and
      inquire my way, at all events; so, without more ado, I proceeded.

      The road, after passing the gate, seemed to lie upon a natural
      ledge, sloping gradually down along the face of the north-eastern
      cliffs. It led me on to the foot of the northern precipice, and
      thence over the bridge, round by the eastern gable to the front
      door. In this progress, I took notice that no sight of the
      out-houses could be obtained.

      As I turned the corner of the gable, the mastiff bounded towards
      me in stern silence, but with the eye and the whole air of a
      tiger. I held him out my hand, however, in token of amity—and I
      never yet knew the dog who was proof against such an appeal to
      his courtesy. He not only shut his mouth and wagged his tail, but
      absolutely offered me his paw—afterward extending his civilities
      to Ponto.

      As no bell was discernible, I rapped with my stick against the
      door, which stood half open. Instantly a figure advanced to the
      threshold—that of a young woman about twenty-eight years of
      age—slender, or rather slight, and somewhat above the medium
      height. As she approached, with a certain modest decision of step
      altogether indescribable. I said to myself, “Surely here I have
      found the perfection of natural, in contradistinction from
      artificial grace.” The second impression which she made on me,
      but by far the more vivid of the two, was that of enthusiasm. So
      intense an expression of romance, perhaps I should call it, or of
      unworldliness, as that which gleamed from her deep-set eyes, had
      never so sunk into my heart of hearts before. I know not how it
      is, but this peculiar expression of the eye, wreathing itself
      occasionally into the lips, is the most powerful, if not
      absolutely the sole spell, which rivets my interest in woman.
      “Romance,” provided my readers fully comprehended what I would
      here imply by the word—“romance” and “womanliness” seem to me
      convertible terms: and, after all, what man truly loves in woman,
      is simply her womanhood. The eyes of Annie (I heard some one from
      the interior call her “Annie, darling!”) were “spiritual grey;”
      her hair, a light chestnut: this is all I had time to observe of
      her.

      At her most courteous of invitations, I entered—passing first
      into a tolerably wide vestibule. Having come mainly to observe, I
      took notice that to my right as I stepped in, was a window, such
      as those in front of the house; to the left, a door leading into
      the principal room; while, opposite me, an open door enabled me
      to see a small apartment, just the size of the vestibule,
      arranged as a study, and having a large bow window looking out to
      the north.

      Passing into the parlor, I found myself with Mr. Landor—for this,
      I afterwards found, was his name. He was civil, even cordial in
      his manner, but just then, I was more intent on observing the
      arrangements of the dwelling which had so much interested me,
      than the personal appearance of the tenant.

      The north wing, I now saw, was a bed-chamber, its door opened
      into the parlor. West of this door was a single window, looking
      toward the brook. At the west end of the parlor, were a
      fireplace, and a door leading into the west wing—probably a
      kitchen.

      Nothing could be more rigorously simple than the furniture of the
      parlor. On the floor was an ingrain carpet, of excellent
      texture—a white ground, spotted with small circular green
      figures. At the windows were curtains of snowy white jaconet
      muslin: they were tolerably full, and hung decisively, perhaps
      rather formally in sharp, parallel plaits to the floor—just to
      the floor. The walls were prepared with a French paper of great
      delicacy, a silver ground, with a faint green cord running
      zig-zag throughout. Its expanse was relieved merely by three of
      Julien’s exquisite lithographs a trois crayons, fastened to the
      wall without frames. One of these drawings was a scene of
      Oriental luxury, or rather voluptuousness; another was a
      “carnival piece,” spirited beyond compare; the third was a Greek
      female head—a face so divinely beautiful, and yet of an
      expression so provokingly indeterminate, never before arrested my
      attention.

      The more substantial furniture consisted of a round table, a few
      chairs (including a large rocking-chair), and a sofa, or rather
      “settee;” its material was plain maple painted a creamy white,
      slightly interstriped with green; the seat of cane. The chairs
      and table were “to match,” but the forms of all had evidently
      been designed by the same brain which planned “the grounds;” it
      is impossible to conceive anything more graceful.

      On the table were a few books; a large, square, crystal bottle of
      some novel perfume; a plain ground glass _astral_ (not solar)
      lamp with an Italian shade; and a large vase of
      resplendently-blooming flowers. Flowers, indeed, of gorgeous
      colours and delicate odour formed the sole mere decoration of the
      apartment. The fire-place was nearly filled with a vase of
      brilliant geranium. On a triangular shelf in each angle of the
      room stood also a similar vase, varied only as to its lovely
      contents. One or two smaller bouquets adorned the mantel, and
      late violets clustered about the open windows.

      It is not the purpose of this work to do more than give in
      detail, a picture of Mr. Landor’s residence—as I found it. How he
      made it what it was—and why—with some particulars of Mr. Landor
      himself—may, possibly form the subject of another article.




WILLIAM WILSON


    What say of it? what say of CONSCIENCE grim,
    That spectre in my path?
                    —_Chamberlayne’s Pharronida._

      Let me call myself, for the present, William Wilson. The fair
      page now lying before me need not be sullied with my real
      appellation. This has been already too much an object for the
      scorn—for the horror—for the detestation of my race. To the
      uttermost regions of the globe have not the indignant winds
      bruited its unparalleled infamy? Oh, outcast of all outcasts most
      abandoned!—to the earth art thou not forever dead? to its honors,
      to its flowers, to its golden aspirations?—and a cloud, dense,
      dismal, and limitless, does it not hang eternally between thy
      hopes and heaven?

      I would not, if I could, here or to-day, embody a record of my
      later years of unspeakable misery, and unpardonable crime. This
      epoch—these later years—took unto themselves a sudden elevation
      in turpitude, whose origin alone it is my present purpose to
      assign. Men usually grow base by degrees. From me, in an instant,
      all virtue dropped bodily as a mantle. From comparatively trivial
      wickedness I passed, with the stride of a giant, into more than
      the enormities of an Elah-Gabalus. What chance—what one event
      brought this evil thing to pass, bear with me while I relate.
      Death approaches; and the shadow which foreruns him has thrown a
      softening influence over my spirit. I long, in passing through
      the dim valley, for the sympathy—I had nearly said for the
      pity—of my fellow men. I would fain have them believe that I have
      been, in some measure, the slave of circumstances beyond human
      control. I would wish them to seek out for me, in the details I
      am about to give, some little oasis of fatality amid a wilderness
      of error. I would have them allow—what they cannot refrain from
      allowing—that, although temptation may have erewhile existed as
      great, man was never thus, at least, tempted before—certainly,
      never thus fell. And is it therefore that he has never thus
      suffered? Have I not indeed been living in a dream? And am I not
      now dying a victim to the horror and the mystery of the wildest
      of all sublunary visions?

      I am the descendant of a race whose imaginative and easily
      excitable temperament has at all times rendered them remarkable;
      and, in my earliest infancy, I gave evidence of having fully
      inherited the family character. As I advanced in years it was
      more strongly developed; becoming, for many reasons, a cause of
      serious disquietude to my friends, and of positive injury to
      myself. I grew self-willed, addicted to the wildest caprices, and
      a prey to the most ungovernable passions. Weak-minded, and beset
      with constitutional infirmities akin to my own, my parents could
      do but little to check the evil propensities which distinguished
      me. Some feeble and ill-directed efforts resulted in complete
      failure on their part, and, of course, in total triumph on mine.
      Thenceforward my voice was a household law; and at an age when
      few children have abandoned their leading-strings, I was left to
      the guidance of my own will, and became, in all but name, the
      master of my own actions.

      My earliest recollections of a school-life, are connected with a
      large, rambling, Elizabethan house, in a misty-looking village of
      England, where were a vast number of gigantic and gnarled trees,
      and where all the houses were excessively ancient. In truth, it
      was a dream-like and spirit-soothing place, that venerable old
      town. At this moment, in fancy, I feel the refreshing chilliness
      of its deeply-shadowed avenues, inhale the fragrance of its
      thousand shrubberies, and thrill anew with undefinable delight,
      at the deep hollow note of the church-bell, breaking, each hour,
      with sullen and sudden roar, upon the stillness of the dusky
      atmosphere in which the fretted Gothic steeple lay imbedded and
      asleep.

      It gives me, perhaps, as much of pleasure as I can now in any
      manner experience, to dwell upon minute recollections of the
      school and its concerns. Steeped in misery as I am—misery, alas!
      only too real—I shall be pardoned for seeking relief, however
      slight and temporary, in the weakness of a few rambling details.
      These, moreover, utterly trivial, and even ridiculous in
      themselves, assume, to my fancy, adventitious importance, as
      connected with a period and a locality when and where I recognise
      the first ambiguous monitions of the destiny which afterwards so
      fully overshadowed me. Let me then remember.

      The house, I have said, was old and irregular. The grounds were
      extensive, and a high and solid brick wall, topped with a bed of
      mortar and broken glass, encompassed the whole. This prison-like
      rampart formed the limit of our domain; beyond it we saw but
      thrice a week—once every Saturday afternoon, when, attended by
      two ushers, we were permitted to take brief walks in a body
      through some of the neighbouring fields—and twice during Sunday,
      when we were paraded in the same formal manner to the morning and
      evening service in the one church of the village. Of this church
      the principal of our school was pastor. With how deep a spirit of
      wonder and perplexity was I wont to regard him from our remote
      pew in the gallery, as, with step solemn and slow, he ascended
      the pulpit! This reverend man, with countenance so demurely
      benign, with robes so glossy and so clerically flowing, with wig
      so minutely powdered, so rigid and so vast,—-could this be he
      who, of late, with sour visage, and in snuffy habiliments,
      administered, ferule in hand, the Draconian laws of the academy?
      Oh, gigantic paradox, too utterly monstrous for solution!

      At an angle of the ponderous wall frowned a more ponderous gate.
      It was riveted and studded with iron bolts, and surmounted with
      jagged iron spikes. What impressions of deep awe did it inspire!
      It was never opened save for the three periodical egressions and
      ingressions already mentioned; then, in every creak of its mighty
      hinges, we found a plenitude of mystery—a world of matter for
      solemn remark, or for more solemn meditation.

      The extensive enclosure was irregular in form, having many
      capacious recesses. Of these, three or four of the largest
      constituted the play-ground. It was level, and covered with fine
      hard gravel. I well remember it had no trees, nor benches, nor
      anything similar within it. Of course it was in the rear of the
      house. In front lay a small parterre, planted with box and other
      shrubs, but through this sacred division we passed only upon rare
      occasions indeed—such as a first advent to school or final
      departure thence, or perhaps, when a parent or friend having
      called for us, we joyfully took our way home for the Christmas or
      Midsummer holidays.

      But the house!—how quaint an old building was this!—to me how
      veritably a palace of enchantment! There was really no end to its
      windings—to its incomprehensible subdivisions. It was difficult,
      at any given time, to say with certainty upon which of its two
      stories one happened to be. From each room to every other there
      were sure to be found three or four steps either in ascent or
      descent. Then the lateral branches were
      innumerable—inconceivable—and so returning in upon themselves,
      that our most exact ideas in regard to the whole mansion were not
      very far different from those with which we pondered upon
      infinity. During the five years of my residence here, I was never
      able to ascertain with precision, in what remote locality lay the
      little sleeping apartment assigned to myself and some eighteen or
      twenty other scholars.

