"Why, but that I am, like yourself, a philosopher, I should say that your
house is--is--a--ha! ha! ha!--HAUNTED!"

"You look very pale, my love," said my wife, as I entered the
drawing-room, where she had been long awaiting my return. "Nothing
unpleasant has happened?"

"Nothing, nothing, I assure you. Pale!--_do_ I look pale?" I answered.
"We are excellent friends, I assure you. So far from having had the
smallest disagreement, there is every prospect of our agreeing but too
well, as you will say; for I find that he holds all my opinions upon
speculative subjects. We have had a great deal of conversation this
evening, I assure you; and I never met, I think, so scholarlike and
able a man."

"I am sorry for it, dearest," she said, sadly. "The greater his talents,
if such be his opinions, the more dangerous a companion is he."

We turned, however, to more cheerful topics, and it was late before we
retired to rest. I believe it was pride--perhaps only vanity--but, at all
events, some obstructive and stubborn instinct of my nature, which I
could not overcome--that prevented my telling my wife the odd occurrences
which had disturbed my visit to our guest. I was unable or ashamed to
confess that so slight a matter had disturbed me; and, above all, that
any accident could possibly have clouded, even for a moment, the frosty
clearness of my pure and lofty scepticism with the shadows of
superstition.

Almost every day seemed to develop some new eccentricity of our strange
guest. His dietary consisted, without any variety or relief, of the