747 lines
57 KiB
Plaintext
747 lines
57 KiB
Plaintext
LIBRARY OF THE FUTURE (R) First Edition Ver. 4.02
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Fall of the House of Usher Poe Edgar Allan
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1839
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THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
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by Edgar Allan Poe
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Electronically Enhanced Text (c) Copyright 1991, World Library, Inc.
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THE_FALL_OF_THE_HOUSE_OF_USHER
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THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
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Son coeur est un luth suspendu;
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Sitot qu'on le touche il resonne.
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De Beranger.
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DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of
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the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, had
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been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of
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country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew
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on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it
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was --but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of
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insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the
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feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because
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poetic, sentiment, with which the mind usually receives even the
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sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the
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scene before me --upon the mere house, and the simple landscape
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features of the domain --upon the bleak walls --upon the vacant
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eye-like windows --upon a few rank sedges --and upon a few white
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trunks of decayed trees --with an utter depression of soul which I can
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compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the
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after-dream of the reveller upon opium --the bitter lapse into
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everyday life-the hideous dropping off of the reveller upon opium
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{^paragraph 5}
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--the bitter lapse into everyday life --the hideous dropping off of
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the veil. There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart
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--an unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the
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imagination could torture into aught of the sublime. What was it --I
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paused to think --what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation
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of the House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I
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grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I pondered. I
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was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactory conclusion, that
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while, beyond doubt, there are combinations of very simple natural
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objects which have the power of thus affecting us, still the
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analysis of this power lies among considerations beyond our depth.
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It was possible, I reflected, that a mere different arrangement of the
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particulars of the scene, of the details of the picture, would be
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sufficient to modify, or perhaps to annihilate its capacity for
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sorrowful impression; and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse to
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the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in
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unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down --but with a
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shudder even more thrilling than before --upon the remodelled and
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inverted images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the
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vacant and eye-like windows.
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Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself a
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sojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick Usher, had been one of
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my boon companions in boyhood; but many years had elapsed since our
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last meeting. A letter, however, had lately reached me in a distant
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part of the country --a letter from him --which, in its wildly
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importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply.
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The MS. gave evidence of nervous agitation. The writer spoke of
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acute bodily illness --of a mental disorder which oppressed him
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--and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best, and indeed his only
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personal friend, with a view of attempting, by the cheerfulness of
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my society, some alleviation of his malady. It was the manner in which
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all this, and much more, was said --it the apparent heart that went
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with his request --which allowed me no room for hesitation; and I
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accordingly obeyed forthwith what I still considered a very singular
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summons.
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Although, as boys, we had been even intimate associates, yet
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really knew little of my friend. His reserve had been always excessive
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and habitual. I was aware, however, that his very ancient family had
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been noted, time out of mind, for a peculiar sensibility of
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temperament, displaying itself, through long ages, in many works of
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exalted art, and manifested, of late, in repeated deeds of
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munificent yet unobtrusive charity, as well as in a passionate
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devotion to the intricacies, perhaps even more than to the orthodox
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and easily recognisable beauties, of musical science. I had learned,
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too, the very remarkable fact, that the stem of the Usher race, all
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time-honoured as it was, had put forth, at no period, any enduring
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branch; in other words, that the entire family lay in the direct
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line of descent, and had always, with very trifling and very temporary
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variation, so lain. It was this deficiency, I considered, while
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running over in thought the perfect keeping of the character of the
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premises with the accredited character of the people, and while
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speculating upon the possible influence which the one, in the long
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lapse of centuries, might have exercised upon the other --it was
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this deficiency, perhaps, of collateral issue, and the consequent
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undeviating transmission, from sire to son, of the patrimony with
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the name, which had, at length, so identified the two as to merge
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the original title of the estate in the quaint and equivocal
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appellation of the "House of Usher" --an appellation which seemed to
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include, in the minds of the peasantry who used it, both the family
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and the family mansion.
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{^paragraph 10}
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I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish
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experiment --that of looking down within the tarn --had been to deepen
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the first singular impression. There can be no doubt that the
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consciousness of the rapid increase of my superstition --for why
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should I not so term it? --served mainly to accelerate the increase
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itself. Such, I have long known, is the paradoxical law of all
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sentiments having terror as a basis. And it might have been for this
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reason only, that, when I again uplifted my eyes to the house
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itself, from its image in the pool, there grew in my mind a strange
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fancy --a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that I but mention it to show
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the vivid force of the sensations which oppressed me. I had so
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worked upon my imagination as really to believe that about the whole
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mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and
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their immediate vicinity-an atmosphere which had no affinity with
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the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and
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the gray wall, and the silent tarn --a pestilent and mystic vapour,
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dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.