      The school-room was the largest in the house—I could not help
      thinking, in the world. It was very long, narrow, and dismally
      low, with pointed Gothic windows and a ceiling of oak. In a
      remote and terror-inspiring angle was a square enclosure of eight
      or ten feet, comprising the sanctum, “during hours,” of our
      principal, the Reverend Dr. Bransby. It was a solid structure,
      with massy door, sooner than open which in the absence of the
      “Dominie,” we would all have willingly perished by the _peine
      forte et dure_. In other angles were two other similar boxes, far
      less reverenced, indeed, but still greatly matters of awe. One of
      these was the pulpit of the “classical” usher, one of the
      “English and mathematical.” Interspersed about the room, crossing
      and recrossing in endless irregularity, were innumerable benches
      and desks, black, ancient, and time-worn, piled desperately with
      much-bethumbed books, and so beseamed with initial letters, names
      at full length, grotesque figures, and other multiplied efforts
      of the knife, as to have entirely lost what little of original
      form might have been their portion in days long departed. A huge
      bucket with water stood at one extremity of the room, and a clock
      of stupendous dimensions at the other.

      Encompassed by the massy walls of this venerable academy, I
      passed, yet not in tedium or disgust, the years of the third
      lustrum of my life. The teeming brain of childhood requires no
      external world of incident to occupy or amuse it; and the
      apparently dismal monotony of a school was replete with more
      intense excitement than my riper youth has derived from luxury,
      or my full manhood from crime. Yet I must believe that my first
      mental development had in it much of the uncommon—even much of
      the _outré_. Upon mankind at large the events of very early
      existence rarely leave in mature age any definite impression. All
      is gray shadow—a weak and irregular remembrance—an indistinct
      regathering of feeble pleasures and phantasmagoric pains. With me
      this is not so. In childhood I must have felt with the energy of
      a man what I now find stamped upon memory in lines as vivid, as
      deep, and as durable as the _exergues_ of the Carthaginian
      medals.

      Yet in fact—in the fact of the world’s view—how little was there
      to remember! The morning’s awakening, the nightly summons to bed;
      the connings, the recitations; the periodical half-holidays, and
      perambulations; the play-ground, with its broils, its pastimes,
      its intrigues;—these, by a mental sorcery long forgotten, were
      made to involve a wilderness of sensation, a world of rich
      incident, an universe of varied emotion, of excitement the most
      passionate and spirit-stirring. “_Oh, le bon temps, que ce siècle
      de fer!_”

      In truth, the ardor, the enthusiasm, and the imperiousness of my
      disposition, soon rendered me a marked character among my
      schoolmates, and by slow, but natural gradations, gave me an
      ascendancy over all not greatly older than myself;—over all with
      a single exception. This exception was found in the person of a
      scholar, who, although no relation, bore the same Christian and
      surname as myself;—a circumstance, in fact, little remarkable;
      for, notwithstanding a noble descent, mine was one of those
      everyday appellations which seem, by prescriptive right, to have
      been, time out of mind, the common property of the mob. In this
      narrative I have therefore designated myself as William Wilson,—a
      fictitious title not very dissimilar to the real. My namesake
      alone, of those who in school phraseology constituted “our set,”
      presumed to compete with me in the studies of the class—in the
      sports and broils of the play-ground—to refuse implicit belief in
      my assertions, and submission to my will—indeed, to interfere
      with my arbitrary dictation in any respect whatsoever. If there
      is on earth a supreme and unqualified despotism, it is the
      despotism of a master-mind in boyhood over the less energetic
      spirits of its companions.

      Wilson’s rebellion was to me a source of the greatest
      embarrassment; the more so as, in spite of the bravado with which
      in public I made a point of treating him and his pretensions, I
      secretly felt that I feared him, and could not help thinking the
      equality which he maintained so easily with myself, a proof of
      his true superiority; since not to be overcome cost me a
      perpetual struggle. Yet this superiority—even this equality—was
      in truth acknowledged by no one but myself; our associates, by
      some unaccountable blindness, seemed not even to suspect it.
      Indeed, his competition, his resistance, and especially his
      impertinent and dogged interference with my purposes, were not
      more pointed than private. He appeared to be destitute alike of
      the ambition which urged, and of the passionate energy of mind
      which enabled me to excel. In his rivalry he might have been
      supposed actuated solely by a whimsical desire to thwart,
      astonish, or mortify myself; although there were times when I
      could not help observing, with a feeling made up of wonder,
      abasement, and pique, that he mingled with his injuries, his
      insults, or his contradictions, a certain most inappropriate, and
      assuredly most unwelcome affectionateness of manner. I could only
      conceive this singular behavior to arise from a consummate
      self-conceit assuming the vulgar airs of patronage and
      protection.

      Perhaps it was this latter trait in Wilson’s conduct, conjoined
      with our identity of name, and the mere accident of our having
      entered the school upon the same day, which set afloat the notion
      that we were brothers, among the senior classes in the academy.
      These do not usually inquire with much strictness into the
      affairs of their juniors. I have before said, or should have
      said, that Wilson was not, in the most remote degree, connected
      with my family. But assuredly if we had been brothers we must
      have been twins; for, after leaving Dr. Bransby’s, I casually
      learned that my namesake was born on the nineteenth of January,
      1813—and this is a somewhat remarkable coincidence; for the day
      is precisely that of my own nativity.

      It may seem strange that in spite of the continual anxiety
      occasioned me by the rivalry of Wilson, and his intolerable
      spirit of contradiction, I could not bring myself to hate him
      altogether. We had, to be sure, nearly every day a quarrel in
      which, yielding me publicly the palm of victory, he, in some
      manner, contrived to make me feel that it was he who had deserved
      it; yet a sense of pride on my part, and a veritable dignity on
      his own, kept us always upon what are called “speaking terms,”
      while there were many points of strong congeniality in our
      tempers, operating to awake me in a sentiment which our position
      alone, perhaps, prevented from ripening into friendship. It is
      difficult, indeed, to define, or even to describe, my real
      feelings towards him. They formed a motley and heterogeneous
      admixture;—some petulant animosity, which was not yet hatred,
      some esteem, more respect, much fear, with a world of uneasy
      curiosity. To the moralist it will be unnecessary to say, in
      addition, that Wilson and myself were the most inseparable of
      companions.

      It was no doubt the anomalous state of affairs existing between
      us, which turned all my attacks upon him, (and they were many,
      either open or covert) into the channel of banter or practical
      joke (giving pain while assuming the aspect of mere fun) rather
      than into a more serious and determined hostility. But my
      endeavours on this head were by no means uniformly successful,
      even when my plans were the most wittily concocted; for my
      namesake had much about him, in character, of that unassuming and
      quiet austerity which, while enjoying the poignancy of its own
      jokes, has no heel of Achilles in itself, and absolutely refuses
      to be laughed at. I could find, indeed, but one vulnerable point,
      and that, lying in a personal peculiarity, arising, perhaps, from
      constitutional disease, would have been spared by any antagonist
      less at his wit’s end than myself;—my rival had a weakness in the
      faucal or guttural organs, which precluded him from raising his
      voice at any time above a very low whisper. Of this defect I did
      not fail to take what poor advantage lay in my power.

      Wilson’s retaliations in kind were many; and there was one form
      of his practical wit that disturbed me beyond measure. How his
      sagacity first discovered at all that so petty a thing would vex
      me, is a question I never could solve; but, having discovered, he
      habitually practised the annoyance. I had always felt aversion to
      my uncourtly patronymic, and its very common, if not plebeian
      praenomen. The words were venom in my ears; and when, upon the
      day of my arrival, a second William Wilson came also to the
      academy, I felt angry with him for bearing the name, and doubly
      disgusted with the name because a stranger bore it, who would be
      the cause of its twofold repetition, who would be constantly in
      my presence, and whose concerns, in the ordinary routine of the
      school business, must inevitably, on account of the detestable
      coincidence, be often confounded with my own.

      The feeling of vexation thus engendered grew stronger with every
      circumstance tending to show resemblance, moral or physical,
      between my rival and myself. I had not then discovered the
      remarkable fact that we were of the same age; but I saw that we
      were of the same height, and I perceived that we were even
      singularly alike in general contour of person and outline of
      feature. I was galled, too, by the rumor touching a relationship,
      which had grown current in the upper forms. In a word, nothing
      could more seriously disturb me, (although I scrupulously
      concealed such disturbance,) than any allusion to a similarity of
      mind, person, or condition existing between us. But, in truth, I
      had no reason to believe that (with the exception of the matter
      of relationship, and in the case of Wilson himself,) this
      similarity had ever been made a subject of comment, or even
      observed at all by our schoolfellows. That he observed it in all
      its bearings, and as fixedly as I, was apparent; but that he
      could discover in such circumstances so fruitful a field of
      annoyance, can only be attributed, as I said before, to his more
      than ordinary penetration.

      His cue, which was to perfect an imitation of myself, lay both in
      words and in actions; and most admirably did he play his part. My
      dress it was an easy matter to copy; my gait and general manner
      were, without difficulty, appropriated; in spite of his
      constitutional defect, even my voice did not escape him. My
      louder tones were, of course, unattempted, but then the key—it
      was identical; _and his singular whisper, it grew the very echo
      of my own_.

      How greatly this most exquisite portraiture harassed me, (for it
      could not justly be termed a caricature,) I will not now venture
      to describe. I had but one consolation—in the fact that the
      imitation, apparently, was noticed by myself alone, and that I
      had to endure only the knowing and strangely sarcastic smiles of
      my namesake himself. Satisfied with having produced in my bosom
      the intended effect, he seemed to chuckle in secret over the
      sting he had inflicted, and was characteristically disregardful
      of the public applause which the success of his witty endeavours
      might have so easily elicited. That the school, indeed, did not
      feel his design, perceive its accomplishment, and participate in
      his sneer, was, for many anxious months, a riddle I could not
      resolve. Perhaps the gradation of his copy rendered it not so
      readily perceptible; or, more possibly, I owed my security to the
      master air of the copyist, who, disdaining the letter, (which in
      a painting is all the obtuse can see,) gave but the full spirit
      of his original for my individual contemplation and chagrin.

      I have already more than once spoken of the disgusting air of
      patronage which he assumed toward me, and of his frequent
      officious interference with my will. This interference often took
      the ungracious character of advice; advice not openly given, but
      hinted or insinuated. I received it with a repugnance which
      gained strength as I grew in years. Yet, at this distant day, let
      me do him the simple justice to acknowledge that I can recall no
      occasion when the suggestions of my rival were on the side of
      those errors or follies so usual to his immature age and seeming
      inexperience; that his moral sense, at least, if not his general
      talents and worldly wisdom, was far keener than my own; and that
      I might, to-day, have been a better, and thus a happier man, had
      I less frequently rejected the counsels embodied in those meaning
      whispers which I then but too cordially hated and too bitterly
      despised.

      As it was, I at length grew restive in the extreme under his
      distasteful supervision, and daily resented more and more openly
      what I considered his intolerable arrogance. I have said that, in
      the first years of our connexion as schoolmates, my feelings in
      regard to him might have been easily ripened into friendship;
      but, in the latter months of my residence at the academy,
      although the intrusion of his ordinary manner had, beyond doubt,
      in some measure, abated, my sentiments, in nearly similar
      proportion, partook very much of positive hatred. Upon one
      occasion he saw this, I think, and afterwards avoided, or made a
      show of avoiding me.

      It was about the same period, if I remember aright, that, in an
      altercation of violence with him, in which he was more than
      usually thrown off his guard, and spoke and acted with an
      openness of demeanor rather foreign to his nature, I discovered,
      or fancied I discovered, in his accent, his air, and general
      appearance, a something which first startled, and then deeply
      interested me, by bringing to mind dim visions of my earliest
      infancy—wild, confused and thronging memories of a time when
      memory herself was yet unborn. I cannot better describe the
      sensation which oppressed me than by saying that I could with
      difficulty shake off the belief of my having been acquainted with
      the being who stood before me, at some epoch very long ago—some
      point of the past even infinitely remote. The delusion, however,
      faded rapidly as it came; and I mention it at all but to define
      the day of the last conversation I there held with my singular
      namesake.

