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Sara Teasdale - "Rivers to the Sea"

Richard Harding Davis - "My Buried Treasure"

Harriet Beecher Stowe - "Queer Little Folks"

Alfred Tennyson - "The Princess"

The Purcell Papers, Volume 1

J >> Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu >> The Purcell Papers, Volume 1




One day, sometime after his perfect
restoration to health, I was surprised on
ascending the stairs, for the purpose of
visiting this man, to find him busily
employed in nailing down some planks
upon the landing-place, through which, at
the commencement of his mysterious vision,
it seemed to him that he had sunk. I
perceived at once that he was strengthening
the floor with a view to securing
himself against such a catastrophe, and
could scarcely forbear a smile as I bid
'God bless his work.'

He perceived my thoughts, I suppose,
for he immediately said:

'I can never pass over that floor without
trembling. I'd leave this house if I
could, but I can't find another lodging in
the town so cheap, and I'll not take a
better till I've paid off all my debts, please
God; but I could not be asy in my mind
till I made it as safe as I could. You'll
hardly believe me, your honour, that while
I'm working, maybe a mile away, my heart
is in a flutter the whole way back, with
the bare thoughts of the two little steps I
have to walk upon this bit of a floor. So
it's no wonder, sir, I'd thry to make it
sound and firm with any idle timber I
have.'

I applauded his resolution to pay off his
debts, and the steadiness with which he
perused his plans of conscientious economy,
and passed on.

Many months elapsed, and still there
appeared no alteration in his resolutions of
amendment. He was a good workman,
and with his better habits he recovered his
former extensive and profitable employment.
Everything seemed to promise comfort and
respectability. I have little more to add,
and that shall be told quickly. I had one
evening met Pat Connell, as he returned
from his work, and as usual, after a mutual,
and on his side respectful salutation, I
spoke a few words of encouragement and
approval. I left him industrious, active,
healthy--when next I saw him, not three
days after, he was a corpse.

The circumstances which marked the
event of his death were somewhat strange
--I might say fearful. The unfortunate
man had accidentally met an early friend
just returned, after a long absence, and in
a moment of excitement, forgetting everything
in the warmth of his joy, he yielded
to his urgent invitation to accompany him
into a public-house, which lay close by the
spot where the encounter had taken place.
Connell, however, previously to entering
the room, had announced his determination
to take nothing more than the strictest
temperance would warrant.

But oh! who can describe the inveterate
tenacity with which a drunkard's habits
cling to him through life? He may repent
--he may reform--he may look with
actual abhorrence upon his past profligacy;
but amid all this reformation and
compunction, who can tell the moment in
which the base and ruinous propensity may
not recur, triumphing over resolution,
remorse, shame, everything, and prostrating
its victim once more in all that is
destructive and revolting in that fatal vice?

The wretched man left the place in a
state of utter intoxication. He was
brought home nearly insensible. and
placed in his bed, where he lay in the deep
calm lethargy of drunkenness. The
younger part of the family retired to rest
much after their usual hour; but the poor
wife remained up sitting by the fire, too
much grieved and shocked at the occur-
rence of what she had so little expected,
to settle to rest; fatigue, however, at
length overcame her, and she sank
gradually into an uneasy slumber. She
could not tell how long she had remained
in this state, when she awakened, and
immediately on opening her eyes, she
perceived by the faint red light of the
smouldering turf embers, two persons, one
of whom she recognised as her husband,
noiselessly gliding out of the room.

'Pat, darling, where are you going?'
said she. There was no answer--the door
closed after them; but in a moment she
was startled and terrified by a loud and
heavy crash, as if some ponderous body had
been hurled down the stair. Much alarmed,
she started up, and going to the head of
the staircase, she called repeatedly upon her
husband, but in vain. She returned to
the room, and with the assistance of her
daughter, whom I had occasion to mention
before, she succeeded in finding and lighting
a candle, with which she hurried again
to the head of the staircase.

At the bottom lay what seemed to be a
bundle of clothes, heaped together, motionless,
lifeless--it was her husband. In
going down the stair, for what purpose
can never now be known, he had fallen
helplessly and violently to the bottom, and
coming head foremost, the spine at the
neck had been dislocated by the shock, and
instant death must have ensued. The
body lay upon that landing-place to which
his dream had referred. It is scarcely
worth endeavouring to clear up a single
point in a narrative where all is mystery;
yet I could not help suspecting that the
second figure which had been seen in the
room by Connell's wife on the night of his
death, might have been no other than his
own shadow. I suggested this solution of
the difficulty; but she told me that the
unknown person had been considerably in
advance of the other, and on reaching the
door, had turned back as if to communicate
something to his companion. It was then
a mystery.

Was the dream verified?--whither had
the disembodied spirit sped?--who can
say? We know not. But I left the house
of death that day in a state of horror
which I could not describe. It seemed to
me that I was scarce awake. I heard and
saw everything as if under the spell of a
night-mare. The coincidence was terrible.

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