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Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned
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more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its principal feature
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seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity. The discoloration of ages
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had been great. Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in
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a fine tangled web-work from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from
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any extraordinary dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had
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fallen; and there appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its
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still perfect adaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of
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the individual stones. In this there was much that reminded me of
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the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years
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in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the
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external air. Beyond this indication of extensive decay, however,
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the fabric gave little token of instability. Perhaps the eye of a
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scrutinising observer might have discovered a barely perceptible
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fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made
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its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in
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the sullen waters of the tarn.
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Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the house.
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A servant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the Gothic archway
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of the hall. A valet, of stealthy step, thence conducted me, in
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silence, through many dark and intricate passages in my progress to
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the studio of his master. Much that I encountered on the way
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contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague sentiments of which
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I have already spoken. While the objects around me --while the
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carvings of the ceilings, the sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon
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blackness of the floors, and the phantasmagoric armorial trophies
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which rattled as I strode, were but matters to which, or to such as
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which, I had been accustomed from my infancy --while I hesitated not
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to acknowledge how familiar was all this --I still wondered to find
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how unfamiliar were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring
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up. On one of the staircases, I met the physician of the family. His
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countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and
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perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation and passed on. The valet
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now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence of his master.
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The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty. The
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windows were long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a distance from
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the black oaken floor as to be altogether inaccessible from within.
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Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their way through the
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trellised panes, and served to render sufficiently distinct the more
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prominent objects around the eye, however, struggled in vain to
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reach the remoter angles of the chamber, or the recesses of the
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vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies hung upon the walls. The
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general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique, and tattered.
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Many books and musical instruments lay scattered about, but failed
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to give any vitality to the scene. I felt that I breathed an
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atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and irredeemable gloom
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hung over and pervaded all.
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Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had been lying
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at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth which had
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much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone cordiality --of the
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constrained effort of the ennuye man of the world. A glance,
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however, at his countenance, convinced me of his perfect sincerity. We
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sat down; and for some moments, while he spoke not, I gazed upon him
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with a feeling half of pity, half of awe. Surely, man had never before
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so terribly altered, in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It
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was with difficulty that I could bring myself to admit the identity of
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the wan being before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet
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the character of his face had been at all times remarkable. A
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cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous
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beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a
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surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model, but
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with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a finely
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moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a want of
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moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity; these
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features, with an inordinate expansion above the regions of the
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temple, made up altogether a countenance not easily to be forgotten.
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And now in the mere exaggeration of the prevailing character of
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these features, and of the expression they were wont to convey, lay so
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much of change that I doubted to whom I spoke. The now ghastly
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pallor of the skin, and the now miraculous lustre of the eve, above
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all things startled and even awed me. The silken hair, too, had been
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suffered to grow all unheeded, and as, in its wild gossamer texture,
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it floated rather than fell about the face, I could not, even with
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effort, connect its Arabesque expression with any idea of simple
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humanity.
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{^paragraph 15}
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In the manner of my friend I was at once struck with an
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incoherence --an inconsistency; and I soon found this to arise from
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a series of feeble and futile struggles to overcome an habitual
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trepidancy --an excessive nervous agitation. For something of this
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nature I had indeed been prepared, no less by his letter, than by
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reminiscences of certain boyish traits, and by conclusions deduced
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from his peculiar physical conformation and temperament. His action
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was alternately vivacious and sullen. His voice varied rapidly from
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a tremulous indecision (when the animal spirits seemed utterly in
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abeyance) to that species of energetic concision --that abrupt,
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weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding enunciation --that leaden,
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self-balanced and perfectly modulated guttural utterance, which may be
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observed in the lost drunkard, or the irreclaimable eater of opium,
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during the periods of his most intense excitement.
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It was thus that he spoke of the object of my visit, of his
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earnest desire to see me, and of the solace he expected me to afford
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him. He entered, at some length, into what he conceived to be the
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nature of his malady. It was, he said, a constitutional and a family
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evil, and one for which he despaired to find a remedy --a mere nervous
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affection, he immediately added, which would undoubtedly soon pass
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off. It displayed itself in a host of unnatural sensations. Some of
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these, as he detailed them, interested and bewildered me; although,
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perhaps, the terms, and the general manner of the narration had
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their weight. He suffered much from a morbid acuteness of the
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senses; the most insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear
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only garments of certain texture; the odours of all flowers were
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oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even a faint light; and there
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were but peculiar sounds, and these from stringed instruments, which
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did not inspire him with horror.