      The huge old house, with its countless subdivisions, had several
      large chambers communicating with each other, where slept the
      greater number of the students. There were, however, (as must
      necessarily happen in a building so awkwardly planned,) many
      little nooks or recesses, the odds and ends of the structure; and
      these the economic ingenuity of Dr. Bransby had also fitted up as
      dormitories; although, being the merest closets, they were
      capable of accommodating but a single individual. One of these
      small apartments was occupied by Wilson.

      One night, about the close of my fifth year at the school, and
      immediately after the altercation just mentioned, finding every
      one wrapped in sleep, I arose from bed, and, lamp in hand, stole
      through a wilderness of narrow passages from my own bedroom to
      that of my rival. I had long been plotting one of those
      ill-natured pieces of practical wit at his expense in which I had
      hitherto been so uniformly unsuccessful. It was my intention,
      now, to put my scheme in operation, and I resolved to make him
      feel the whole extent of the malice with which I was imbued.
      Having reached his closet, I noiselessly entered, leaving the
      lamp, with a shade over it, on the outside. I advanced a step,
      and listened to the sound of his tranquil breathing. Assured of
      his being asleep, I returned, took the light, and with it again
      approached the bed. Close curtains were around it, which, in the
      prosecution of my plan, I slowly and quietly withdrew, when the
      bright rays fell vividly upon the sleeper, and my eyes, at the
      same moment, upon his countenance. I looked;—and a numbness, an
      iciness of feeling instantly pervaded my frame. My breast heaved,
      my knees tottered, my whole spirit became possessed with an
      objectless yet intolerable horror. Gasping for breath, I lowered
      the lamp in still nearer proximity to the face. Were these—these
      the lineaments of William Wilson? I saw, indeed, that they were
      his, but I shook as if with a fit of the ague in fancying they
      were not. What was there about them to confound me in this
      manner? I gazed;—while my brain reeled with a multitude of
      incoherent thoughts. Not thus he appeared—assuredly not thus—in
      the vivacity of his waking hours. The same name! the same contour
      of person! the same day of arrival at the academy! And then his
      dogged and meaningless imitation of my gait, my voice, my habits,
      and my manner! Was it, in truth, within the bounds of human
      possibility, that what I now saw was the result, merely, of the
      habitual practice of this sarcastic imitation? Awe-stricken, and
      with a creeping shudder, I extinguished the lamp, passed silently
      from the chamber, and left, at once, the halls of that old
      academy, never to enter them again.

      After a lapse of some months, spent at home in mere idleness, I
      found myself a student at Eton. The brief interval had been
      sufficient to enfeeble my remembrance of the events at Dr.
      Bransby’s, or at least to effect a material change in the nature
      of the feelings with which I remembered them. The truth—the
      tragedy—of the drama was no more. I could now find room to doubt
      the evidence of my senses; and seldom called up the subject at
      all but with wonder at extent of human credulity, and a smile at
      the vivid force of the imagination which I hereditarily
      possessed. Neither was this species of scepticism likely to be
      diminished by the character of the life I led at Eton. The vortex
      of thoughtless folly into which I there so immediately and so
      recklessly plunged, washed away all but the froth of my past
      hours, engulfed at once every solid or serious impression, and
      left to memory only the veriest levities of a former existence.

      I do not wish, however, to trace the course of my miserable
      profligacy here—a profligacy which set at defiance the laws,
      while it eluded the vigilance of the institution. Three years of
      folly, passed without profit, had but given me rooted habits of
      vice, and added, in a somewhat unusual degree, to my bodily
      stature, when, after a week of soulless dissipation, I invited a
      small party of the most dissolute students to a secret carousal
      in my chambers. We met at a late hour of the night; for our
      debaucheries were to be faithfully protracted until morning. The
      wine flowed freely, and there were not wanting other and perhaps
      more dangerous seductions; so that the gray dawn had already
      faintly appeared in the east, while our delirious extravagance
      was at its height. Madly flushed with cards and intoxication, I
      was in the act of insisting upon a toast of more than wonted
      profanity, when my attention was suddenly diverted by the
      violent, although partial unclosing of the door of the apartment,
      and by the eager voice of a servant from without. He said that
      some person, apparently in great haste, demanded to speak with me
      in the hall.

      Wildly excited with wine, the unexpected interruption rather
      delighted than surprised me. I staggered forward at once, and a
      few steps brought me to the vestibule of the building. In this
      low and small room there hung no lamp; and now no light at all
      was admitted, save that of the exceedingly feeble dawn which made
      its way through the semi-circular window. As I put my foot over
      the threshold, I became aware of the figure of a youth about my
      own height, and habited in a white kerseymere morning frock, cut
      in the novel fashion of the one I myself wore at the moment. This
      the faint light enabled me to perceive; but the features of his
      face I could not distinguish. Upon my entering he strode
      hurriedly up to me, and, seizing me by the arm with a gesture of
      petulant impatience, whispered the words “William Wilson!” in my
      ear.

      I grew perfectly sober in an instant.

      There was that in the manner of the stranger, and in the
      tremulous shake of his uplifted finger, as he held it between my
      eyes and the light, which filled me with unqualified amazement;
      but it was not this which had so violently moved me. It was the
      pregnancy of solemn admonition in the singular, low, hissing
      utterance; and, above all, it was the character, the tone, the
      key, of those few, simple, and familiar, yet whispered syllables,
      which came with a thousand thronging memories of bygone days, and
      struck upon my soul with the shock of a galvanic battery. Ere I
      could recover the use of my senses he was gone.

      Although this event failed not of a vivid effect upon my
      disordered imagination, yet was it evanescent as vivid. For some
      weeks, indeed, I busied myself in earnest inquiry, or was wrapped
      in a cloud of morbid speculation. I did not pretend to disguise
      from my perception the identity of the singular individual who
      thus perseveringly interfered with my affairs, and harassed me
      with his insinuated counsel. But who and what was this
      Wilson?—and whence came he?—and what were his purposes? Upon
      neither of these points could I be satisfied; merely
      ascertaining, in regard to him, that a sudden accident in his
      family had caused his removal from Dr. Bransby’s academy on the
      afternoon of the day in which I myself had eloped. But in a brief
      period I ceased to think upon the subject; my attention being all
      absorbed in a contemplated departure for Oxford. Thither I soon
      went; the uncalculating vanity of my parents furnishing me with
      an outfit and annual establishment, which would enable me to
      indulge at will in the luxury already so dear to my heart,—to vie
      in profuseness of expenditure with the haughtiest heirs of the
      wealthiest earldoms in Great Britain.

      Excited by such appliances to vice, my constitutional temperament
      broke forth with redoubled ardor, and I spurned even the common
      restraints of decency in the mad infatuation of my revels. But it
      were absurd to pause in the detail of my extravagance. Let it
      suffice, that among spendthrifts I out-Heroded Herod, and that,
      giving name to a multitude of novel follies, I added no brief
      appendix to the long catalogue of vices then usual in the most
      dissolute university of Europe.

      It could hardly be credited, however, that I had, even here, so
      utterly fallen from the gentlemanly estate, as to seek
      acquaintance with the vilest arts of the gambler by profession,
      and, having become an adept in his despicable science, to
      practise it habitually as a means of increasing my already
      enormous income at the expense of the weak-minded among my
      fellow-collegians. Such, nevertheless, was the fact. And the very
      enormity of this offence against all manly and honourable
      sentiment proved, beyond doubt, the main if not the sole reason
      of the impunity with which it was committed. Who, indeed, among
      my most abandoned associates, would not rather have disputed the
      clearest evidence of his senses, than have suspected of such
      courses, the gay, the frank, the generous William Wilson—the
      noblest and most liberal commoner at Oxford—him whose follies
      (said his parasites) were but the follies of youth and unbridled
      fancy—whose errors but inimitable whim—whose darkest vice but a
      careless and dashing extravagance?

      I had been now two years successfully busied in this way, when
      there came to the university a young parvenu nobleman,
      Glendinning—rich, said report, as Herodes Atticus—his riches,
      too, as easily acquired. I soon found him of weak intellect, and,
      of course, marked him as a fitting subject for my skill. I
      frequently engaged him in play, and contrived, with the gambler’s
      usual art, to let him win considerable sums, the more effectually
      to entangle him in my snares. At length, my schemes being ripe, I
      met him (with the full intention that this meeting should be
      final and decisive) at the chambers of a fellow-commoner, (Mr.
      Preston,) equally intimate with both, but who, to do him justice,
      entertained not even a remote suspicion of my design. To give to
      this a better coloring, I had contrived to have assembled a party
      of some eight or ten, and was solicitously careful that the
      introduction of cards should appear accidental, and originate in
      the proposal of my contemplated dupe himself. To be brief upon a
      vile topic, none of the low finesse was omitted, so customary
      upon similar occasions that it is a just matter for wonder how
      any are still found so besotted as to fall its victim.

      We had protracted our sitting far into the night, and I had at
      length effected the manoeuvre of getting Glendinning as my sole
      antagonist. The game, too, was my favorite _écarté!_ The rest of
      the company, interested in the extent of our play, had abandoned
      their own cards, and were standing around us as spectators. The
      _parvenu_, who had been induced by my artifices in the early part
      of the evening, to drink deeply, now shuffled, dealt, or played,
      with a wild nervousness of manner for which his intoxication, I
      thought, might partially, but could not altogether account. In a
      very short period he had become my debtor to a large amount,
      when, having taken a long draught of port, he did precisely what
      I had been coolly anticipating—he proposed to double our already
      extravagant stakes. With a well-feigned show of reluctance, and
      not until after my repeated refusal had seduced him into some
      angry words which gave a color of pique to my compliance, did I
      finally comply. The result, of course, did but prove how entirely
      the prey was in my toils: in less than an hour he had quadrupled
      his debt. For some time his countenance had been losing the
      florid tinge lent it by the wine; but now, to my astonishment, I
      perceived that it had grown to a pallor truly fearful. I say to
      my astonishment. Glendinning had been represented to my eager
      inquiries as immeasurably wealthy; and the sums which he had as
      yet lost, although in themselves vast, could not, I supposed,
      very seriously annoy, much less so violently affect him. That he
      was overcome by the wine just swallowed, was the idea which most
      readily presented itself; and, rather with a view to the
      preservation of my own character in the eyes of my associates,
      than from any less interested motive, I was about to insist,
      peremptorily, upon a discontinuance of the play, when some
      expressions at my elbow from among the company, and an
      ejaculation evincing utter despair on the part of Glendinning,
      gave me to understand that I had effected his total ruin under
      circumstances which, rendering him an object for the pity of all,
      should have protected him from the ill offices even of a fiend.

      What now might have been my conduct it is difficult to say. The
      pitiable condition of my dupe had thrown an air of embarrassed
      gloom over all; and, for some moments, a profound silence was
      maintained, during which I could not help feeling my cheeks
      tingle with the many burning glances of scorn or reproach cast
      upon me by the less abandoned of the party. I will even own that
      an intolerable weight of anxiety was for a brief instant lifted
      from my bosom by the sudden and extraordinary interruption which
      ensued. The wide, heavy folding doors of the apartment were all
      at once thrown open, to their full extent, with a vigorous and
      rushing impetuosity that extinguished, as if by magic, every
      candle in the room. Their light, in dying, enabled us just to
      perceive that a stranger had entered, about my own height, and
      closely muffled in a cloak. The darkness, however, was now total;
      and we could only feel that he was standing in our midst. Before
      any one of us could recover from the extreme astonishment into
      which this rudeness had thrown all, we heard the voice of the
      intruder.

