At last, we find him pallid, haggard, and emaciated,
wandering alone in an avenue of cedar trees beside a silent lake:
"At this moment a breath of wind blew a branch aside--a
sunbeam fell upon the baron's face; he took it for the
eyes of his wife. Alas! his remedy lay temptingly
before him, the still, the profound, the shadowy lake.
De Launaye took one plunge--it was into eternity."
The writer foolishly ruins the effect of this climax by
super-imposing an allegorical interpretation.
Like the _Story-Teller, The Romancist and Novelist's Library_
should be read
"At night when doors are shut,
And the wood-worm pricks,
And the death-watch ticks,
And the bar has a flag of smut,--
And the cat's in the water-butt--
And the socket floats and flares,
And the housebeams groan,
And a foot unknown
Is surmised on the garret stairs,
And the locks slip unawares."
But "tales of terror" lose some of their power when read one
after another; they are most effective read singly in
periodicals. _Blackwood's Magazine_ was especially famous for its
tales, the best of which have been collected and published
separately. The editor of the _Dublin University Magazine_ shows
a marked preference for tales of a supernatural or sensational
cast.
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