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To an anomalous species of terror I found him a bounden slave. "I
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shall perish," said he, "I must perish in this deplorable folly. Thus,
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thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost. I dread the events of the
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future, not in themselves, but in their results. I shudder at the
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thought of any, even the most trivial, incident, which may operate
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upon this intolerable agitation of soul. I have, indeed, no abhorrence
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of danger, except in its absolute effect --in terror. In this
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unnerved-in this pitiable condition --I feel that the period will
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sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together,
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in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR."
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I learned, moreover, at intervals, and through broken and
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equivocal hints, another singular feature of his mental condition.
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He was enchained by certain superstitious impressions in regard to the
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dwelling which he tenanted, and whence, for many years, he had never
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ventured forth --in regard to an influence whose supposititious
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force was conveyed in terms too shadowy here to be re-stated --an
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influence which some peculiarities in the mere form and substance of
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his family mansion, had, by dint of long sufferance, he said, obtained
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over his spirit-an effect which the physique of the gray walls and
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turrets, and of the dim tarn into which they all looked down, had,
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at length, brought about upon the morale of his existence.
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He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much of the
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peculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced to a more
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natural and far more palpable origin --to the severe and
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long-continued illness --indeed to the evidently approaching
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dissolution-of a tenderly beloved sister --his sole companion for long
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years --his last and only relative on earth. "Her decease," he said,
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with a bitterness which I can never forget, "would leave him (him
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the hopeless and the frail) the last of the ancient race of the
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Ushers." While he spoke, the lady Madeline (for so was she called)
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passed slowly through a remote portion of the apartment, and,
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without having noticed my presence, disappeared. I regarded her with
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an utter astonishment not unmingled with dread --and yet I found it
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impossible to account for such feelings. A sensation of stupor
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oppressed me, as my eyes followed her retreating steps. When a door,
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at length, closed upon her, my glance sought instinctively and eagerly
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the countenance of the brother --but he had buried his face in his
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hands, and I could only perceive that a far more than ordinary wanness
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had overspread the emaciated fingers through which trickled many
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passionate tears.
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{^paragraph 20}
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The disease of the lady Madeline had long baffled the skill of her
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physicians. A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the person,
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and frequent although transient affections of a partially cataleptical
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character, were the unusual diagnosis. Hitherto she had steadily borne
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up against the pressure of her malady, and had not betaken herself
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finally to bed; but, on the closing in of the evening of my arrival at
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the house, she succumbed (as her brother told me at night with
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inexpressible agitation) to the prostrating power of the destroyer;
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and I learned that the glimpse I had obtained of her person would thus
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probably be the last I should obtain --that the lady, at least while
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living, would be seen by me no more.
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For several days ensuing, her name was unmentioned by either Usher
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or myself: and during this period I was busied in earnest endeavours
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to alleviate the melancholy of my friend. We painted and read
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together; or I listened, as if in a dream, to the wild
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improvisations of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a closer and still
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intimacy admitted me more unreservedly into the recesses of his
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spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive the futility of all attempt
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at cheering a mind from which darkness, as if an inherent positive
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quality, poured forth upon all objects of the moral and physical
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universe, in one unceasing radiation of gloom.
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I shall ever bear about me a memory of the many solemn hours I
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thus spent alone with the master of the House of Usher. Yet I should
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fail in any attempt to convey an idea of the exact character of the
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studies, or of the occupations, in which he involved me, or led me the
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way. An excited and highly distempered ideality threw a sulphureous
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lustre over all. His long improvised dirges will ring forever in my
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cars. Among other things, I hold painfully in mind a certain
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singular perversion and amplification of the wild air of the last
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waltz of Von Weber. From the paintings over which his elaborate
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fancy brooded, and which grew, touch by touch, into vaguenesses at
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which I shuddered the more thrillingly, because I shuddered knowing
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not why; --from these paintings (vivid as their images now are
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before me) I would in vain endeavour to educe more than a small
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portion which should lie within the compass of merely written words.
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By the utter simplicity, by the nakedness of his designs, he
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arrested and overawed attention. If ever mortal painted an idea,
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that mortal was Roderick Usher. For me at least --in the circumstances
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then surrounding me --there arose out of the pure abstractions which
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the hypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvas, an intensity
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of intolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever yet in the
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contemplation of the certainly glowing yet too concrete reveries of
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Fuseli.
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One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend, partaking not so
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rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be shadowed forth,
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although feebly, in words. A small picture presented the interior of
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an immensely long and rectangular vault or tunnel, with low walls,
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smooth, white, and without interruption or device. Certain accessory
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points of the design served well to convey the idea that this
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excavation lay at an exceeding depth below the surface of the earth.