      “Gentlemen,” he said, in a low, distinct, and
      never-to-be-forgotten whisper which thrilled to the very marrow
      of my bones, “Gentlemen, I make no apology for this behaviour,
      because in thus behaving, I am but fulfilling a duty. You are,
      beyond doubt, uninformed of the true character of the person who
      has to-night won at _écarté_ a large sum of money from Lord
      Glendinning. I will therefore put you upon an expeditious and
      decisive plan of obtaining this very necessary information.
      Please to examine, at your leisure, the inner linings of the cuff
      of his left sleeve, and the several little packages which may be
      found in the somewhat capacious pockets of his embroidered
      morning wrapper.”

      While he spoke, so profound was the stillness that one might have
      heard a pin drop upon the floor. In ceasing, he departed at once,
      and as abruptly as he had entered. Can I—shall I describe my
      sensations? Must I say that I felt all the horrors of the damned?
      Most assuredly I had little time given for reflection. Many hands
      roughly seized me upon the spot, and lights were immediately
      reprocured. A search ensued. In the lining of my sleeve were
      found all the court cards essential in _écarté_, and, in the
      pockets of my wrapper, a number of packs, facsimiles of those
      used at our sittings, with the single exception that mine were of
      the species called, technically, arrondees; the honours being
      slightly convex at the ends, the lower cards slightly convex at
      the sides. In this disposition, the dupe who cuts, as customary,
      at the length of the pack, will invariably find that he cuts his
      antagonist an honor; while the gambler, cutting at the breadth,
      will, as certainly, cut nothing for his victim which may count in
      the records of the game.

      Any burst of indignation upon this discovery would have affected
      me less than the silent contempt, or the sarcastic composure,
      with which it was received.

      “Mr. Wilson,” said our host, stooping to remove from beneath his
      feet an exceedingly luxurious cloak of rare furs, “Mr. Wilson,
      this is your property.” (The weather was cold; and, upon quitting
      my own room, I had thrown a cloak over my dressing wrapper,
      putting it off upon reaching the scene of play.) “I presume it is
      supererogatory to seek here (eyeing the folds of the garment with
      a bitter smile) for any farther evidence of your skill. Indeed,
      we have had enough. You will see the necessity, I hope, of
      quitting Oxford—at all events, of quitting instantly my
      chambers.”

      Abased, humbled to the dust as I then was, it is probable that I
      should have resented this galling language by immediate personal
      violence, had not my whole attention been at the moment arrested
      by a fact of the most startling character. The cloak which I had
      worn was of a rare description of fur; how rare, how
      extravagantly costly, I shall not venture to say. Its fashion,
      too, was of my own fantastic invention; for I was fastidious to
      an absurd degree of coxcombry, in matters of this frivolous
      nature. When, therefore, Mr. Preston reached me that which he had
      picked up upon the floor, and near the folding doors of the
      apartment, it was with an astonishment nearly bordering upon
      terror, that I perceived my own already hanging on my arm, (where
      I had no doubt unwittingly placed it,) and that the one presented
      me was but its exact counterpart in every, in even the minutest
      possible particular. The singular being who had so disastrously
      exposed me, had been muffled, I remembered, in a cloak; and none
      had been worn at all by any of the members of our party with the
      exception of myself. Retaining some presence of mind, I took the
      one offered me by Preston; placed it, unnoticed, over my own;
      left the apartment with a resolute scowl of defiance; and, next
      morning ere dawn of day, commenced a hurried journey from Oxford
      to the continent, in a perfect agony of horror and of shame.

      I fled in vain. My evil destiny pursued me as if in exultation,
      and proved, indeed, that the exercise of its mysterious dominion
      had as yet only begun. Scarcely had I set foot in Paris ere I had
      fresh evidence of the detestable interest taken by this Wilson in
      my concerns. Years flew, while I experienced no relief.
      Villain!—at Rome, with how untimely, yet with how spectral an
      officiousness, stepped he in between me and my ambition! At
      Vienna, too—at Berlin—and at Moscow! Where, in truth, had I not
      bitter cause to curse him within my heart? From his inscrutable
      tyranny did I at length flee, panic-stricken, as from a
      pestilence; and to the very ends of the earth I fled in vain.

      And again, and again, in secret communion with my own spirit,
      would I demand the questions “Who is he?—whence came he?—and what
      are his objects?” But no answer was there found. And then I
      scrutinized, with a minute scrutiny, the forms, and the methods,
      and the leading traits of his impertinent supervision. But even
      here there was very little upon which to base a conjecture. It
      was noticeable, indeed, that, in no one of the multiplied
      instances in which he had of late crossed my path, had he so
      crossed it except to frustrate those schemes, or to disturb those
      actions, which, if fully carried out, might have resulted in
      bitter mischief. Poor justification this, in truth, for an
      authority so imperiously assumed! Poor indemnity for natural
      rights of self-agency so pertinaciously, so insultingly denied!

      I had also been forced to notice that my tormentor, for a very
      long period of time, (while scrupulously and with miraculous
      dexterity maintaining his whim of an identity of apparel with
      myself,) had so contrived it, in the execution of his varied
      interference with my will, that I saw not, at any moment, the
      features of his face. Be Wilson what he might, this, at least,
      was but the veriest of affectation, or of folly. Could he, for an
      instant, have supposed that, in my admonisher at Eton—in the
      destroyer of my honor at Oxford,—in him who thwarted my ambition
      at Rome, my revenge at Paris, my passionate love at Naples, or
      what he falsely termed my avarice in Egypt,—that in this, my
      arch-enemy and evil genius, could fail to recognise the William
      Wilson of my school boy days,—the namesake, the companion, the
      rival,—the hated and dreaded rival at Dr. Bransby’s?
      Impossible!—But let me hasten to the last eventful scene of the
      drama.

      Thus far I had succumbed supinely to this imperious domination.
      The sentiment of deep awe with which I habitually regarded the
      elevated character, the majestic wisdom, the apparent
      omnipresence and omnipotence of Wilson, added to a feeling of
      even terror, with which certain other traits in his nature and
      assumptions inspired me, had operated, hitherto, to impress me
      with an idea of my own utter weakness and helplessness, and to
      suggest an implicit, although bitterly reluctant submission to
      his arbitrary will. But, of late days, I had given myself up
      entirely to wine; and its maddening influence upon my hereditary
      temper rendered me more and more impatient of control. I began to
      murmur,—to hesitate,—to resist. And was it only fancy which
      induced me to believe that, with the increase of my own firmness,
      that of my tormentor underwent a proportional diminution? Be this
      as it may, I now began to feel the inspiration of a burning hope,
      and at length nurtured in my secret thoughts a stern and
      desperate resolution that I would submit no longer to be
      enslaved.

      It was at Rome, during the Carnival of 18—, that I attended a
      masquerade in the palazzo of the Neapolitan Duke Di Broglio. I
      had indulged more freely than usual in the excesses of the
      wine-table; and now the suffocating atmosphere of the crowded
      rooms irritated me beyond endurance. The difficulty, too, of
      forcing my way through the mazes of the company contributed not a
      little to the ruffling of my temper; for I was anxiously seeking,
      (let me not say with what unworthy motive) the young, the gay,
      the beautiful wife of the aged and doting Di Broglio. With a too
      unscrupulous confidence she had previously communicated to me the
      secret of the costume in which she would be habited, and now,
      having caught a glimpse of her person, I was hurrying to make my
      way into her presence. At this moment I felt a light hand placed
      upon my shoulder, and that ever-remembered, low, damnable
      _whisper_ within my ear.

      In an absolute phrenzy of wrath, I turned at once upon him who
      had thus interrupted me, and seized him violently by the collar.
      He was attired, as I had expected, in a costume altogether
      similar to my own; wearing a Spanish cloak of blue velvet, begirt
      about the waist with a crimson belt sustaining a rapier. A mask
      of black silk entirely covered his face.

      “Scoundrel!” I said, in a voice husky with rage, while every
      syllable I uttered seemed as new fuel to my fury, “scoundrel!
      impostor! accursed villain! you shall not—you shall not dog me
      unto death! Follow me, or I stab you where you stand!”—and I
      broke my way from the ball-room into a small ante-chamber
      adjoining, dragging him unresistingly with me as I went.

      Upon entering, I thrust him furiously from me. He staggered
      against the wall, while I closed the door with an oath, and
      commanded him to draw. He hesitated but for an instant; then,
      with a slight sigh, drew in silence, and put himself upon his
      defence.

      The contest was brief indeed. I was frantic with every species of
      wild excitement, and felt within my single arm the energy and
      power of a multitude. In a few seconds I forced him by sheer
      strength against the wainscoting, and thus, getting him at mercy,
      plunged my sword, with brute ferocity, repeatedly through and
      through his bosom.

      At that instant some person tried the latch of the door. I
      hastened to prevent an intrusion, and then immediately returned
      to my dying antagonist. But what human language can adequately
      portray that astonishment, that horror which possessed me at the
      spectacle then presented to view? The brief moment in which I
      averted my eyes had been sufficient to produce, apparently, a
      material change in the arrangements at the upper or farther end
      of the room. A large mirror,—so at first it seemed to me in my
      confusion—now stood where none had been perceptible before; and,
      as I stepped up to it in extremity of terror, mine own image, but
      with features all pale and dabbled in blood, advanced to meet me
      with a feeble and tottering gait.

      Thus it appeared, I say, but was not. It was my antagonist—it was
      Wilson, who then stood before me in the agonies of his
      dissolution. His mask and cloak lay, where he had thrown them,
      upon the floor. Not a thread in all his raiment—not a line in all
      the marked and singular lineaments of his face which was not,
      even in the most absolute identity, mine own!

      It was Wilson; but he spoke no longer in a whisper, and I could
      have fancied that I myself was speaking while he said:

      _“You have conquered, and I yield. Yet, henceforward art thou
      also dead—dead to the World, to Heaven and to Hope! In me didst
      thou exist—and, in my death, see by this image, which is thine
      own, how utterly thou hast murdered thyself.”_




THE TELL-TALE HEART.


      True!—nervous—very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am;
      but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my
      senses—not destroyed—not dulled them. Above all was the sense of
      hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth.
      I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken! and
      observe how healthily—how calmly I can tell you the whole story.

      It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but
      once conceived, it haunted me day and night. Object there was
      none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man. He had never
      wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no
      desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye
      of a vulture—a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it
      fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees—very
      gradually—I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and
      thus rid myself of the eye forever.

      Now this is the point. You fancy me mad. Madmen know nothing. But
      you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I
      proceeded—with what caution—with what foresight—with what
      dissimulation I went to work! I was never kinder to the old man
      than during the whole week before I killed him. And every night,
      about midnight, I turned the latch of his door and opened it—oh,
      so gently! And then, when I had made an opening sufficient for my
      head, I put in a dark lantern, all closed, closed, that no light
      shone out, and then I thrust in my head. Oh, you would have
      laughed to see how cunningly I thrust it in! I moved it
      slowly—very, very slowly, so that I might not disturb the old
      man’s sleep. It took me an hour to place my whole head within the
      opening so far that I could see him as he lay upon his bed.
      Ha!—would a madman have been so wise as this? And then, when my
      head was well in the room, I undid the lantern cautiously—oh, so
      cautiously—cautiously (for the hinges creaked)—I undid it just so
      much that a single thin ray fell upon the vulture eye. And this I
      did for seven long nights—every night just at midnight—but I
      found the eye always closed; and so it was impossible to do the
      work; for it was not the old man who vexed me, but his Evil Eye.
      And every morning, when the day broke, I went boldly into the
      chamber, and spoke courageously to him, calling him by name in a
      hearty tone, and inquiring how he has passed the night. So you
      see he would have been a very profound old man, indeed, to
      suspect that every night, just at twelve, I looked in upon him
      while he slept.