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No outlet was observed in any portion of its vast extent, and no
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torch, or other artificial source of light was discernible; yet a
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flood of intense rays rolled throughout, and bathed the whole in a
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ghastly and inappropriate splendour.
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I have just spoken of that morbid condition of the auditory nerve
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which rendered all music intolerable to the sufferer, with the
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exception of certain effects of stringed instruments. It was, perhaps,
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the narrow limits to which he thus confined himself upon the guitar,
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which gave birth, in great measure, to the fantastic character of
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his performances. But the fervid facility of his impromptus could
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not be so accounted for. They must have been, and were, in the
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notes, as well as in the words of his wild fantasias (for he not
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unfrequently accompanied himself with rhymed verbal improvisations),
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the result of that intense mental collectedness and concentration to
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which I have previously alluded as observable only in particular
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moments of the highest artificial excitement. The words of one of
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these rhapsodies I have easily remembered. I was, perhaps, the more
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forcibly impressed with it, as he gave it, because, in the under or
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mystic current of its meaning, I fancied that I perceived, and for the
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first time, a full consciousness on the part of Usher, of the
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tottering of his lofty reason upon her throne. The verses, which
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were entitled "The Haunted Palace," ran very nearly, if not
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accurately, thus:
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{^paragraph 25}
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I.
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In the greenest of our valleys,
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By good angels tenanted,
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Once fair and stately palace --
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{^paragraph 30}
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Radiant palace --reared its head.
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In the monarch Thought's dominion --
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It stood there!
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Never seraph spread a pinion
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Over fabric half so fair.
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{^paragraph 35}
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-
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II.
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Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
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On its roof did float and flow;
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(This --all this --was in the olden
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{^paragraph 40}
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Time long ago)
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And every gentle air that dallied,
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In that sweet day,
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Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
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A winged odour went away.
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{^paragraph 45}
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-
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III.
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Wanderers in that happy valley
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Through two luminous windows saw
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Spirits moving musically
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{^paragraph 50}
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To a lute's well-tuned law,
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Round about a throne, where sitting
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(Porphyrogene!)
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In state his glory well befitting,
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The ruler of the realm was seen.
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{^paragraph 55}
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-
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IV.
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And all with pearl and ruby glowing
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Was the fair palace door,
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Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing
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{^paragraph 60}
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And sparkling evermore,
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A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty
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Was but to sing,
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In voices of surpassing beauty,
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The wit and wisdom of their king.
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{^paragraph 65}
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-
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V.
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But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
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Assailed the monarch's high estate;
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(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
|
||
{^paragraph 70}
|
||
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.
|
||
{^paragraph 75}
|
||
-
|
||
VI.
|
||
And travellers now within that valley,
|
||
Through the red-litten windows, see
|
||
Vast forms that move fantastically
|
||
{^paragraph 80}
|
||
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.
|
||
{^paragraph 85}
|
||
-
|
||
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.
|
||
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'Indagine, and of De la
|
||
Chambre; the Journey into the Blue Distance of Tieck; and the City
|
||
of the Sun of Campanella. One favourite volume was a small octavo
|
||
edition of the Directorium Inquisitorum, by the Dominican Eymeric de
|
||
Gironne; and there were passages in Pomponius Mela, about the old
|
||
African Satyrs and AEgipans, 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 Vigilae 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
|
||
stair case, 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 toll, into the scarcely less gloomy
|
||
apartments of the upper portion of the house.
|
||
{^paragraph 90}
|
||
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 labouring
|
||
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 endeavoured 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 tremour 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, hearkened --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 endeavoured 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
|
||
demeanour. 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?
|
||
{^paragraph 95}
|
||
--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 vapour, 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
|
||
favourite 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 favourite 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 over-strained air of vivacity with which
|
||
he hearkened, or apparently hearkened, to the words of the tale, I
|
||
might well have congratulated myself upon the success of my design.
|
||
{^paragraph 100}
|
||
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 there-with
|
||
sturdily, he so cracked, and ripped, and tore all asunder, that the
|
||
noise of the dry and hollow-sounding wood alarumed 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
|
||
demeanour, 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 --
|
||
-
|
||
{^paragraph 105}
|
||
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 the 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 demeanour. 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:
|
||
{^paragraph 110}
|
||
"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 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
|
||
{^paragraph 115}
|
||
--Ethelred --ha! ha! --the breaking of the hermit's door, and the
|
||
death-cry of the dragon, and the clangour 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 panels to which the
|
||
speaker pointed, threw slowly back, upon the instant, 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 wi 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."
|
||
-
|
||
-
|
||
-THE END-
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
Electronically Enhanced Text (C) Copyright 1991, 1992, World Library, Inc.
|
||
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|
||
|
||
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