      Upon the eighth night I was more than usually cautious in opening
      the door. A watch’s minute hand moves more quickly than did mine.
      Never before that night had I felt the extent of my own powers—of
      my sagacity. I could scarcely contain my feelings of triumph. To
      think that there I was, opening the door, little by little, and
      he not even to dream of my secret deeds or thoughts. I fairly
      chuckled at the idea; and perhaps he heard me; for he moved on
      the bed suddenly, as if startled. Now you may think that I drew
      back—but no. His room was as black as pitch with the thick
      darkness, (for the shutters were close fastened, through fear of
      robbers,) and so I knew that he could not see the opening of the
      door, and I kept pushing it on steadily, steadily.

      I had my head in, and was about to open the lantern, when my
      thumb slipped upon the tin fastening, and the old man sprang up
      in bed, crying out—“Who’s there?”

      I kept quite still and said nothing. For a whole hour I did not
      move a muscle, and in the meantime I did not hear him lie down.
      He was still sitting up in the bed listening;—just as I have
      done, night after night, hearkening to the death watches in the
      wall.

      Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of
      mortal terror. It was not a groan of pain or of grief—oh, no!—it
      was the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul
      when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. Many a night,
      just at midnight, when all the world slept, it has welled up from
      my own bosom, deepening, with its dreadful echo, the terrors that
      distracted me. I say I knew it well. I knew what the old man
      felt, and pitied him, although I chuckled at heart. I knew that
      he had been lying awake ever since the first slight noise, when
      he had turned in the bed. His fears had been ever since growing
      upon him. He had been trying to fancy them causeless, but could
      not. He had been saying to himself—“It is nothing but the wind in
      the chimney—it is only a mouse crossing the floor,” or “It is
      merely a cricket which has made a single chirp.” Yes, he had been
      trying to comfort himself with these suppositions: but he had
      found all in vain. All in vain; because Death, in approaching him
      had stalked with his black shadow before him, and enveloped the
      victim. And it was the mournful influence of the unperceived
      shadow that caused him to feel—although he neither saw nor
      heard—to feel the presence of my head within the room.

      When I had waited a long time, very patiently, without hearing
      him lie down, I resolved to open a little—a very, very little
      crevice in the lantern. So I opened it—you cannot imagine how
      stealthily, stealthily—until, at length a simple dim ray, like
      the thread of the spider, shot from out the crevice and fell full
      upon the vulture eye.

      It was open—wide, wide open—and I grew furious as I gazed upon
      it. I saw it with perfect distinctness—all a dull blue, with a
      hideous veil over it that chilled the very marrow in my bones;
      but I could see nothing else of the old man’s face or person: for
      I had directed the ray as if by instinct, precisely upon the
      damned spot.

      And have I not told you that what you mistake for madness is but
      over-acuteness of the sense?—now, I say, there came to my ears a
      low, dull, quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in
      cotton. I knew that sound well, too. It was the beating of the
      old man’s heart. It increased my fury, as the beating of a drum
      stimulates the soldier into courage.

      But even yet I refrained and kept still. I scarcely breathed. I
      held the lantern motionless. I tried how steadily I could
      maintain the ray upon the eve. Meantime the hellish tattoo of the
      heart increased. It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and
      louder every instant. The old man’s terror must have been
      extreme! It grew louder, I say, louder every moment!—do you mark
      me well? I have told you that I am nervous: so I am. And now at
      the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old
      house, so strange a noise as this excited me to uncontrollable
      terror. Yet, for some minutes longer I refrained and stood still.
      But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must
      burst. And now a new anxiety seized me—the sound would be heard
      by a neighbour! The old man’s hour had come! With a loud yell, I
      threw open the lantern and leaped into the room. He shrieked
      once—once only. In an instant I dragged him to the floor, and
      pulled the heavy bed over him. I then smiled gaily, to find the
      deed so far done. But, for many minutes, the heart beat on with a
      muffled sound. This, however, did not vex me; it would not be
      heard through the wall. At length it ceased. The old man was
      dead. I removed the bed and examined the corpse. Yes, he was
      stone, stone dead. I placed my hand upon the heart and held it
      there many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was stone dead.
      His eye would trouble me no more.

      If still you think me mad, you will think so no longer when I
      describe the wise precautions I took for the concealment of the
      body. The night waned, and I worked hastily, but in silence.
      First of all I dismembered the corpse. I cut off the head and the
      arms and the legs.

      I then took up three planks from the flooring of the chamber, and
      deposited all between the scantlings. I then replaced the boards
      so cleverly, so cunningly, that no human eye—not even his—could
      have detected any thing wrong. There was nothing to wash out—no
      stain of any kind—no blood-spot whatever. I had been too wary for
      that. A tub had caught all—ha! ha!

      When I had made an end of these labors, it was four o’clock—still
      dark as midnight. As the bell sounded the hour, there came a
      knocking at the street door. I went down to open it with a light
      heart,—for what had I now to fear? There entered three men, who
      introduced themselves, with perfect suavity, as officers of the
      police. A shriek had been heard by a neighbour during the night;
      suspicion of foul play had been aroused; information had been
      lodged at the police office, and they (the officers) had been
      deputed to search the premises.

      I smiled,—for what had I to fear? I bade the gentlemen welcome.
      The shriek, I said, was my own in a dream. The old man, I
      mentioned, was absent in the country. I took my visitors all over
      the house. I bade them search—search well. I led them, at length,
      to his chamber. I showed them his treasures, secure, undisturbed.
      In the enthusiasm of my confidence, I brought chairs into the
      room, and desired them here to rest from their fatigues, while I
      myself, in the wild audacity of my perfect triumph, placed my own
      seat upon the very spot beneath which reposed the corpse of the
      victim.

      The officers were satisfied. My manner had convinced them. I was
      singularly at ease. They sat, and while I answered cheerily, they
      chatted of familiar things. But, ere long, I felt myself getting
      pale and wished them gone. My head ached, and I fancied a ringing
      in my ears: but still they sat and still chatted. The ringing
      became more distinct:—it continued and became more distinct: I
      talked more freely to get rid of the feeling: but it continued
      and gained definiteness—until, at length, I found that the noise
      was not within my ears.

      No doubt I now grew _very_ pale;—but I talked more fluently, and
      with a heightened voice. Yet the sound increased—and what could I
      do? It was a low, dull, quick sound—much such a sound as a watch
      makes when enveloped in cotton. I gasped for breath—and yet the
      officers heard it not. I talked more quickly—more vehemently; but
      the noise steadily increased. I arose and argued about trifles,
      in a high key and with violent gesticulations; but the noise
      steadily increased. Why would they not be gone? I paced the floor
      to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury by the
      observations of the men—but the noise steadily increased. Oh God!
      what could I do? I foamed—I raved—I swore! I swung the chair upon
      which I had been sitting, and grated it upon the boards, but the
      noise arose over all and continually increased. It grew
      louder—louder—louder! And still the men chatted pleasantly, and
      smiled. Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God!—no, no!
      They heard!—they suspected!—they knew!—they were making a mockery
      of my horror!—this I thought, and this I think. But anything was
      better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this
      derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer! I
      felt that I must scream or die! and now—again!—hark! louder!
      louder! louder! _louder!_

      “Villains!” I shrieked, “dissemble no more! I admit the
      deed!—tear up the planks!—here, here!—It is the beating of his
      hideous heart!”




BERENICE


     Dicebant mihi sodales, si sepulchrum amicae visitarem, curas meas
     aliquar tulum fore levatas.—_Ebn Zaiat_.

      Misery is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform.
      Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow, its hues are as
      various as the hues of that arch—as distinct too, yet as
      intimately blended. Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow!
      How is it that from beauty I have derived a type of
      unloveliness?—from the covenant of peace, a simile of sorrow? But
      as, in ethics, evil is a consequence of good, so, in fact, out of
      joy is sorrow born. Either the memory of past bliss is the
      anguish of to-day, or the agonies which _are_, have their origin
      in the ecstasies which _might have been_.

      My baptismal name is Egaeus; that of my family I will not
      mention. Yet there are no towers in the land more time-honored
      than my gloomy, gray, hereditary halls. Our line has been called
      a race of visionaries; and in many striking particulars—in the
      character of the family mansion—in the frescos of the chief
      saloon—in the tapestries of the dormitories—in the chiselling of
      some buttresses in the armory—but more especially in the gallery
      of antique paintings—in the fashion of the library chamber—and,
      lastly, in the very peculiar nature of the library’s
      contents—there is more than sufficient evidence to warrant the
      belief.

      The recollections of my earliest years are connected with that
      chamber, and with its volumes—of which latter I will say no more.
      Here died my mother. Herein was I born. But it is mere idleness
      to say that I had not lived before—that the soul has no previous
      existence. You deny it?—let us not argue the matter. Convinced
      myself, I seek not to convince. There is, however, a remembrance
      of aerial forms—of spiritual and meaning eyes—of sounds, musical
      yet sad—a remembrance which will not be excluded; a memory like a
      shadow—vague, variable, indefinite, unsteady; and like a shadow,
      too, in the impossibility of my getting rid of it while the
      sunlight of my reason shall exist.

      In that chamber was I born. Thus awaking from the long night of
      what seemed, but was not, nonentity, at once into the very
      regions of fairy land—into a palace of imagination—into the wild
      dominions of monastic thought and erudition—it is not singular
      that I gazed around me with a startled and ardent eye—that I
      loitered away my boyhood in books, and dissipated my youth in
      reverie; but it _is_ singular that as years rolled away, and the
      noon of manhood found me still in the mansion of my fathers—it
      _is_ wonderful what stagnation there fell upon the springs of my
      life—wonderful how total an inversion took place in the character
      of my commonest thought. The realities of the world affected me
      as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land
      of dreams became, in turn, not the material of my every-day
      existence, but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in
      itself.

      Berenice and I were cousins, and we grew up together in my
      paternal halls. Yet differently we grew—I, ill of health, and
      buried in gloom—she, agile, graceful, and overflowing with
      energy; hers, the ramble on the hill-side—mine the studies of the
      cloister; I, living within my own heart, and addicted, body and
      soul, to the most intense and painful meditation—she, roaming
      carelessly through life, with no thought of the shadows in her
      path, or the silent flight of the raven-winged hours. Berenice!—I
      call upon her name—Berenice!—and from the gray ruins of memory a
      thousand tumultuous recollections are startled at the sound! Ah,
      vividly is her image before me now, as in the early days of her
      light-heartedness and joy! Oh, gorgeous yet fantastic beauty! Oh,
      sylph amid the shrubberies of Arnheim! Oh, Naiad among its
      fountains! And then—then all is mystery and terror, and a tale
      which should not be told. Disease—a fatal disease, fell like the
      simoon upon her frame; and, even while I gazed upon her, the
      spirit of change swept over her, pervading her mind, her habits,
      and her character, and, in a manner the most subtle and terrible,
      disturbing even the identity of her person! Alas! the destroyer
      came and went!—and the victim—where is she? I knew her not—or
      knew her no longer as Berenice.

      Among the numerous train of maladies superinduced by that fatal
      and primary one which effected a revolution of so horrible a kind
      in the moral and physical being of my cousin, may be mentioned as
      the most distressing and obstinate in its nature, a species of
      epilepsy not unfrequently terminating in _trance_ itself—trance
      very nearly resembling positive dissolution, and from which her
      manner of recovery was in most instances, startlingly abrupt. In
      the mean time my own disease—for I have been told that I should
      call it by no other appellation—my own disease, then, grew
      rapidly upon me, and assumed finally a monomaniac character of a
      novel and extraordinary form—hourly and momently gaining
      vigor—and at length obtaining over me the most incomprehensible
      ascendancy. This monomania, if I must so term it, consisted in a
      morbid irritability of those properties of the mind in
      metaphysical science termed the _attentive_. It is more than
      probable that I am not understood; but I fear, indeed, that it is
      in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general
      reader, an adequate idea of that nervous _intensity of interest_
      with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak
      technically) busied and buried themselves, in the contemplation
      of even the most ordinary objects of the universe.

      To muse for long unwearied hours, with my attention riveted to
      some frivolous device on the margin, or in the typography of a
      book; to become absorbed, for the better part of a summer’s day,
      in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry or upon the
      floor; to lose myself, for an entire night, in watching the
      steady flame of a lamp, or the embers of a fire; to dream away
      whole days over the perfume of a flower; to repeat, monotonously,
      some common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent
      repetition, ceased to convey any idea whatever to the mind; to
      lose all sense of motion or physical existence, by means of
      absolute bodily quiescence long and obstinately persevered in:
      such were a few of the most common and least pernicious vagaries
      induced by a condition of the mental faculties, not, indeed,
      altogether unparalleled, but certainly bidding defiance to
      anything like analysis or explanation.

      Yet let me not be misapprehended. The undue, earnest, and morbid
      attention thus excited by objects in their own nature frivolous,
      must not be confounded in character with that ruminating
      propensity common to all mankind, and more especially indulged in
      by persons of ardent imagination. It was not even, as might be at
      first supposed, an extreme condition, or exaggeration of such
      propensity, but primarily and essentially distinct and different.
      In the one instance, the dreamer, or enthusiast, being interested
      by an object usually _not_ frivolous, imperceptibly loses sight
      of this object in a wilderness of deductions and suggestions
      issuing therefrom, until, at the conclusion of a day-dream _often
      replete with luxury_, he finds the _incitamentum_, or first cause
      of his musings, entirely vanished and forgotten. In my case, the
      primary object was _invariably frivolous_, although assuming,
      through the medium of my distempered vision, a refracted and
      unreal importance. Few deductions, if any, were made; and those
      few pertinaciously returning in upon the original object as a
      centre. The meditations were _never_ pleasurable; and, at the
      termination of the reverie, the first cause, so far from being
      out of sight, had attained that supernaturally exaggerated
      interest which was the prevailing feature of the disease. In a
      word, the powers of mind more particularly exercised were, with
      me, as I have said before, the _attentive_, and are, with the
      day-dreamer, the _speculative_.

      My books, at this epoch, if they did not actually serve to
      irritate the disorder, partook, it will be perceived, largely, in
      their imaginative and inconsequential nature, of the
      characteristic qualities of the disorder itself. I well remember,
      among others, the treatise of the noble Italian, Coelius Secundus
      Curio, “_De Amplitudine Beati Regni Dei;_” St. Austin’s great
      work, the “City of God;” and Tertullian’s “_De Carne Christi_,”
      in which the paradoxical sentence “_Mortuus est Dei filius;
      credible est quia ineptum est: et sepultus resurrexit; certum est
      quia impossibile est,_” occupied my undivided time, for many
      weeks of laborious and fruitless investigation.

      Thus it will appear that, shaken from its balance only by trivial
      things, my reason bore resemblance to that ocean-crag spoken of
      by Ptolemy Hephestion, which steadily resisting the attacks of
      human violence, and the fiercer fury of the waters and the winds,
      trembled only to the touch of the flower called Asphodel. And
      although, to a careless thinker, it might appear a matter beyond
      doubt, that the alteration produced by her unhappy malady, in the
      _moral_ condition of Berenice, would afford me many objects for
      the exercise of that intense and abnormal meditation whose nature
      I have been at some trouble in explaining, yet such was not in
      any degree the case. In the lucid intervals of my infirmity, her
      calamity, indeed, gave me pain, and, taking deeply to heart that
      total wreck of her fair and gentle life, I did not fail to
      ponder, frequently and bitterly, upon the wonder-working means by
      which so strange a revolution had been so suddenly brought to
      pass. But these reflections partook not of the idiosyncrasy of my
      disease, and were such as would have occurred, under similar
      circumstances, to the ordinary mass of mankind. True to its own
      character, my disorder revelled in the less important but more
      startling changes wrought in the _physical_ frame of Berenice—in
      the singular and most appalling distortion of her personal
      identity.

      During the brightest days of her unparalleled beauty, most surely
      I had never loved her. In the strange anomaly of my existence,
      feelings with me, _had never been_ of the heart, and my passions
      _always were_ of the mind. Through the gray of the early
      morning—among the trellised shadows of the forest at noonday—and
      in the silence of my library at night—she had flitted by my eyes,
      and I had seen her—not as the living and breathing Berenice, but
      as the Berenice of a dream; not as a being of the earth, earthy,
      but as the abstraction of such a being; not as a thing to admire,
      but to analyze; not as an object of love, but as the theme of the
      most abstruse although desultory speculation. And _now_—now I
      shuddered in her presence, and grew pale at her approach; yet,
      bitterly lamenting her fallen and desolate condition, I called to
      mind that she had loved me long, and, in an evil moment, I spoke
      to her of marriage.

      And at length the period of our nuptials was approaching, when,
      upon an afternoon in the winter of the year—one of those
      unseasonably warm, calm, and misty days which are the nurse of
      the beautiful Halcyon (*1),—I sat, (and sat, as I thought,
      alone,) in the inner apartment of the library. But, uplifting my
      eyes, I saw that Berenice stood before me.

      Was it my own excited imagination—or the misty influence of the
      atmosphere—or the uncertain twilight of the chamber—or the gray
      draperies which fell around her figure—that caused in it so
      vacillating and indistinct an outline? I could not tell. She
      spoke no word; and I—not for worlds could I have uttered a
      syllable. An icy chill ran through my frame; a sense of
      insufferable anxiety oppressed me; a consuming curiosity pervaded
      my soul; and sinking back upon the chair, I remained for some
      time breathless and motionless, with my eyes riveted upon her
      person. Alas! its emaciation was excessive, and not one vestige
      of the former being lurked in any single line of the contour. My
      burning glances at length fell upon the face.

      The forehead was high, and very pale, and singularly placid; and
      the once jetty hair fell partially over it, and overshadowed the
      hollow temples with innumerable ringlets, now of a vivid yellow,
      and jarring discordantly, in their fantastic character, with the
      reigning melancholy of the countenance. The eyes were lifeless,
      and lustreless, and seemingly pupilless, and I shrank
      involuntarily from their glassy stare to the contemplation of the
      thin and shrunken lips. They parted; and in a smile of peculiar
      meaning, _the teeth_ of the changed Berenice disclosed themselves
      slowly to my view. Would to God that I had never beheld them, or
      that, having done so, I had died!

      The shutting of a door disturbed me, and, looking up, I found
      that my cousin had departed from the chamber. But from the
      disordered chamber of my brain, had not, alas! departed, and
      would not be driven away, the white and ghastly _spectrum_ of the
      teeth. Not a speck on their surface—not a shade on their
      enamel—not an indenture in their edges—but what that period of
      her smile had sufficed to brand in upon my memory. I saw them
      _now_ even more unequivocally than I beheld them _then_. The
      teeth!—the teeth!—they were here, and there, and everywhere, and
      visibly and palpably before me; long, narrow, and excessively
      white, with the pale lips writhing about them, as in the very
      moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full
      fury of my _monomania_, and I struggled in vain against its
      strange and irresistible influence. In the multiplied objects of
      the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth. For these
      I longed with a phrenzied desire. All other matters and all
      different interests became absorbed in their single
      contemplation. They—they alone were present to the mental eye,
      and they, in their sole individuality, became the essence of my
      mental life. I held them in every light. I turned them in every
      attitude. I surveyed their characteristics. I dwelt upon their
      peculiarities. I pondered upon their conformation. I mused upon
      the alteration in their nature. I shuddered as I assigned to them
      in imagination a sensitive and sentient power, and even when
      unassisted by the lips, a capability of moral expression. Of
      Mademoiselle Salle it has been well said, “_Que tous ses pas
      etaient des sentiments_,” and of Berenice I more seriously
      believed _que toutes ses dents etaient des idées_. _Des
      idées!_—ah here was the idiotic thought that destroyed me! _Des
      idées!_—ah, _therefore_ it was that I coveted them so madly! I
      felt that their possession could alone ever restore me to peace,
      in giving me back to reason.

      And the evening closed in upon me thus—and then the darkness
      came, and tarried, and went—and the day again dawned—and the
      mists of a second night were now gathering around—and still I sat
      motionless in that solitary room—and still I sat buried in
      meditation—and still the _phantasma_ of the teeth maintained its
      terrible ascendancy, as, with the most vivid hideous
      distinctness, it floated about amid the changing lights and
      shadows of the chamber. At length there broke in upon my dreams a
      cry as of horror and dismay; and thereunto, after a pause,
      succeeded the sound of troubled voices, intermingled with many
      low moanings of sorrow or of pain. I arose from my seat, and
      throwing open one of the doors of the library, saw standing out
      in the ante-chamber a servant maiden, all in tears, who told me
      that Berenice was—no more! She had been seized with epilepsy in
      the early morning, and now, at the closing in of the night, the
      grave was ready for its tenant, and all the preparations for the
      burial were completed.

      I found myself sitting in the library, and again sitting there
      alone. It seemed that I had newly awakened from a confused and
      exciting dream. I knew that it was now midnight, and I was well
      aware, that since the setting of the sun, Berenice had been
      interred. But of that dreary period which intervened I had no
      positive, at least no definite comprehension. Yet its memory was
      replete with horror—horror more horrible from being vague, and
      terror more terrible from ambiguity. It was a fearful page in the
      record my existence, written all over with dim, and hideous, and
      unintelligible recollections. I strived to decypher them, but in
      vain; while ever and anon, like the spirit of a departed sound,
      the shrill and piercing shriek of a female voice seemed to be
      ringing in my ears. I had done a deed—what was it? I asked myself
      the question aloud, and the whispering echoes of the chamber
      answered me,—“_What was it?_”

      On the table beside me burned a lamp, and near it lay a little
      box. It was of no remarkable character, and I had seen it
      frequently before, for it was the property of the family
      physician; but how came it _there_, upon my table, and why did I
      shudder in regarding it? These things were in no manner to be
      accounted for, and my eyes at length dropped to the open pages of
      a book, and to a sentence underscored therein. The words were the
      singular but simple ones of the poet Ebn Zaiat:—“_Dicebant mihi
      sodales si sepulchrum amicae visitarem, curas meas aliquantulum
      fore levatas_.” Why then, as I perused them, did the hairs of my
      head erect themselves on end, and the blood of my body become
      congealed within my veins?

      There came a light tap at the library door—and, pale as the
      tenant of a tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe. His looks were
      wild with terror, and he spoke to me in a voice tremulous, husky,
      and very low. What said he?—some broken sentences I heard. He
      told of a wild cry disturbing the silence of the night—of the
      gathering together of the household—of a search in the direction
      of the sound; and then his tones grew thrillingly distinct as he
      whispered me of a violated grave—of a disfigured body enshrouded,
      yet still breathing—still palpitating—_still alive_!

      He pointed to garments;—they were muddy and clotted with gore. I
      spoke not, and he took me gently by the hand: it was indented
      with the impress of human nails. He directed my attention to some
      object against the wall. I looked at it for some minutes: it was
      a spade. With a shriek I bounded to the table, and grasped the
      box that lay upon it. But I could not force it open; and in my
      tremor, it slipped from my hands, and fell heavily, and burst
      into pieces; and from it, with a rattling sound, there rolled out
      some instruments of dental surgery, intermingled with thirty-two
      small, white and ivory-looking substances that were scattered to
      and fro about the floor.




ELEONORA


     Sub conservatione formæ specificæ salva anima.
                    —_Raymond Lully_.

      I am come of a race noted for vigor of fancy and ardor of
      passion. Men have called me mad; but the question is not yet
      settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest
      intelligence—whether much that is glorious—whether all that is
      profound—does not spring from disease of thought—from moods of
      mind exalted at the expense of the general intellect. They who
      dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who
      dream only by night. In their gray visions they obtain glimpses
      of eternity, and thrill, in awakening, to find that they have
      been upon the verge of the great secret. In snatches, they learn
      something of the wisdom which is of good, and more of the mere
      knowledge which is of evil. They penetrate, however, rudderless
      or compassless into the vast ocean of the “light ineffable,” and
      again, like the adventures of the Nubian geographer, “agressi
      sunt mare tenebrarum, quid in eo esset exploraturi.”

      We will say, then, that I am mad. I grant, at least, that there
      are two distinct conditions of my mental existence—the condition
      of a lucid reason, not to be disputed, and belonging to the
      memory of events forming the first epoch of my life—and a
      condition of shadow and doubt, appertaining to the present, and
      to the recollection of what constitutes the second great era of
      my being. Therefore, what I shall tell of the earlier period,
      believe; and to what I may relate of the later time, give only
      such credit as may seem due, or doubt it altogether, or, if doubt
      it ye cannot, then play unto its riddle the Oedipus.

      She whom I loved in youth, and of whom I now pen calmly and
      distinctly these remembrances, was the sole daughter of the only
      sister of my mother long departed. Eleonora was the name of my
      cousin. We had always dwelled together, beneath a tropical sun,
      in the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. No unguided footstep
      ever came upon that vale; for it lay away up among a range of
      giant hills that hung beetling around about it, shutting out the
      sunlight from its sweetest recesses. No path was trodden in its
      vicinity; and, to reach our happy home, there was need of putting
      back, with force, the foliage of many thousands of forest trees,
      and of crushing to death the glories of many millions of fragrant
      flowers. Thus it was that we lived all alone, knowing nothing of
      the world without the valley—I, and my cousin, and her mother.

      From the dim regions beyond the mountains at the upper end of our
      encircled domain, there crept out a narrow and deep river,
      brighter than all save the eyes of Eleonora; and, winding
      stealthily about in mazy courses, it passed away, at length,
      through a shadowy gorge, among hills still dimmer than those
      whence it had issued. We called it the “River of Silence”; for
      there seemed to be a hushing influence in its flow. No murmur
      arose from its bed, and so gently it wandered along, that the
      pearly pebbles upon which we loved to gaze, far down within its
      bosom, stirred not at all, but lay in a motionless content, each
      in its own old station, shining on gloriously forever.

      The margin of the river, and of the many dazzling rivulets that
      glided through devious ways into its channel, as well as the
      spaces that extended from the margins away down into the depths
      of the streams until they reached the bed of pebbles at the
      bottom,—these spots, not less than the whole surface of the
      valley, from the river to the mountains that girdled it in, were
      carpeted all by a soft green grass, thick, short, perfectly even,
      and vanilla-perfumed, but so besprinkled throughout with the
      yellow buttercup, the white daisy, the purple violet, and the
      ruby-red asphodel, that its exceeding beauty spoke to our hearts
      in loud tones, of the love and of the glory of God.

      And, here and there, in groves about this grass, like
      wildernesses of dreams, sprang up fantastic trees, whose tall
      slender stems stood not upright, but slanted gracefully toward
      the light that peered at noon-day into the centre of the valley.
      Their mark was speckled with the vivid alternate splendor of
      ebony and silver, and was smoother than all save the cheeks of
      Eleonora; so that, but for the brilliant green of the huge leaves
      that spread from their summits in long, tremulous lines, dallying
      with the Zephyrs, one might have fancied them giant serpents of
      Syria doing homage to their sovereign the Sun.

      Hand in hand about this valley, for fifteen years, roamed I with
      Eleonora before Love entered within our hearts. It was one
      evening at the close of the third lustrum of her life, and of the
      fourth of my own, that we sat, locked in each other’s embrace,
      beneath the serpent-like trees, and looked down within the water
      of the River of Silence at our images therein. We spoke no words
      during the rest of that sweet day, and our words even upon the
      morrow were tremulous and few. We had drawn the God Eros from
      that wave, and now we felt that he had enkindled within us the
      fiery souls of our forefathers. The passions which had for
      centuries distinguished our race, came thronging with the fancies
      for which they had been equally noted, and together breathed a
      delirious bliss over the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. A
      change fell upon all things. Strange, brilliant flowers,
      star-shaped, burn out upon the trees where no flowers had been
      known before. The tints of the green carpet deepened; and when,
      one by one, the white daisies shrank away, there sprang up in
      place of them, ten by ten of the ruby-red asphodel. And life
      arose in our paths; for the tall flamingo, hitherto unseen, with
      all gay glowing birds, flaunted his scarlet plumage before us.
      The golden and silver fish haunted the river, out of the bosom of
      which issued, little by little, a murmur that swelled, at length,
      into a lulling melody more divine than that of the harp of
      Æolus—sweeter than all save the voice of Eleonora. And now, too,
      a voluminous cloud, which we had long watched in the regions of
      Hesper, floated out thence, all gorgeous in crimson and gold, and
      settling in peace above us, sank, day by day, lower and lower,
      until its edges rested upon the tops of the mountains, turning
      all their dimness into magnificence, and shutting us up, as if
      forever, within a magic prison-house of grandeur and of glory.

      The loveliness of Eleonora was that of the Seraphim; but she was
      a maiden artless and innocent as the brief life she had led among
      the flowers. No guile disguised the fervor of love which animated
      her heart, and she examined with me its inmost recesses as we
      walked together in the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass, and
      discoursed of the mighty changes which had lately taken place
      therein.

      At length, having spoken one day, in tears, of the last sad
      change which must befall Humanity, she thenceforward dwelt only
      upon this one sorrowful theme, interweaving it into all our
      converse, as, in the songs of the bard of Schiraz, the same
      images are found occurring, again and again, in every impressive
      variation of phrase.

      She had seen that the finger of Death was upon her bosom—that,
      like the ephemeron, she had been made perfect in loveliness only
      to die; but the terrors of the grave to her lay solely in a
      consideration which she revealed to me, one evening at twilight,
      by the banks of the River of Silence. She grieved to think that,
      having entombed her in the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass, I
      would quit forever its happy recesses, transferring the love
      which now was so passionately her own to some maiden of the outer
      and everyday world. And, then and there, I threw myself hurriedly
      at the feet of Eleonora, and offered up a vow, to herself and to
      Heaven, that I would never bind myself in marriage to any
      daughter of Earth—that I would in no manner prove recreant to her
      dear memory, or to the memory of the devout affection with which
      she had blessed me. And I called the Mighty Ruler of the Universe
      to witness the pious solemnity of my vow. And the curse which I
      invoked of Him and of her, a saint in Helusion should I prove
      traitorous to that promise, involved a penalty the exceeding
      great horror of which will not permit me to make record of it
      here. And the bright eyes of Eleonora grew brighter at my words;
      and she sighed as if a deadly burthen had been taken from her
      breast; and she trembled and very bitterly wept; but she made
      acceptance of the vow, (for what was she but a child?) and it
      made easy to her the bed of her death. And she said to me, not
      many days afterward, tranquilly dying, that, because of what I
      had done for the comfort of her spirit she would watch over me in
      that spirit when departed, and, if so it were permitted her
      return to me visibly in the watches of the night; but, if this
      thing were, indeed, beyond the power of the souls in Paradise,
      that she would, at least, give me frequent indications of her
      presence, sighing upon me in the evening winds, or filling the
      air which I breathed with perfume from the censers of the angels.
      And, with these words upon her lips, she yielded up her innocent
      life, putting an end to the first epoch of my own.

      Thus far I have faithfully said. But as I pass the barrier in
      Time’s path, formed by the death of my beloved, and proceed with
      the second era of my existence, I feel that a shadow gathers over
      my brain, and I mistrust the perfect sanity of the record. But
      let me on.—Years dragged themselves along heavily, and still I
      dwelled within the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass; but a second
      change had come upon all things. The star-shaped flowers shrank
      into the stems of the trees, and appeared no more. The tints of
      the green carpet faded; and, one by one, the ruby-red asphodels
      withered away; and there sprang up, in place of them, ten by ten,
      dark, eye-like violets, that writhed uneasily and were ever
      encumbered with dew. And Life departed from our paths; for the
      tall flamingo flaunted no longer his scarlet plumage before us,
      but flew sadly from the vale into the hills, with all the gay
      glowing birds that had arrived in his company. And the golden and
      silver fish swam down through the gorge at the lower end of our
      domain and bedecked the sweet river never again. And the lulling
      melody that had been softer than the wind-harp of Æolus, and more
      divine than all save the voice of Eleonora, it died little by
      little away, in murmurs growing lower and lower, until the stream
      returned, at length, utterly, into the solemnity of its original
      silence. And then, lastly, the voluminous cloud uprose, and,
      abandoning the tops of the mountains to the dimness of old, fell
      back into the regions of Hesper, and took away all its manifold
      golden and gorgeous glories from the Valley of the Many-Colored
      Grass.

      Yet the promises of Eleonora were not forgotten; for I heard the
      sounds of the swinging of the censers of the angels; and streams
      of a holy perfume floated ever and ever about the valley; and at
      lone hours, when my heart beat heavily, the winds that bathed my
      brow came unto me laden with soft sighs; and indistinct murmurs
      filled often the night air, and once—oh, but once only! I was
      awakened from a slumber, like the slumber of death, by the
      pressing of spiritual lips upon my own.

      But the void within my heart refused, even thus, to be filled. I
      longed for the love which had before filled it to overflowing. At
      length the valley pained me through its memories of Eleonora, and
      I left it for ever for the vanities and the turbulent triumphs of
      the world.

      I found myself within a strange city, where all things might have
      served to blot from recollection the sweet dreams I had dreamed
      so long in the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. The pomps and
      pageantries of a stately court, and the mad clangor of arms, and
      the radiant loveliness of women, bewildered and intoxicated my
      brain. But as yet my soul had proved true to its vows, and the
      indications of the presence of Eleonora were still given me in
      the silent hours of the night. Suddenly these manifestations they
      ceased, and the world grew dark before mine eyes, and I stood
      aghast at the burning thoughts which possessed, at the terrible
      temptations which beset me; for there came from some far, far
      distant and unknown land, into the gay court of the king I
      served, a maiden to whose beauty my whole recreant heart yielded
      at once—at whose footstool I bowed down without a struggle, in
      the most ardent, in the most abject worship of love. What,
      indeed, was my passion for the young girl of the valley in
      comparison with the fervor, and the delirium, and the
      spirit-lifting ecstasy of adoration with which I poured out my
      whole soul in tears at the feet of the ethereal Ermengarde?—Oh,
      bright was the seraph Ermengarde! and in that knowledge I had
      room for none other. Oh, divine was the angel Ermengarde! and as
      I looked down into the depths of her memorial eyes, I thought
      only of them—and of her.

      I wedded—nor dreaded the curse I had invoked; and its bitterness
      was not visited upon me. And once—but once again in the silence
      of the night; there came through my lattice the soft sighs which
      had forsaken me; and they modelled themselves into familiar and
      sweet voice, saying:

      “Sleep in peace! for the Spirit of Love reigneth and ruleth, and,
      in taking to thy passionate heart her who is Ermengarde, thou art
      absolved, for reasons which shall be made known to thee in
      Heaven, of thy vows unto Eleonora.”




NOTES TO THE SECOND VOLUME


Notes — Scheherazade

      (*1) The coralites.

      (*2) “One of the most remarkable natural curiosities in Texas is
      a petrified forest, near the head of Pasigno river. It consists
      of several hundred trees, in an erect position, all turned to
      stone. Some trees, now growing, are partly petrified. This is a
      startling fact for natural philosophers, and must cause them to
      modify the existing theory of petrification.—_Kennedy_.

      This account, at first discredited, has since been corroborated
      by the discovery of a completely petrified forest, near the head
      waters of the Cheyenne, or Chienne river, which has its source in
      the Black Hills of the rocky chain.

      There is scarcely, perhaps, a spectacle on the surface of the
      globe more remarkable, either in a geological or picturesque
      point of view than that presented by the petrified forest, near
      Cairo. The traveller, having passed the tombs of the caliphs,
      just beyond the gates of the city, proceeds to the southward,
      nearly at right angles to the road across the desert to Suez, and
      after having travelled some ten miles up a low barren valley,
      covered with sand, gravel, and sea shells, fresh as if the tide
      had retired but yesterday, crosses a low range of sandhills,
      which has for some distance run parallel to his path. The scene
      now presented to him is beyond conception singular and desolate.
      A mass of fragments of trees, all converted into stone, and when
      struck by his horse’s hoof ringing like cast iron, is seen to
      extend itself for miles and miles around him, in the form of a
      decayed and prostrate forest. The wood is of a dark brown hue,
      but retains its form in perfection, the pieces being from one to
      fifteen feet in length, and from half a foot to three feet in
      thickness, strewed so closely together, as far as the eye can
      reach, that an Egyptian donkey can scarcely thread its way
      through amongst them, and so natural that, were it in Scotland or
      Ireland, it might pass without remark for some enormous drained
      bog, on which the exhumed trees lay rotting in the sun. The roots
      and rudiments of the branches are, in many cases, nearly perfect,
      and in some the worm-holes eaten under the bark are readily
      recognizable. The most delicate of the sap vessels, and all the
      finer portions of the centre of the wood, are perfectly entire,
      and bear to be examined with the strongest magnifiers. The whole
      are so thoroughly silicified as to scratch glass and are capable
      of receiving the highest polish.— _Asiatic Magazine_.

      (*3) The Mammoth Cave of Kentucky.

      (*4) In Iceland, 1783.

      (*5) “During the eruption of Hecla, in 1766, clouds of this kind
      produced such a degree of darkness that, at Glaumba, which is
      more than fifty leagues from the mountain, people could only find
      their way by groping. During the eruption of Vesuvius, in 1794,
      at Caserta, four leagues distant, people could only walk by the
      light of torches. On the first of May, 1812, a cloud of volcanic
      ashes and sand, coming from a volcano in the island of St.
      Vincent, covered the whole of Barbadoes, spreading over it so
      intense a darkness that, at mid-day, in the open air, one could
      not perceive the trees or other objects near him, or even a white
      handkerchief placed at the distance of six inches from the
      eye._“—Murray, p. 215, Phil. edit._

      (*6) In the year 1790, in the Caraccas during an earthquake a
      portion of the granite soil sank and left a lake eight hundred
      yards in diameter, and from eighty to a hundred feet deep. It was
      a part of the forest of Aripao which sank, and the trees remained
      green for several months under the water.”—_Murray_, p. 221

      (*7) The hardest steel ever manufactured may, under the action of
      a blowpipe, be reduced to an impalpable powder, which will float
      readily in the atmospheric air.

      (*8) The region of the Niger. See Simmona’s _Colonial Magazine_.

      (*9) The _Myrmeleon_—lion-ant. The term “monster” is equally
      applicable to small abnormal things and to great, while such
      epithets as “vast” are merely comparative. The cavern of the
      myrmeleon is vast in comparison with the hole of the common red
      ant. A grain of silex is also a “rock.”

      (*10) The _Epidendron, Flos Aeris,_ of the family of the
      _Orchideae_, grows with merely the surface of its roots attached
      to a tree or other object, from which it derives no
      nutriment—subsisting altogether upon air.

      (*11) The _Parasites,_ such as the wonderful _Rafflesia
      Arnaldii_.

      (*12) _Schouw_ advocates a class of plants that grow upon living
      animals—the _Plantae_ _Epizoae_. Of this class are the _Fuci_ and
      _Algae_.

      _Mr. J. B. Williams, of Salem, Mass._, presented the “National
      Institute” with an insect from New Zealand, with the following
      description: “‘_The Hotte_, a decided caterpillar, or worm, is
      found gnawing at the root of the _Rota_ tree, with a plant
      growing out of its head. This most peculiar and extraordinary
      insect travels up both the _Rota_ and _Ferriri_ trees, and
      entering into the top, eats its way, perforating the trunk of the
      trees until it reaches the root, and dies, or remains dormant,
      and the plant propagates out of its head; the body remains
      perfect and entire, of a harder substance than when alive. From
      this insect the natives make a coloring for tattooing.

      (*13) In mines and natural caves we find a species of
      cryptogamous _fungus_ that emits an intense phosphorescence.

      (*14) The orchis, scabius and valisneria.

      (*15) The corolla of this flower (_Aristolochia Clematitis_),
      which is tubular, but terminating upwards in a ligulate limb, is
      inflated into a globular figure at the base. The tubular part is
      internally beset with stiff hairs, pointing downwards. The
      globular part contains the pistil, which consists merely of a
      germen and stigma, together with the surrounding stamens. But the
      stamens, being shorter than the germen, cannot discharge the
      pollen so as to throw it upon the stigma, as the flower stands
      always upright till after impregnation. And hence, without some
      additional and peculiar aid, the pollen must necessarily fan down
      to the bottom of the flower. Now, the aid that nature has
      furnished in this case, is that of the _Tiputa Pennicornis_, a
      small insect, which entering the tube of the corrolla in quest of
      honey, descends to the bottom, and rummages about till it becomes
      quite covered with pollen; but not being able to force its way
      out again, owing to the downward position of the hairs, which
      converge to a point like the wires of a mouse-trap, and being
      somewhat impatient of its confinement it brushes backwards and
      forwards, trying every corner, till, after repeatedly traversing
      the stigma, it covers it with pollen sufficient for its
      impregnation, in consequence of which the flower soon begins to
      droop, and the hairs to shrink to the sides of the tube,
      effecting an easy passage for the escape of the insect.”—_Rev. P.
      Keith-System of Physiological Botany_.

      (*16) The bees—ever since bees were—have been constructing their
      cells with just such sides, in just such number, and at just such
      inclinations, as it has been demonstrated (in a problem involving
      the profoundest mathematical principles) are the very sides, in
      the very number, and at the very angles, which will afford the
      creatures the most room that is compatible with the greatest
      stability of structure.

      During the latter part of the last century, the question arose
      among mathematicians—“to determine the best form that can be
      given to the sails of a windmill, according to their varying
      distances from the revolving vanes, and likewise from the centres
      of the revolution.” This is an excessively complex problem, for
      it is, in other words, to find the best possible position at an
      infinity of varied distances and at an infinity of points on the
      arm. There were a thousand futile attempts to answer the query on
      the part of the most illustrious mathematicians, and when at
      length, an undeniable solution was discovered, men found that the
      wings of a bird had given it with absolute precision ever since
      the first bird had traversed the air.

      (*17) He observed a flock of pigeons passing betwixt Frankfort
      and the Indian territory, one mile at least in breadth; it took
      up four hours in passing, which, at the rate of one mile per
      minute, gives a length of 240 miles; and, supposing three pigeons
      to each square yard, gives 2,230,272,000 Pigeons.—“_Travels in
      Canada and the United States,” by Lieut. F. Hall._

      (*18) The earth is upheld by a cow of a blue color, having horns
      four hundred in number.”—_Sale’s Koran_.

      (*19) “The _Entozoa_, or intestinal worms, have repeatedly been
      observed in the muscles, and in the cerebral substance of
      men.”—See Wyatt’s Physiology, p. 143.

      (*20) On the Great Western Railway, between London and Exeter, a
      speed of 71 miles per hour has been attained. A train weighing 90
      tons was whirled from Paddington to Didcot (53 miles) in 51
      minutes.

      (*21) The _Eccalobeion_

      (*22) Mäelzel’s Automaton Chess-player.

      (*23) Babbage’s Calculating Machine.

      (*24) _Chabert_, and since him, a hundred others.

      (*25) The Electrotype.

      (*26) _Wollaston_ made of platinum for the field of views in a
      telescope a wire one eighteen-thousandth part of an inch in
      thickness. It could be seen only by means of the microscope.

      (*27) Newton demonstrated that the retina beneath the influence
      of the violet ray of the spectrum, vibrated 900,000,000 of times
      in a second.

      (*28) Voltaic pile.

      (*29) The Electro Telegraph Printing Apparatus.

      (*30) The Electro telegraph transmits intelligence
      instantaneously—at least at so far as regards any distance upon
      the earth.

      (*31) Common experiments in Natural Philosophy. If two red rays
      from two luminous points be admitted into a dark chamber so as to
      fall on a white surface, and differ in their length by 0.0000258
      of an inch, their intensity is doubled. So also if the difference
      in length be any whole-number multiple of that fraction. A
      multiple by 2 1/4, 3 1/4, &c., gives an intensity equal to one
      ray only; but a multiple by 2 1/2, 3 1/2, &c., gives the result
      of total darkness. In violet rays similar effects arise when the
      difference in length is 0.000157 of an inch; and with all other
      rays the results are the same—the difference varying with a
      uniform increase from the violet to the red.

      “Analogous experiments in respect to sound produce analogous
      results.”

      (*32) Place a platina crucible over a spirit lamp, and keep it a
      red heat; pour in some sulphuric acid, which, though the most
      volatile of bodies at a common temperature, will be found to
      become completely fixed in a hot crucible, and not a drop
      evaporates—being surrounded by an atmosphere of its own, it does
      not, in fact, touch the sides. A few drops of water are now
      introduced, when the acid, immediately coming in contact with the
      heated sides of the crucible, flies off in sulphurous acid vapor,
      and so rapid is its progress, that the caloric of the water
      passes off with it, which falls a lump of ice to the bottom; by
      taking advantage of the moment before it is allowed to remelt, it
      may be turned out a lump of ice from a red-hot vessel.

      (*33) The Daguerreotype.

      (*34) Although light travels 167,000 miles in a second, the
      distance of 61 Cygni (the only star whose distance is
      ascertained) is so inconceivably great, that its rays would
      require more than ten years to reach the earth. For stars beyond
      this, 20—or even 1000 years—would be a moderate estimate. Thus,
      if they had been annihilated 20, or 1000 years ago, we might
      still see them to-day by the light which started from their
      surfaces 20 or 1000 years in the past time. That many which we
      see daily are really extinct, is not impossible—not even
      improbable.

Notes—Maelstrom

      (*1) See Archimedes, “_De Incidentibus in Fluido_.”—lib. 2.

Notes—Island of the Fay

      (*1) Moraux is here derived from moeurs, and its meaning is
      “fashionable” or more strictly “of manners.”

      (*2) Speaking of the tides, Pomponius Mela, in his treatise “De
      Situ Orbis,” says “either the world is a great animal, or” etc

      (*3) Balzac—in substance—I do not remember the words

      (*4) Florem putares nare per liquidum aethera.—P. Commire.

Notes — Domain of Arnheim

      (*1) An incident, similar in outline to the one here imagined,
      occurred, not very long ago, in England. The name of the
      fortunate heir was Thelluson. I first saw an account of this
      matter in the “Tour” of Prince Puckler Muskau, who makes the sum
      inherited _ninety millions of pounds_, and justly observes that
      “in the contemplation of so vast a sum, and of the services to
      which it might be applied, there is something even of the
      sublime.” To suit the views of this article I have followed the
      Prince’s statement, although a grossly exaggerated one. The germ,
      and in fact, the commencement of the present paper was published
      many years ago—previous to the issue of the first number of Sue’s
      admirable _Juif Errant_, which may possibly have been suggested
      to him by Muskau’s account.

Notes—Berenice

      (*1) For as Jove, during the winter season, gives twice seven
      days of warmth, men have called this element and temperate time
      the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon—_Simonides_




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